You might like to look at Skytrax; www.airlinequality.com which rates airlines with one to five stars. Most US based carriers get three stars, as does American. The site will also allow you to view passenger's comments bout their experiences. Again, many people only comment when things go wrong, so bear that in mind.
Reconstruction and Its Aftermath. The Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 freed African Americans in rebel states, and after the Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment emancipated all U.S. slaves wherever they were. As a result, the mass of Southern blacks now faced the difficulty Northern blacks had confronted--that of a free people surrounded by many hostile whites.
By 1860, there were about four million slaves in the United States. On April 16, 1862, Abraham Lincoln, who was the US president at the time, signed the Compensated Emancipation Act, which freed more than 3000 slaves in the District of Columbia.n 2007, the observance Emancipation Day in Washington DC had the effect of nationally extending the 2006 income tax filing deadline from April 16 to April 17.