Civil War Reconstruction
How do we rebuild the South, and our Nation, after the
American Civil War?
•AKS 39
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39a - compare and contrast Presidential Reconstruction with Radical Republican
Reconstruction
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39b - explain efforts to redistribute land in the South among the former slaves, provide
them with advanced education such as Morehouse College, and the Freedmen's Bureau
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39c - describe the significance of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments
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39d - explain Black Codes, the Ku Klux Klan, and other forms of resistance to racial equality
during Reconstruction
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39e - explain the impeachment of Andrew Johnson in relationship to Reconstruction
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39f - describe government corruption after the Civil War, such as the Tweed Ring
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39g - analyze how the presidential election of 1876 and the subsequent Compromise of
1877 marked the end of Reconstruction
•Essential Question
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What was Lincoln’s plan for reconstruction vs. what ended up
being implemented? Discuss the different perspectives.
•How does this differ from Lincoln's views
of reconstruction?
•Andrew Johnson
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17th President
Southerner
Lincoln’s VP during his
second term
Took over Presidency after
Lincoln's assassination
First President to be
impeached?
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What does “impeached
mean?”
•Reconstruction
1865 - 1877
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Plan to rebuild the nation after Civil War
Many different ideas on how this should be accomplished
•Lincoln’s Plan
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Lincoln’s Ten-Percent Plan
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Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction calls for 10%
allegiance
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What does “Amnesty” mean?
•Review
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What was Lincoln’s plan called?
How was it supposed to work?
•Radical Republicans
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Radical Republicans led by Charles Sumner, Thaddeus
Stevens
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want to destroy power of former slaveholders
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give full citizenship, suffrage to African Americans
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What is “suffrage?”
1864 Wade-Davis Bill makes Congress responsible for
Reconstruction
Lincoln uses pocket veto to kill Wade-Davis; Radicals
outraged
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You have 2 min to look up “Pocket Veto” in your books… GO!
•Johnson’s Plan
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President Andrew Johnson proposes own Presidential
Reconstruction:
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very easy on the South
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does not address voting rights, land, laws for former slaves
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Southerners relieved
•Freedman’s Bureau
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Congress enlarges Freedmen’s Bureau—helps former
slaves, poor whites
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gives social services, medical care, education
•Civil Rights Act of 1866
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Congress passes Civil Rights Act of 1866:
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grants citizenship to African Americans
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forbids black codes or discriminatory laws
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Looking ahead: Jim Crow
Black codes restore many restrictions of slavery
Whites use violence to prevent blacks from improving their
lives
Johnson vetoes Freedmen’s Bureau and Civil Rights Act
Alienates moderate Republicans; angers Radicals
•Reconstruction Act of 1867
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1867 Reconstruction Act doesn’t recognize most new
state governments
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divides South into military districts
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sets new conditions for reentry in Union
Johnson believes act unconstitutional, vetoes; Congress
overrides
Congress Passes the Fourteenth Amendment:
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Made “all persons born or naturalized in the United States”
citizens; equal protection.
•Review
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What was the Civil Rights Act of 1866?
What were Black Codes?
•Johnson Impeached
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Radicals seek to impeach—formally charge with
misconduct in office
House Radicals impeach Johnson; Senate does not
convict
•Remember this guy?
•Ulysses S. Grant elected President
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1868, Grant wins presidency with help of AfricanAmerican vote
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Fifteenth Amendment— gives voting rights to all, regardless of
color
South does not enforce 14th, 15th Amendments
White Southerners use violence to prevent blacks from
voting
Corruption
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Tweed ring in New York City spent $13M on Court House; actual
cost was $3M
•Review
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What is the 13th Amendment?
What is the 14th Amendment?
What is the 15th Amendment?
•Review
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Who were the Radical Republicans?
What did they want?
•Essential Question
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What were conditions like in the South for freed slaves?
How did reconstruction continue in the South from an
economic, social, and political standpoint?
•Conditions in Postwar South
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By 1870, all Confederate states
in Union with Republican
governments
Buildings, infrastructure, farms
destroyed throughout South
People poor; property value
plummets, Confederate bonds
worthless
1/5 white males dead, many
maimed; tens of thousands
black males dead
80% illiteracy for freed slaves
•Politics in Postwar South
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Democrats call Southern white Republicans scalawags
Carpetbaggers—Northerners who moved to South after
war
•Former Slaves Face Many Challenges
• Education
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Freed people of all ages seek education
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African Americans establish schools and universities –
Morehouse University
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Initially, most teachers Northern whites; by 1869, most are black
• Politics
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Almost as many black as white citizens; black officeholders minority
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only 16 African Americans in Congress
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Hiram Revels is first black senator
•Economics
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Landless African Americans sign labor contracts with
planters
Sharecropping—owner gives land, seed, tools for part of
crops
Tenant farming—rent land from owner; buy own tools
•Sharecropping
•Sharecropping/Tenant Farming
•What would you have done?
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In one paragraph, describe how you would have handled
rebuilding the nation after the Civil War.
Some things to think about…
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Would you have been forgiving?
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How would you have helped bring the slaves into the U.S. as citizens?
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Would you have punished any Southerners?
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Would you have used military force?
•Essential Questions
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What was resistance like to racial equality in the South?
Was there corruption and what forms did it take?
How did reconstruction end?
•Opposition to Reconstruction
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Ku Klux Klan (KKK)—Confederate veterans group that
turns terrorist
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Grows rapidly; aims to restore white supremacy
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1868–1871 Klan, others kill thousands, burn schools, churches,
homes
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Klan works to force Republican state governments out of power
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Southern Democrats use violence to intimidate black voters
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White Democratic candidates win state elections in 1875, 1876
•What is the message here?
•Popular support fades
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1870s Supreme Court decisions undermine 14th, 15th
Amendments
Federal government loses power to protect AfricanAmerican rights
Northern support fades
Corruption
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Grant considered honest; appoints friends to political office
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Beginning in 1872, series of Grant administration scandals
exposed
•The end of Reconstruction
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Redemption—return of Democrats to power in the South,
1869–1875
Election of 1876
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Republicans nominate Governor Rutherford B. Hayes
Compromise of 1877—Hayes gets presidency,
Democrats get:
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federal troops leave LA, SC
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funding for Southern railroad, waterways
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conservative Southerner in cabinet
Compromise means end of Reconstruction
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Southern states establish home rule
•The end
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"W. E. B. DuBois captured that failure well when he wrote in
Black Reconstruction in America (1935): 'The slave went free;
stood a brief moment in the sun; then moved back again toward
slavery.'“
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Did “Reconstruction” work?
5 minutes with a partner!
•Review
•3
•2
– things you learned
– things you want to find out more about
• 1 – thing you have a question about