History of Louisiana

History of Louisiana
By year Pre-statehood U.S. Civil War Post-Civil War Topics: African-Americans - Cities - Politics
United States portal
v t e

The history of the area that is now the U.S. state of Louisiana, can be traced back thousands of years to when it was occupied by indigenous peoples. The first indications of permanent settlement, ushering in the Archaic period, appear about 5,500 years ago. The area that is now Louisiana formed part of the Eastern Agricultural Complex. The Marksville culture emerged about 2,000 years ago out of the earlier Tchefuncte culture. It is considered ancestral to the Natchez and Taensa peoples. Around the year 800 CE, the Mississippian culture emerged from the Woodland period. The emergence of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex coincides with the adoption of maize agriculture and chiefdom-level complex social organization beginning in circa 1200 CE. The Mississippian culture mostly disappeared around the 16th century, with the exception of some Natchez communities that maintained Mississippian cultural practices into the 1700s.

European influence began in the 1500s, and La Louisiane (named after Louis XIV of France) became a colony of the Kingdom of France in 1682, before passing to Spain in 1763. Louisiana became part of the Louisiana Purchase from France in 1803. The U.S. would divide that area into two territories, the Territory of Orleans, which formed what would become the boundaries of Louisiana, and the District of Louisiana. Louisiana was admitted as the 18th state of the United States on April 30, 1812. The final major battle in the War of 1812, the Battle of New Orleans, was fought in Louisiana and resulted in a U.S. victory.

Antebellum Louisiana was a leading slave state, where by 1860, 47% of the population was enslaved. Louisiana seceded from the Union on January 26, 1861, joining the Confederate States of America. New Orleans, the largest city in the entire South at the time, and strategically important port city, was taken by Union troops on April 25, 1862. After the defeat of the Confederate Army in 1865, Louisiana would enter the Reconstruction era (1865–1877). During Reconstruction, Louisiana was subject to U.S. Army occupation, as part of the Fifth Military District.

Following Reconstruction in the 1870s, white Democrats had regained political control in the state. In 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Plessy v. Ferguson case ruled that "separate but equal" facilities were constitutional. The lawsuit stemmed from 1892 when Homer Plessy, a mixed-race resident of New Orleans, violated Louisiana's Separate Car Act of 1890, which required "equal, but separate" railroad accommodations for white and non-white passengers. This court decision upheld Jim Crow laws that had started to form in the 1870s. In 1898, white Democrats in the Louisiana state legislature passed a new disfranchising constitution, whose effects were immediate and long-lasting. The disfranchisement of African Americans in the state did not end until national legislation passed during the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s.

In the early-to-mid 20th century, many African Americans would leave the state in the Great Migration. They moved to mainly urban areas in the North and Midwest. The Great Depression of the 1930s would hit the states economy hard, as mostly agricultural state at the time, farm prices had dropped to all-time lows. In the states urban areas such as New Orleans, many warehouses and businesses had closed, leaving many unemployed. The Federal Emergency Relief Administration would help flow money into the state, providing employment opportunities for Louisiana projects. World War II would help accelerate the industrialization of Louisiana's economy and provide further economic growth.^[1][2] In the 1950s and 1960s, the Civil Rights movement had started to gain national attention, and with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965, disfranchisement of African Americans in the state had ended.

In the late 20th Century, Louisiana saw rapid industrialization and rise of economic markets such as oil refineries, petrochemical plants, foundries, along with industries of produce foods, fishing, transportation equipment, and electronic equipment. Tourism also became important to the Louisiana economy, with Mardi Gras becoming a known major celebration held annually since 1838.^[3] In 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana and surrounding areas in the Gulf of Mexico, resulting in major damages. A $15 billion new levee system built in New Orleans would take place from 2006 to 2011.