Name a notable Supreme Court decision during Reconstruction and its impact on federal authority over civil rights.

• A. Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) established separate but equal.
• B. United States v. Cruikshank (1876) limited federal protection for individual rights and undermined enforcement powers.
• C. Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) addressed citizenship.
• D. Brown v. Board of Education (1954) ended segregation in schools.

Answer: (B)

During Reconstruction, the federal government sought to protect newly guaranteed civil rights through federal laws and the amendments, but United States v. Cruikshank shows how the Supreme Court limited that federal authority. In this 1876 decision, the Court ruled that federal powers under the Reconstruction-era Enforcement Acts could not be used to punish individuals who deprived others of civil rights when those acts were carried out by private individuals rather than state actors. The 14th Amendment, the justices said, applied to state action, not to private violence, which meant the federal government’s ability to enforce civil rights against private perpetrators was sharply curtailed. This weakened federal protection for civil rights during a critical period and helped enable white supremacist violence in the South with less federal enforcement ability for years to come.

For context, the other listed cases don’t fit the Reconstruction focus: Plessy v. Ferguson came later and dealt with segregation under the separate-but-equal doctrine; Dred Scott v. Sandford was decided before the Civil War and dealt with citizenship status; Brown v. Board of Education was a mid-20th-century civil rights advancement.