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“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in
the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to
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 his
orphan – to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a
lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.
Abraham Lincoln
Second Inaugural Address
Timeline of Events
 1865
 Confederacy surrenders at Appomattox,
April 9th
 Abraham Lincoln assassinated on April 14th
 Andrew Johnson becomes President
 Thirteenth Amendment passed abolishing
the institution of slavery
 Congress creates the Freedmen’s Bureau
Timeline of Events
 1866
 President Johnson proposes moderate
Reconstruction policies
 Tennessee readmitted into the Union
 Austro-Prussian War is fought
 Civil Rights Act
 Ku Klux Klan founded in Tennessee by
Nathaniel Bedford Forrest
Timeline of Events
 1867
 U.S. purchases Alaska from Russia for $7.2
million (Seward’s Folly)
 Reconstruction Act of 1867
 First South African diamond field is
discovered
Timeline of Events
 1868
 Fourteenth Amendment ratified
 Congress impeaches President Johnson
 Ulysses S. Grant elected President
 Arkansas readmitted into the Union
 Louisiana readmitted into the Union
Timeline of Events
 1868
 Alabama readmitted into the Union
 South Carolina readmitted into the Union
 North Carolina readmitted into the Union
 Florida readmitted into the Union
Timeline of Events
 1869
 Mohandas K. Gandhi is born in India
 1870
 Fifteenth Amendment ratified
 Enforcement Act of 1870
 Virginia readmitted into the Union
Timeline of Events
 1870
 Georgia readmitted into the Union
 Texas readmitted into the Union
 Mississippi readmitted into the Union
 Unification of Italy is completed
Timeline of Events
 1871
 U.S. and Great Britain sing Treaty of
Washington
 Kaiser Wilhelm I unifies Germany
 1872
 Horace Greeley runs for president as a
Liberal Republican
 U.S. Grant is reelected
Timeline of Events
 1874
 British declare Gold Coast of Africa a
colony
 1875
 France’s National Assembly votes to
continue the Third Republic
 1876
 Hayes-Tilden presidential election results in
deadlock
Timeline of Events
 1877
 Federal troops withdraw from the South
 Rutherford B. Hayes is inaugurated
 Reconstruction ends
The Politics of Reconstruction
 Reconstruction
 Period during which the U.S. began to
rebuild after the Civil War, lasting from
1865 until 1877
 It is the process the federal government
used to readmit the Confederate states
 Lincoln, Johnson, and Congress all had
different plans
Lincoln’s Plan for Reconstruction
 Lincoln favored a lenient Reconstruction policy
 Believed secession was constitutionally
impossible so the Confederate states had
never seceded
 Individuals, not the states had rebelled
Lincoln’s Plan for Reconstruction
 Proclamation of Amnesty & Reconstruction
(AKA ~ 10% Plan)
 Presented in December 1863
 Government would pardon all Confederates
(except high-ranking Confederate officials and
those accused of war crimes against POWs) if
they would swear allegiance to the Union
 After 10% of those on the voting lists in 1860
swore allegiance, a state could form a new state
government and gain representation in Congress
Lincoln’s Plan for Reconstruction
 4 states moved towards readmission
 Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Virginia
 Radical Republicans in Congress
 Led by Charles Sumner ~ Massachusetts Senator and
Thaddeus Stevens ~ Pennsylvania Representative
 Wanted to destroy political power of the former
slaveholders
 Wanted African Americans to have full citizenship
and the right to vote
Radical Reaction
 Wade-Davis Bill
 Proposed Congress not the president be in charge of
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Reconstruction
Majority of those eligible to vote in 1860 had to
swear an oath of allegiance not just 10%
Lincoln’s used a pocket veto to kill the bill after
Congress adjourned
Radicals became upset and outraged by Lincoln’s veto
Set stage for a presidential-congressional showdown
Johnson’s Plan
 Andrew Johnson
 Democrat from Tennessee becomes president in April
1865
 Staunch Unionist
 Presidential Reconstruction
 Declared each remaining state could be admitted if they
met certain conditions
 Requirements for states
 Withdraw its secession
 Swear allegiance to the Union
 Annul Confederate war debts
 Ratify the 13th Amendment
Johnson’s Plan
 Johnson’s Plan did not differ that much from
Lincoln’s
 Johnson did want to prevent high ranking
Confederates and wealthy plantation owners
from taking the oath for voting privileges
 Did not address the needs of the former
slaves as far as land, voting rights, and
protection under the law
 Angered the Radical Republicans
Johnson’s Plan
 Southern States liked Johnson’s Plan
 Within a few months, they held conventions,
set up new constitutions and elected their
representatives to Congress
 Many of the representatives had served in
the Confederate Congress, cabinet and 4
were Confederate Generals
 Johnson pardoned all of them
 Radical and African Americans were angry
The Standstill
 Congress convenes in December 1865
 Radical Republicans dispute Johnson’s claim that
Reconstruction was complete
 Congress refuses to admit the new elected
Southern legislators
 Freedmen’s Bureau (General O.O. Howard)
 Congress voted to continue it in February 1866
 Assisted former slaves and poor whites in the South
 Distributed food and clothing
 Set up more than 40 hospitals, 4,000 schools, 6
industrial institutes, and 74 teacher-training centers
Civil Rights Act of 1866
 Gave African American males voting rights
 Forbade states from passing “black codes” ~ laws
that restricted African Americans’ lives
 Black Codes ~ African Americans could not
 Carry weapons
 Serve on juries
 testify against whites
 Marry whites
 Travel without permits
 Own land (in some states)
Johnson’s Veto
 Johnson shocked everyone when he vetoed the
Freedmen’s Bureau Act and the Civil Rights Act of
1866
 Alienated the moderate Republicans who were
trying to improve his Reconstruction plans
 Angered the Radical Republicans by appearing to
support Southerners
 Presidential Reconstruction ground to a halt
Congressional Reconstruction
 Radical and moderate Republicans decided to work
together to overthrow Johnson’s veto
 Civil Rights Act of 1866 ~ first major legislation
ever enacted over a presidential veto
 Congress drafted the 14th Amendment
 Made “all persons born or naturalized in the United
States” citizens of the country
 All were entitled to equal protection of the law
 Could not be deprived of their life, liberty, or
property with due process of law
 Johnson advised Southern states not to ratify it, did
not become an amendment until 1868 (Tennessee)
Congressional Elections of 1866
 Johnson goes on a speaking tour with U.S. Grant,
turns many voters away because of his rough
language
 Moderate and Radical Republicans win a landslide
victory over the Democrats
 Republicans gains a 2/3 majority in Congress
 Have enough votes to override any presidential
vetoes
Reconstruction Act of 1867
 Did not recognize state governments formed under
Lincoln and Johnson’s Reconstruction plans
 Tennessee was excepted because it had ratified the
14th Amendment
 Divided the 10 remaining Confederate states into
military districts each headed by a Union general
 John Schofield ~ Virginia
 Daniel Sickles ~ North and South Carolina
 John Pope ~ Georgia, Alabama, and Florida
 Edward Ord ~ Arkansas and Mississippi
 Philip Sheridan ~ Texas and Louisiana
Reconstruction Act of 1867
 Voters in districts would elect delegates to
convention in which new state constitutions would
be drafted
 To reenter into the Union a state had to ratify the
14th Amendment
 Johnson vetoed it
 Congress overrode the veto
Johnson’s Impeachment
 Radical Republicans believed Johnson was not
carrying out his obligation to enforce the
Reconstruction Act
 Looked for grounds on which to impeach Johnson
 Tenure of Office Act
 passed by Congress in March 1867
 Stated the president could not remove cabinet
officers “during the term of the president by whom
they may have been appointed”
 Trying to protect Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton,
their ally
Johnson’s Impeachment
 Johnson fired Stanton
 House of Representatives impeached Johnson on 11
charges, 9 were based on the Tenure of Office Act
 Trial took place in the Senate
 Need a 2/3 majority to remove Johnson from office
 The vote was 35 to 19, one vote shy of the majority
Election of 1868
 Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour, a wartime
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governor of New York
Republicans nominated U.S. Grant, a Civil War hero
Grant won by a wide margin in the Electoral College,
but on 306,000 popular votes
Southern African Americans voted mostly
Republican which helped Grant win the election
After election Radicals introduced the 15th
Amendment (ratified in 1870) which states no one
can be kept from voting because of “race, color, or
previous condition of servitude”
Postwar South Conditions
 1868
 Former Confederate states of Alabama, Arkansas,
Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina, and South Carolina
reentered the Union
 1870
 Georgia, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia reentered
the Union
 Even with all states back in the Union, Republicans
did not end Reconstruction
 They wanted to make economic changes in the
South
Physical & Economic Conditions
 Physical Effects
 New Southern state governments had to rebuild
battle scarred regions
 William T. Sherman estimated that his Union troops
had destroyed about $100 million word of
Confederate property in Georgia and South Carolina
 Destroyed railroads, buildings and bridges
 Neglected roads and abandoned farms had to be
restored or replaced
Physical & Economic Conditions
 Economic Effects
 Property values plummeted
 Those with Confederate bonds or money had little
hope of recovering their value
 Small farms were ruined or in disrepair
 Southern economic resources were destroyed
 Region’s population was devastated
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1/5 of the adult white male population had died during the
war
Many who returned from the war were maimed for life
Tens of thousands of African American males died as well
Public Works Programs
 Republican governments
 Built roads, bridges, and railroads
 Established orphanages
 Created institutions for the mentally ill and disabled
 Created the first public school systems
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Virginia ~ established its public school system in 1869
Created by Dr. William Henry Ruffner, who became the
first Superintendent of Public Instruction for the
Commonwealth of Virginia
Was given less then 30 days to completely create it, did
so in less than 20 days
 Increased taxes to create the money needed for
recovery
Scalawags and Carpetbaggers
 Scalawags
 white Southerners who joined the Republican Party
 Hoped to gain political offices with the help of the
African American vote
 Wanted to use the offices to enrich themselves
 Carpetbaggers
 Northerners who arrived in the South carrying so few
belongings that they could fit into a carpetbag
 White Southerners believed these men wanted to
exploit the South’s postwar turmoil for their own
profit
African Americans as Voters
 Made up the largest group of Southern
Republicans
 Many registered to vote for the first time
 9 out of 10 voted Republican
 Eager to exercise their voting rights
 90% of African American voters voted
Political Differences
 Internal conflicts in the Republican Party
caused disunity
 New status of African Americans required
changes in the attitudes of Southern whites
 Southern whites thought that Northern
investments would help the south recover from
the war
 Many Southern whites refused to accept the
new status of blacks and resisted the idea of
equal rights
Former Slaves Face Challenges
 New Won Freedoms
 Now allowed to travel with passes, many former slaves
moved
 Between 1865 and 1870 the population of the 10 largest
Southern cities doubled
 Former slaves wanted to leave the plantations behind
 Plantations were symbols of oppression
 Reunification of Families
 Slavery split up many African American families
 Many freed slaves took advantage of their freedom to look
for their loved ones
 Freedmen’s Bureau worked to reunited families
 African Americans were now allowed to marry
Former Slaves Face Challenges
 Education
 Over 90% of freed African Americans over the age
of 20 could not read or write
 Established educational institutions with the
assistance of both public and private institutions
 Hampton Normal and Agricultural School was founded
in Hampton, Virginia (Now Hampton University)
 Most teachers in black schools were initially white
and about half were women
 By 1869, black teachers outnumbered the whites
 By 1877, 600,000 blacks were enrolled in elementary
schools
Former Slaves Face Challenges
 Churches
 African Americans found their own churches after
the war which were usually Baptist or Methodist
 African American ministers became influential in
their communities
 Volunteer Groups
 Established their own fire companies, trade
associations, political organizations, and drama groups
 Provided financial and emotional support for their
members
Former Slaves Face Challenges
 Politics
 1865 – 1877
 Growing African American involvement
 First time African Americans held local, state, and
federal government offices
 16 African Americans elected to Congress
 No African American governors until Virginia elected
Douglas Wilder in 1990
 Hiram Revels was the first African American Senator
Former Slaves Face Challenges
 Laws Against Segregation
 Most Republican Southern state governments
repealed the black codes
 Most African Americans focused on building up the
black community rather than total integration
 By establishing separate school blacks were able to
escape the interference by whites who had for so
long dominated their lives
Changes in the Southern Economy
 40 Acres and a Mule
 Sherman promised freed slaves who followed him 40
acres and the use of army mules
 40,000 blacks settled on 400,000 acres of
confiscated land and began farming it
 President Johnson issued an order allowing the
original owners to reclaim their land
 Former slaves were evicted
 Land that was set aside for blacks and loyal white was
not suitable for farming
Changes in the Southern Economy
 Restoration of Plantations
 Planter class wanted to restore plantations
 Wealthy Northern merchants encouraged this
because they wanted the cash crop of cotton for
their businesses
 White planters were determined to get the labor
they needed in order to get their plantations working
again
 Used sharecropping and tenant farming to do this
 Economic necessity forced former slaves to sign labor
contacts with planters
 In exchange for wages, housing, and food, freedmen
worked in the fields
Changes in the Southern Economy
 Sharecropping and Tenant Farming
 Sharecropping
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Landowners divided their land and gave each worker
(freed slave or poor white) a few acres along with seeds
and tools
At harvest time, each worker gave a share of his crop,
usually half, to the landowner
Share paid the owner back and end the arrangement until
the next year
Changes in the Southern Economy
 Sharecropping and Tenant Farming
 Tenant Farming
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Sharecroppers who saved a little and bought heir own
tools could bargain better with landowners
Could even rent land for cash from the owner and keep
all their harvest
 Seldom worked in practice, most bought on credit
from merchants who charged them inflated prices
 End result could not save enough to buy their own land
Changes in the Southern Economy
 Cotton No Longer King
 Demand for Southern cotton began to drop during the
war as other countries increased their cotton
production
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1869 ~ 16.5 cents per pound
Late 1870s ~ 8 center per pound
 Instead of diversifying, Southerners planted even
more cotton driving the price down even further
 Southerners will begin to diversify the economy
 Devastating effects on the economy because of the
war will last into the 20th century
The Collapse of Reconstruction
 Most white Southerners
accepted the change in
African American status
 Some were bitter and
used violence to keep
African Americans from
participating in politics
Ku Klux Klan
 Founded as a social club for Confederate veterans
 Started in Pulaski, Tennessee in 1866 by 6 former
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Confederate veterans
The name comes from the Greek word “kyklos”
(circle) and the word clan.
Eventually spread to every Southern state by 1868
Many chapters became violent terrorist
organizations
Goal ~ to restore white supremacy
Method ~ to prevent African Americans from
exercising their political rights
Ku Klux Klan
 Was a secret society so not much is truly known
about the KKK
 They wore the robes and masks to represent the
ghosts of Confederates killed during the Civil War
 Also wore them to remain anonymous and hide their
numbers
 Southern states did most of their activities during
the night whereas Northern states did their
activities during the day
Ku Klux Klan
A cartoon threatening that the KKK would lynch carpetbaggers,
Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Independent Monitor, 1868.
Ku Klux Klan
 Nathaniel Bedford Forrest
 Former slave trader
 Confederate General
 Said to be the KKK’s first
Grand Wizard
 He denies that he had a
leadership role in the Klan
Anti-Black Violence
 1868 – 1871
 Klan killed thousands of men, women, and children
 Burned schools, churches and property
 Any whites who tried to help were also in jeopardy
 Goals
 Turn the Republicans out of power in Southern
states
 Use outfits to conceal their identity so they can
intimidate people into not voting
Anti-Black Violence
Economic Pressure
 Also tried to prevent African Americans from
making economic progress
 African Americans who owned their own land or
worked in jobs other than agriculture were
targeted by attacks and destruction of their
property
 Fear of economic reprisals kept many former
slaves from voting
Legislative Response
 Enforcement Acts of 1870 and 1871
 First one provided for federal supervision of
elections in Southern states
 Second one gave the president the power to use
federal troops in areas where the Klan was active
 1882
 Supreme Court ruled the Enforcement Act of 1871
was unconstitutional
 Acts helped to decrease Klan activity
 By 1880 Klan managed to restore white supremacy
to the South
Shifts in Political Power
 Amnesty Act of 1872
 Congress returned the right to vote and hold
federal and state offices to 150,000 former
Confederates
 The former Confederates would vote democratic
 1872
 Congress allows the Freedmen’s Bureau to expire
 Southern Democrats able to shift the balance of
power in their favor
Scandals and Money Crises
 Fraud and Bribery
 Grant
 Honest man with no political experience
 Did not believe others would use him for their
own political gains
 Appointees to political offices proved to be
dishonest
 Credit Mobilier
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Exposed by the New York Sun
A construction company had skimmed off large profits
from a government railroad contract
Involved Schuyler Colfax, Grant’s Vice President
Scandals and Money Crises
 Republican Unity Shattered
 Liberal Republican Party formed in 1872
 Formed because of all the scandals occurring
 Horace Greeley,
 editor of the New York Tribune
 Presidential candidate
 Broke with the Radical Republicans because he
disagreed with their politics concerning
Reconstruction and the former slaves
 Also nominated by the Democrats
 Grant easily won the election of 1872
Continued Scandal
 Whiskey Ring ~ 1875
 Internal revenue collectors and other officials were
accepting bribes from whiskey distillers who want to
avoid paying taxes on their product
 Defrauded the federal government of millions of
dollars
 238 people will be indicted in the scandal
 Orville E. Babcock, Grant’s private secretary was
involved but Grant helped him escape prosecution
Continued Scandal
 1876
 Secretary of War, William W. Belknap accepted bribes
from merchants so they could keep their trading
concession in Indian Territory
 Secretary of the Navy, George M. Robeson, accepted
bribes from shipbuilders
 Secretary of the Interior, Zachariah Chandler, had
shady dealing with land speculators
The Panic of 1873
 Economy was booming, investors felt it would
continue to do so
 Invested heavily in new business opportunities
 Many took on more debt than they could
afford
 Jay Cooke, a Philadelphia banker, invested
heavily in railroads
 Did not get enough investors
 Cooke’s banking firm, the nation’s largest dealer in
government securities, went bankrupt
The Panic of 1873
 Financial failures became known as the Panic
of 1873
 Small banks closed
 Stock market temporarily collapsed
 89 railroads went broke
 By 1875, 18,000 companies had folded
 Triggered a 5 year economic depression
 3 million workers lost their jobs
Currency Dispute
 Caused by the Panic of 1873
 Roots were in the Civil War
 Greenbacks issued by the federal government
which were not backed by equal value in gold
 North wanted greenbacks to be taken out of
circulation
 South and West wanted more greenbacks
introduced
 Specie Resumption Act ~ 1875
 Promised to put the country back on the gold
standard which sparked more debate
 Economy improved and issued died down by 1878
Supreme Court Decisions
Date
Decision(s)
Ruling
1873
Slaughterhouse cases
Most civil rights were ruled to be state,
rather than federal, rights and therefore
unprotected by the Fourteenth
Amendment
1876
U.S. v. Cruikshank
The Fourteenth Amendment did not to
grant the federal government power to
punish whites who oppressed blacks
1876
U.S. v. Reese
The Fifteenth Amendment was determined
not to grant voting rights to anyone, but
rather to restrict types of voter
discrimination
•The Supreme Court’s restrictive rulings narrowed the
scope of the amendments so that the federal government
could not protect black rights.
Northern Support Fades
 Supreme Court is rejecting Reconstruction
policies of the 1870s
 Northern voters begin to grow indifferent to
the South
 Concerns shift to national issues like the Panic
of 1873
 Judicial and public support for Reconstruction
diminish
 Republicans will slowly retreat from the
policies of Reconstruction
Democrats Redeem the South
 1869 – 1875
 Democrats recapture state governments of
Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, North
Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia
 Named this redemption ~ their return to power in
the South
 Redemption and the national election of 1876 will
put an end to congressional Reconstruction
Election of 1876
 Republicans choose Rutherford B. Hayes, the
governor of Ohio as their candidate
 Democrats choose Samuel J. Tilden, the
governor of New York as their candidate
 Tilden helped clean up graft caused by the Tweed
Ring in New York City
 Tilden was one vote shy of winning the electoral
vote
 A commission gave the election to Hayes because
they made a deal with the Democrats
Election of 1876
 Compromise of 1877
 Withdrawal of federal troops from Louisiana and
South Carolina
 Democrats wanted federal money to build a railroad
from Texas to the West coast and to improve
Southern rivers, harbors, and bridges
 Hayes was to appoint a Southerner to his cabinet
 Republican leaders agreed to the demands and
Rutherford B. Hayes was inaugurated
 Reconstruction had officially ended
Home Rule in the South
 Republicans and Democrats will dispute the
rules of elections in Louisiana and South
Carolina
 Each group will set up rival state governments
 Hayes removes federal troops and Democrats
take over
 Florida’s elections were also questionable but
their state supreme court ruled in favor of
the Democrats
 All southern states were now controlled by
Democrats
Home Rule in the South
 Democrats achieved their goal of home rule
 They now had the ability to run their state
governments without federal intervention
 New laws passed did the following
 restrict the rights of African Americans
 wiped out social programs
 slashed taxes
 dismantled public schools
Legacy of Reconstruction
 Reconstruction ended with much real progress in
the battle against discrimination
 Radical Republicans wanted to help former slaves
but they made several mistakes
 By giving former slaves civil rights they thought they
were protecting them
 Problems that occurred were that Congress did not
adequately protect the rights and the Supreme Court
undermined them
 Did not want to distribute land to former slaves which
prevented them from becoming economically
independent
 Did not fully realize the extent of racism in society
Legacy of Reconstruction
 Congressional Reconstruction was not a complete
failure
 Allowed for the passage of the 13th, 14th, and 15th
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Amendments
Supreme Court will narrow their scope, but in the
20th century they will become the foundation for
civil rights legislation
African Americans were the founders of many
black colleges (Howard University) and volunteer
organizations
Literacy among blacks will increase
Inspired the fight to regain civil rights