After more than two and half centuries of slavery, the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation, and the 13th Amendment, Black people in America were no longer bound by the violent constraints of slavery — legally. Nonetheless, the transition from enslavement to life post-emancipation was not going to be easy. In an attempt to support this transition, the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, commonly referred to as the Freedmen’s Bureau, was established.
This year marks 160 years since that bureau’s creation, which makes this a great time to recognize its legacy, its unfulfilled promises, and what we can learn from it all. Although this agency was short-lived — lasting from 1865 until 1872 — its impact was huge, including the pivotal role it played for Black Americans transitioning from slavery to life as freedpeople and the stories it continues to illuminate about generations of Black folks and American history.