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Carpetbaggers are not easily categorized as you might expect. It is a derogatory name as mentioned in previous definitions used by Southern whites after the defeat in the Civil War. The term had been applied to several class of people including Northern soldiers who worked for the Freedmen's Bureau (or just about anyone who worked for the Freedmen's Bureau); the derisive term also applied to Northerners who came South after the war to take advantage of the political situation and gain power in the Republican-dominated state legislatures. Third, carpetbaggers also described any Northern white educators who came to teach the four million freed slaves. All three of these groups came under direct harassment by the Ku Klux Klan and other white vigilante groups when they began forming in the mid-to-late 1860s.

The term should NOT be confused with scalawags which was used by white Southern Democrats to scorn those white Southerners who joined the Republican Party in an attempt to gain political advantage after the war. These "scalawags" were usually poor white farmers looking to gain some power by hitching their wagon to the party in charge (in this case, the Republicans until 1877) and going for a ride. They were elected to state legislatures and conventions to help rewrite state constitutions and govern the states after they were allowed back into the Union wit the approval of the 14th Amendment (equal protection under the law - citizenship for freed slaves - high rebel commanders are disenfranchised and lose citizenship).

The term carpetbagger has made a comeback in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina when a swarm of shady Northern businesses descended upon the Gulf region in an effort to "help" and exploited those in need. Their only hope was to grab up as many of the government contracts (worth $200 billion) as they could.

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