Download Reconstruction

#20 The South is destroyed
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The Civil War ended April 9, 1865.
Much of the factories, railroads, and farm
land in the South was destroyed by the
Civil War. The South would need to be
rebuilt.
This rebuilding of the South was called
Reconstruction.
President Lincoln’s
Reconstruction Plan
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President Lincoln wanted to reunite the
nation as quickly as possible.
Any southern state with at least 10% of
its voters making a pledge to be loyal to
the U.S. could be readmitted to the
Union.
The South also had to accept a ban on
slavery (13th Amendment).
The Slaves Are Free
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With the ending of the war, the slaves
were now free.
The 13th Amendment to the Constitution
was passed.
The 13th Amendment made slavery illegal
forever in the United States before the
war’s end by only Union states.
With slavery ended, African-Americans are
called the Freedmen.
The Freedmen’s Bureau
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The Freedmen’s Bureau was established to
help poor blacks and whites in the South.
The Freedmen’s Bureau established
schools in the South and assisted with
legal aid and writing contracts with former
masters.
Laws against educating slaves during the
Civil War meant that most ex-slaves did not
know how to read and write.
Civil Rights and
Economic
Opportunities
Freedmen’s Bureau:
From June 1865 to
January 1866, the
occupation force in
the South shrank
from roughly 270,000
to 87,550 soldiers
and later just 20,000.
They are to there to
end slavery and
assist the Freedmen
Lincoln’s Second Inaugural
Address
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On March 4, 1865, President Lincoln laid
out his approach to Reconstruction in his
second inaugural address.
He hoped to reunite the nation and it’s
people.
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“With malice [hatred] toward none, with
charity for all, with firmness in the right
as God gives us to see the right, let us
finish the work we are in, to bind up the
nation's wounds, to care for him who
shall have borne the battle, and for his
widow and for his orphans, to do all
which may achieve and cherish a just
and a lasting peace among ourselves
and with all nations.
Lincoln is assassinated
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Just six days after the war ended at
Appomattox, on April 15, 1865,
President Abraham Lincoln was
assassinated while watching a play.
Lincoln was assassinated by John
Wilkes Booth, a Southerner who was
angry at Lincoln.
Vice-President Andrew Johnson
became the 14th US President.
President Johnson’s
Reconstruction Plan
■Plan
for Reconstruction: 1. ratify the 13th
Amendment, 2. Swear an Oath of Loyalty to
the Union, 3. Cancel the Confederate War
Debt
■Johnson pardon’s (offers amnesty) to 13,000
Confederate leaders who regain their
citizenship and property. This ends “40 acres
and a mule” for abandoned lands given to the
Freedmen.
■President Johnson is a white supremacist
who cares little for Freedmen’s rights
Results of President Johnson’s
Reconstruction Plan
The Southern states were rapidly readmitted
to the Union. They reelected Confederate
Governors; sent former CSA Senators and
Congressmen to Washington in 1866.
Republicans refuse to seat them in
Congress. What was the war fought for if the
same rebel leaders are reelected and the
lives of Freedmen are terrorized and close to
slavery?
The Black Codes
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The Black Codes were laws passed by
Southern states that limited the new-found
freedom of Freedmen / African Americans.
Provides cheap Freedmen labor “Slavery
without ownership;”
Forced African Americans to work on farms
or as servants. They also prevented African
Americans from owning guns, holding
public meetings, or renting property in
cities.
Voting Rights
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Other laws were passed to keep blacks
from voting.
One law said former slaves had to pay a
tax to vote. It was called a poll tax.
Laws were passed that allowed a person
to skip literacy tests or poll taxes if their
grandfather had voted. These laws were
called the Grandfather Clause.
Radical Republicans
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The Black Codes angered many Republicans for
erasing the results of the Civil War.
The Radical Republicans wanted the South to
protect the Freedmen before they could be
readmitted to the Union. They were angry at
President Johnson for readmitting the South so
easily.
They believed that the Freedmen would be the
loyal Americans of the South.
They wanted (perhaps selfishly) to establish the
Republican party in the former CSA states.
African-American troops from the Civil War
provided protection during Reconstruction
54th Mass: The original “Glory Roaders”
Radical Republicans’
Response to the Black Codes
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The 14th Amendment guaranteed
citizenship to all people born or
naturalized within the U.S. except for the
Indians.
It said that state governments could not
“deprive any person of life, liberty, or
property, without due process of law.”
Ratified in 1868
Checks and Balances +
Separation of Powers in the US Constitution
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Congress can override a Presidential veto
with 2/3 majority in the House of
Representatives and the Senate.
The House of Representatives can impeach
the President and the Senate votes on his
innocence or guilt.
(Benchmark example: The President
negotiates treaties and appoints Supreme
Court Justices but the Senate has to approve
them.)
President Johnson, The Radical
Republicans, and Impeachment
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Congress was angry at President Johnson
for trying to block their Reconstruction
policies. So Congress impeached Johnson.
Impeachment is the process of charging a
public official with a crime.
The next step was to try the President in the
Senate.
By a single vote, Republicans failed to
convict Johnson.
Ku Klux Klan
(White Supremacy)
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The KKK was a secret society opposed to African
Americans obtaining civil rights, particularly the
right to vote.
The KKK used violence and intimidation to
prevent the Freedmen from using their rights.
Klan members wore white robes and hoods to
hide their identities.
The Klan and other white Supremacists murdered
over 50,000 African-Americans between 18631890.
1869 towards Carpetbaggers and Scalawags
Radical Reconstruction 1867-76
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The Union Army occupied the South and helped
register the Freedmen to vote and oversaw
elections for state constitutional conventions.
These new conventions provided for Freedmen civil
rights, public schools, and ratified the 14th
Amendment.
Military commanders had the power to enforce
martial law and dismiss local sheriffs and judges
who did not prosecute whites who terrorized the
Freedmen.
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Kirk-Holden War
NC 1870
1870 NC Kirk-Holden
War – Governor Holden
declared martial law to
stop the KKK in the
Piedmont. The violence
was stopped but Gov.
Holden became the 1st
US Governor to be
removed from office by
impeachment.
NC had no public
schools before the war
and over 30% of whites
were illiterate with over
70% of the Freedmen.
15th Amendment
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The 15th Amendment gave African
American men the right to vote in 1870.
Women’s rights activists were angry
because the amendment did not also grant
women the right to vote.
Over 1500 Freedmen were elected
during Reconstruction
The End of Reconstruction
Presidential Election of 1876 results in disputed
votes. The Democrats agreed not to block
Republican Hayes’ victory on the condition that
Republicans withdraw all federal troops from the
South. As a result of the so-called Compromise of
1877 (or 1876), all remaining US troops are
withdrawn and they will not act to protect the civil
rights of Freedmen anymore.
Most Freedmen and poor whites are reduced to
sharecropping and poverty.
Crash Course #22 Reconstruction annotated
https://nerdfighteria.info/v/nowsS7pMApI
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Black Leaders During Reconstruction
http://www.history.com/topics/americancivil-war/black-leaders-duringreconstruction
PBS Reconstruction
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJL
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