Final answer:
Southerners were uneasy with free African Americans due to the challenge they posed to the social hierarchy, the disruption to the labor market, and the resentment over Black individuals obtaining roles traditionally held by whites. These tensions were heightened during the Reconstruction period, leading to the implementation of restrictive laws to suppress African American freedoms.
Step-by-step explanation:
Most southerners were uncomfortable with free African Americans living in the South due to several intertwined reasons rooted in the socio-economic fabric and racial ideologies of the time. After the Civil War, the presence of free African Americans posed a direct challenge to the existing social hierarchy that subjugated Black people to positions of inferiority and servitude. The economic structure of the South, heavily dependent on slave labor, meant that the emancipation of African Americans disrupted the labor market and threatened the former slaveholders' economic interests. Moreover, free African Americans, by exercising their newfound liberties, could aspire to roles and occupations formerly limited to whites, breeding resentment among the white population that was unaccustomed to viewing African Americans as equals.
The transition period of Reconstruction exacerbated tensions as the sight of African Americans in positions of authority, such as sheriffs and congressmen, was seen as a reversal of the established order. The emotional and psychological impact of this overturning of social norms caused many white southerners to react with hostility and to participate in creating and enforcing laws that suppressed the freedoms of African Americans, both free and formerly enslaved.
The historical context of the Lowland South, urban slaves, and the phenomena concerning free People of Color are critical in understanding why their free status was viewed with suspicion and often hostility, as it presented an unsettling example that ran counter to the pro-slavery and racially discriminatory ideology of the time.