Chapter 17
RECONSTRUCTION AND THE NEW
SOUTH (1865-1896)
Essential Question
 How did plans to unify the nation differ after
the Civil War?
Reconstruction Debate
 Main Idea: Government leaders disagreed
about how Southern states could rejoin the
Union
 Southern states, because they had left the Union
in 1861, needed to be readmitted
 The economy and society of the South needed to
be rebuilt
Lincoln’s Plan
 Ten Percent Plan: When 10% of the voters of
a state took an oath of loyalty to the Union,
that state could be readmitted.
 Punishing the South was useless
 Offered amnesty to all white Southerners willing
to swear loyalty to the Union.
The Radical’s Plan
 Radical Republicans headed by Thaddeus
Stevens believed Lincoln’s plan was too
forgiving.
 Radical Republicans controlled Congress and
voted to deny seats to representatives from
any state readmitted under Lincoln’s plan.
 Passed the Wade Davis Bill
Wade Davis Bill
 July 1864 – passed by Congress
 To rejoin the Union, a state had to meet the
following requirements
 Majority of white males must swear loyalty to the
Union
 Only white males who did not fight against the
Union could vote for delegates to a state
constitutional convention
 Had to ban slavery
The Freedmen’s Bureau
 Set up by Lincoln and Congress to help
African Americans adjust to freedom
 Provided food, clothing and medical services
 Set up schools
 Helped freed people acquire land or find work
Assassination of Lincoln
 Shortly after the Freedmen’s Bureau was
founded, a tragic event took place that
shocked the nation. On April 14, 1865,
President Lincoln attended a play at Ford’s
Theater in Washington D.C. John Wilkes
Booth, an actor and Confederate
sympathizer, entered the private box and
shot Lincoln in the head. Lincoln died several
hours later.
Assassination of Lincoln
Assassination of Lincoln
 When Lincoln died, Vice President Andrew
Johnson became president. Johnson was
born in the South but supported the Union
during the war. Johnson soon revealed his
plan for Reconstruction.
Johnson’s Plan
 Grant amnesty to most Southerners once they
swore loyalty
 Desired to humiliate Southern Confederate
leaders by making them appeal to him
personally for a pardon
 Opposed equal rights for African Americans
 States had to ratify the 13th Amendment before
allowed back in the Union
 By the end of 1865, all states, except Texas, had
new governments and were ready to join the
Union.
Compare and Contrast
 What were the similarities and differences
between Lincoln’s views and the Radical
Republicans’ views concerning
Reconstruction?
 Venn Diagram
Radicals in Control
 Essential Question:
 What were the results of Radical Reconstruction?
The Thirteenth Amendment
 December 6th, 1865
 The first of the Reconstruction Amendments
 Abolishes and continues to prohibit slavery
and involuntary servitude
Radicals in Control
 Black Codes
 Laws to control freed men and women that
resembled slavery
 Examples
 Arrest and fined jobless African Americans
 Banned from renting or owning farms
Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866 which
granted full citizenship to African Americans and
overturned the Black Codes
The Fourteenth Amendment
 Congress, fearing that the Civil Rights Act of
1866 might be overturned in court, passed
this in 1866
 Granted full citizenship to all people born in
the United States
 “Equal protection of the laws”
 Excluded citizenship of Native Americans
Radical Reconstruction
 After winning the congressional elections of
1866, the Radical Republicans were able to
put their version of Reconstruction into action
 President Johnson could do little to stop the
Republicans because they could easily
override his vetoes in Congress. Thus began a
period known as Radical Reconstruction.
Reconstruction Acts of 1867
 Divided 10 Southern states into military




districts
Run by a military commander until a new
government could be formed
Guaranteed African American men the right
to vote in state elections
Banned former Confederate leaders from
holding office
States had to pass 14th Amendment to
reenter the Union.
Readmission of States
 With help of African American voters, all ten
states were readmitted to the Union by 1870.
Impeaching the President
 So that Johnson could not control the military
governors as commander-in-chief, Congress
passed a series of laws to limit his power
 Tenure of Office Act: Prohibited president from
removing government officials without the
approval of the Senate
Impeaching the President
(cont.)
 Johnson removed Secretary of War Edwin
Stanton without Senate’s approval
 Outraged by his actions, the House of
Representatives moved to impeach Johnson
 Senators could not get a 2/3 majority because
some Republicans said Johnson should not be
removed from office due to political
differences
 Johnson stayed in office until 1869
The Fifteenth Amendment
 1896
 Prohibits the state and federal governments
from denying the right to vote to any male
citizen because of “race, color or previous
condition of servitude.”
 Right to Vote!!!
Making Connections
 Comparing: How were the black codes similar
to slavery?
 Summarize the Reconstruction Amendments
Answer the Essential
Question
 What were the results of Radical
Reconstruction?
 African Americans gained full citizenship,
although protecting these rights proved
difficult
 African American voters helped to put
Republicans in control of Southern gov’t
 By 1870, all Southern states had met the
requirements under Radical Reconstruction
and were restored to the Union.
The South During
Reconstruction
 Essential Question:
 What kinds of resistance did African Americans
face as they tried to exercise their rights as
citizens of the South?
The South During
Reconstruction
 Main Idea: As African Americans began to
take part in civic life in the South, they faced
resistance, including violence from the
Whites.
African Americans in
Government
 Played important roles in Reconstruction
politics as voters and officials
 Contributed heavily to some Republican
victories
Scalawags and Carpetbaggers
 Scalawags
 Southern whites who were non-slave holding and
backed Republicans
 Carpetbaggers
 Northern whites to moved south after the war and
backed Republicans
 Many Southerners accused Reconstruction
governments of corruption. Although some
officials made money illegally, probably less
corruption occurred in the South than in the
North.
Resistance to Reconstruction
 Most Southern whites opposed efforts to give
rights to African Americans
 African Americans were often
 Refused land to rent
 Refused credit at stores
 Not hired by white employers
Ku Klux Klan
 Secret society who used fear and violence to
deny rights to freed men and women.
 Killed thousands of African Americans while
wearing sheets and hoods
 Burned African American schools, churches and
homes
 Supported by many Southern planters and
Democrats
 Congress passed several rather unsuccessful
laws to stop the Klan in 1870 and 1871.
KKK
Education
 Education improved for both races during
Reconstruction
 1870s – public schools created for both races
 Attended separate schools
Farming
 Sharecropping
 Farmer works land for an owner who provides
equipment and seeds and receives a share of the
crops
Answer the Essential
Question
 WHAT KINDS OF RESISTANCE DID AFRICAN
AMERICANS FACE AS THEY TRIED TO EXERCISE
THEIR RIGHTS AS CITIZENS OF THE SOUTH?
Change in the South
 Essential Question:
 How did the South change politically,
economically and socially when Reconstruction
ended?
Panic of 1873
 Severe economic depression
 Small banks close, stock market plummets
 Blame for hard times fell on the Republicans
and the Grant Administration
Panic of 1873
Election of 1876
 Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) vs. Samuel
Tilden (Democrat)
 Hayes wins although the outcome of the
election is disputed
Compromise of 1877
 Hayes presidential victory is disputed and
Democrats threaten to challenge the decision.
Party leaders meet in secret to work out an
agreement.
 Agreement includes some favors for the South
 New gov’t would give more aid to the South
 Republicans would withdraw all troops from the South
 Democrats in turn, promised to maintain African
American rights
A New Policy
 Hayes announces intention to let Southerners
handle radical issues
 Federal government would no longer attempt
to reshape Southern society
 Reconstruction has come to an end
Change in the South
 After Reconstruction, the South experienced
a political shift and industrial growth.
Democrats in Control
 Large landowners, merchants, bankers,
business leaders
 Adopted conservative practices
 Lower taxes
 Cut government spending
 Eliminated many social services begun during
Reconstruction
 Cut public education
Rise of the “New South”
 By the 1880s, forward-looking Southerners
were convinced that their region must
develop a strong industrial economy. They
argued that the South lost the Civil War
because its industry didn’t match the North’s.
Rise of the “New South”
 Built industry based on coal, iron, tobacco,
cotton and lumber
 Textile mills, tobacco manufacturing, iron and
steel mills
 Industry grows as a result of cheap, reliable
workforce
 Agriculture is still the South’s main economic
activity
Rural Economy
 Supporters of the “New South” hope to
advance agriculture as well
 Too much debt for farmers
 To repay debt, farmers rely on cash crops like
cotton
 Too much cotton forced prices down
 Sharecropping and reliance on one cash crop
keeps Southern agriculture from advancing
A Divided Society
 As Reconstruction ended, African Americans’
dreams for justice faded. In the last 20 years
of the 1800s, racism became firmly set in the
culture. Individuals took steps to keep
African Americans separated from white and
to deny them basic rights.
Jim Crow Laws
 What is it?
 Laws that required African Americans and whites
to be separated in almost every public place
 Impact
 Segregation! Unequal facilities and
accommodations
Poll Tax
 What is it?
 A fee people had to pay to vote
 Impact
 Most African Americans could not afford the tax
and therefore could not vote
Literacy Test
 What is it?
 Voters take a test in which they have to read and
explain difficult parts of the Constitution in order
to vote.
 Impact
 Because most African Americans had little
education, literacy tests prevented many from
voting.
Grandfather Clause
 What is it?
 Law that allowed people whose fathers or
grandfathers had voted before Reconstruction to
vote.
 Impact
 Literacy tests could keep some whites from
voting. These laws allowed them to do so.
Because African Americans could not vote until
1867, they were excluded.
Lynching
 What is it?
 When an angry mob kills a person by hanging
 Impact
 Fear! African Americans were lynched because
they were suspected of crimes, or because they
did not behave the way they should.
Lynching
Plessy vs. Ferguson
 The Supreme Court decides to uphold the
idea of “segregation of the South” by handing
down the decision of Plessy vs. Ferguson
(1896)
 Impact: Said separate is equal. The problem
is however, that the facilities are separate
but in no way, equal. Gave legal support to
Southern segregation and inequality.
Answer the Essential
Question
 How did the South change politically,
economically and socially when
Reconstruction ended?