Download Notes on Reconstruction

Notes on Reconstruction
Reconstruction - the period of time/the process to rebuild the South and to bring
the Southern states back into the Union.
Lincoln’s Plan for Reconstruction
 As Union troops took Southern territory, Lincoln appointed Union governors
for these territories
 Wanted a moderate policy to patch things up with the South and NOT to
punish them.
 Plan entitled the Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction - Dec. 1863
1. offered general amnesty to all southerners who took an oath of
loyalty to the US and accepted the USA’s viewpoint on slavery
2. When 10% of a state’s voters had taken the oath, the state could create
a new government
Radical Republicans (put forth in the Reconstruction Act of 1867) Radical
Republicans were a large group in Congress led by Thaddeus Stevens of PA and
Charles Sumner of MA) did not want to reconcile with the South - they wanted to
punish the South and change the way things were done in the South. Their plan for
Reconstruction was threefold:
 Stop former Confederate leaders and officers from coming back into power
in the South
 Wanted the Republican Party to gain strength in the South
 Wanted the African Americans to gain political equality in the South and be
able to vote (they would vote Republican)
Moderate Republicans - believed that Lincoln was being too easy on the South,
but that the Radical Republicans were too harsh - they came up with their own
plan, that was supported by the Radical Republicans.
The Wade-Davis Bill said
 Majority (not 10%) of men in a state would have to swear on oath of loyalty
to the USA; when that occurred, they could hold a convention to make a new
state government
 Each state, in convention, would have to outlaw slavery and reject all
debts incurred as a result of the Confederacy
 No former Confederate officers or government officials could vote or hold
office.
***Lincoln blocks this after it passes through the House and Senate with a pocket
veto - doesn’t want to anger or push the Southerners away with harsh penalties.
But, something has to be done with all the Freedmen - the slaves who became free
as the Union army pushed through the South. Sherman had over 25,000 former
slaves following his army. Sherman takes the land along the coast in SC and GA
and turns it over to the slaves and relocated about 40,000 there.
Congress takes matters into their own hands and created the Freedmen’s Bureau
(actually known as the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands).
The job of the Freedmen’s Bureau is to feed and clothe the former slaves. They
also helped the former slaves to find work, negotiate contracts with former slave
owners, and be educated. Conflict over the taking of Confederate plantations and
land led to the “forty acres and a mule” expected by the freedmen never to
materialize - Congress voted against taking the land. The biggest success of the
Freedmen’s Bureau was in the area of education - many of the former slaves
received an education at schools started and supported by the Freedmen’s
Bureau.
Many African-Americans moved west with the military and fought against the
Native Americans in the Indian Wars. These soldiers fought with much bravery
and were nicknamed “Buffalo Soldiers” by the Native Americans.
After Lincoln was assassinated, his vice president, Andrew Johnson, took over.
Johnson was a Democrat from Tennessee and was one of the few, if only,
Congressmen from Confederate States to remain with the Union. He was brought
on as Lincoln’s VP in the election of 1864 with the hope that he could bring some
of the Democrats’ votes to the ticket.
Johnson’s Plan for Reconstruction - much like Lincoln’s; issued in May 1865:
 A pardon for all citizens of the Confederacy who took the oath of loyalty to
the USA
 All former Confederate officials and officers, and all former Confederates
who owned property worth more than $20,000 were excluded. He felt that
these were the people who had caused the Civil War. He would allow them
to be pardoned, but they had to apply in person to the President..
Johnson’s plan was generally accepted and became the way that some states were
brought back into the Union, until December 1865 - the Southern states sent their
representatives to Congress - many of them were former Confederate officers and
officials, including Alexander Stephens, VP of the Confederacy. The Radical and
many moderate Republicans were furious and refused to seat the new
representatives to the Senate and the House.
In addition to bringing back their former leaders to positions of power, the former
Confederate states were intent on making things as much like they were before as
possible. Black Codes were passed, laws much like the earlier slave codes,
designed to keep the Freedmen in a position as close to slavery as possible and to
restrict their abilities to be treated equally. As a result, the Moderate Republicans
banded with the Radical Republicans and took over Reconstruction.
 to override the Black Codes, the Civil Rights Act of 1866 was passed granted citizenship rights to all who were born in the USA except Native
Americans. It granted African-Americans the right to own property and to be
treated equally by the courts. The Federal Government was given the
authority to enforce the law. To keep the Civil Rights Act from being
overturned as unconstitutional, the Fourteenth Amendment was passed
which guaranteed citizenship rights to all born in the USA; no state could
deny anyone of life, liberty, or property without due process of law and
guaranteed “equal protection under the law.”
 March 1867, the Military Reconstruction Act was passed - this did away
with all the President Johnson had done and divided the former Confederate
States (except Tennessee) into 5 military districts with a General from the
Union placed in charge of each.
 The MRA also made each state hold a convention to create a state
Constitution which would have to be accepted by Congress. The new
constitutions had to contain
1. the right to votes for all adult males regardless of race
2. State had to ratify the 14th amendment
Conflicts between the Congress and President Johnson resulted in the
impeachment of Johnson; Johnson was tried in the Senate, but those who wanted to
be rid of Johnson were just 1 vote short of removing him from office. While
Johnson stayed in power, this rendered him virtually powerless. In the election of
1868, the Republicans nominated General Ulysses S Grant for President and the
Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour who ran on the racist slogan, “This Is a
White Man's Country, Let White Men Rule”
Grant, with his popularity in the North and with the support of the Freedmen in the
South (many of the Democrats were former Confederate and could not vote), Grant
won by an overwhelming majority.
After the election of 1868, the Republican firmly held control of the National
Government. They passed the Fifteenth Amendment to guarantee the former
slaves the fight to vote.
In the South, the white Southerners hated the Republican Party and those who
sided with them. They also hated the Northerners who came south - thinking that
all had come to capitalize on the South’s problems. While some certainly had come
south for that reason, many had come to help, especially with the newly freed
slaves. For whatever reason the Northerners were here, the Southerners lumped
them all together and called them carpetbaggers for the type of luggage that many
brought with them.
Another hated group in the south was the Scalawags, white Southerners who
supported the Republicans and Reconstruction. They were considered traitorous.
Many had their own reasons for supporting the Republicans - some believed that
the Republican idea for the development of the South’s economy was good; others
were small farmers who did not want to see the planters of old regain power, and
finally many were those who had not totally supported the war at the start.
Many African-Americans took power in state and national governments. Without
the white (former Confederates) men’s’ votes, the African-Americans were elected
by Republicans and other African-Americans. Hiram Revels, from Mississippi,
was the first African American elected to the Senate. Joseph Rainey of
Georgetown, SC was the first African-American elected to the House of
Representatives.
Republican Reforms in the South
 repeal of black codes
 established state hospitals and institutions
 rebuilt roads and railroads and bridges
 established a system of public schools
White Southerners turned to secret societies to such as the Ku Klux Klan to help
them maintain control of things. The KKK was started in Pulaski, Tennessee by
Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest. The goals for the KKK were to drive
out the Carpetbaggers and Union troops and bring the Southern Democrats back to
power. They used tactics of terror to break up meetings of Republicans and to keep
the Freedmen from voting.
Sharecropping - a form of tenant farming that developed in the South after the
war. The former slaves had nothing - land, tools, animals, nor money to help them
get a farm going. The former plantation owners had the land, the tools, the animals,
and the seed to farm but they did not have the labor. A system developed where the
freedmen would sign a contract with the landowners - the landowner would
provide shelter, land, tools, etc and the freedman would provide the labor and they
could agree to split the crop as spelled out in the contract. Most of the freedmen
received only 1/3 - ½ of the crop. This system was ripe for corruption; the
freedmen couldn’t read or write, so had to take the word of the landowner as to the
content of the contract. If a year or two went by where the crop wasn’t very good,
the freedman would end up owing the landowner and was therefore kept the
freedman “tied to the land” or basically enslaved because he couldn’t leave until he
had paid his debt.
End of Reconstruction - Grant was elected President on the Republican ticket in
the election of 1868. While he was a good general, he did not understand politics
and left the policy making to Congress, namely the Radical Republicans. This
pleased the Radical Republicans greatly, but left the presidency to be quite weak.
Grant’s two terms were full of scandal and economic problems which tended to
push support from the Republicans towards the Democrats. By the election of
1874, the Democrats had taken the House of Reps and made great inroads into the
Senate. To pass more Reconstruction policies and enforce those already in place
became more and more difficult with fewer Republican in Congress. Plus, many in
the North were becoming more and more concerned about the economic situations
and less concerned about what was happening in the South. Throughout the 1870s,
the Southern Democrats worked to take support away from the Republicans and
bring it back to the Democrats. Appealing on ideas of White Supremacy, the
Democrats were able to retake the governments of all southern states except those
still under Military control - Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida.
Election of 1876 - because of all the scandal, Grant was not renominated for the
Republican Party; Rutherford B Hayes became the nominee. Samuel Tilden was
the Democrat’s candidate. In the election, Tilden clearly (and cleanly) won 184
electoral votes - one vote shy of the majority he needed. Hayes had won 165
electoral votes. Nineteen votes from the military controlled southern states had not
been counted because there was so much fraud in the election that no one could be
sure who won those states, plus another vote had not counted. A commission was
formed to handle the situation (neither candidate had received the needed number
of votes) with members of the House, Senate, and Supreme Court. The commission
had 15 members; eight Republican and seven Democrat. The voting in the
commission stayed along party lines with Hayes constantly getting 8 votes and
Tilden 7. The Congress needed to accept the ruling of the commission for it to go
into effect. It passed in the Republican controlled Senate, but not in the Democrat
controlled House of Representatives. After awhile, a number of Southern
Democrats sided with the Republicans to give the vote to Hayes. It was assumed
that a deal was made between the Southern Democrats and the Republicans to
make the Southern Democrats vote for the Republican candidate, Hayes. When
Hayes pulled the remaining military troops out of the South, it was assumed that
this was the deal - the end of Reconstruction in exchange for the Presidency. This
was known as the Compromise of 1877. No proof of this has been shown, yet
historians are fairly certain that it did take place. With this, Reconstruction was
over.