Lincoln’s 10% Plan
• “malice toward none, with charity for all”
• Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction
• Before the end of the war, Lincoln came up
with the 10% plan. As soon as 10% of the
voting population took an oath of allegiance
to the Union, they would be able to create a
new government and be readmitted to the
United States
Reconstruction Plans
Radical Republicans advocated extending full civil
rights to ex-slaves.
Conservative Republicans principally wanted to
pursue economic development.
Both the Radical and Conservative Republicans
agreed that African Americans should have legal
equality.
Texans sought to reestablish the Democratic rule
redolent of that before the war. Most urgent, for
them, was to find a way to keep a newly freed black
population (estimated by scholars to have numbered
about 250,000) in subordination.
Wade-Davis Bill
• 1. The majority of whites have to take an oath not just
10%
• 2. For the men to be delegates to the constitutional
conventions of the states they needed to take an “iron
clad” oath that they never aided any Confederate
policies
• 3. All officers above the rank of lieutenant would not
be considered a citizen of the United States
• This bill was pocket vetoed by Lincoln
• Wade-Davis Manifesto – letters issued in the
newspaper by Republicans that criticized Lincoln for
being too lenient on the South
13th Amendment
• On January 31, Congressed passed the 13th
Amendment to the Constitution.
• 1. abolished involuntary servitude everywhere
in the United States
• 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this
outcome by “appropriate legislation”.
Freedmen’s Bureau
• The Freedman's Bureau, established in 1865, provided
relocation, education and medical relief to newly freed
Africans, as well as Southern whites displaced during
the Civil War.
• In 1866 the Freedman's Bureau opened 45 million
acres of public lands in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana,
Arkansas and Florida to settlers regardless of race.
• Many freedmen took advantage of the homestead
opportunity, creating the first major wave of AfricanAmerican land ownership.
• Freedmen Bureau created over 4,000 schools to
educate the freedmen (Howard University).
Freedmen Life
• Life in freedom might still be a matter of what
was allowed, not what was right
• Most freedmen that had good owner stayed with
them, however worked as sharecroppers.
• Major goal was trying to reunite the families that
were torn apart by slavery
• Many freedmen put ads in the paper for help
with trying to find their misplaced love ones
• African Methodist Episcopal – formed in 1877
now allowed what was a secret church to be out
in the open
Sherman’s Field Order #15
• 400,000 acres were set aside in Sea Islands
Region for Freedmen
• However President Johnson ordered them
removed from the territory and returned the
land to its original owner before the war
• The lands that were not given back were sold
to rich investors in the North
Black Codes
• White Southerners sought ways to control
newly freed African Americans
• They wrote Black Codes to regulate civil and
legal rights, from marriage to the right to hold
and sell property
• In many ways the codes guaranteed African
Americans would continue working as farm
laborers
14th Amendment
• It conferred citizenship on the freedmen and
prohibited states from abridging their
constitutional “privileges and immunities”
• Barred any state from taking a person’s life,
liberty or property without due process of the
law
• It also banned any Confederate leader from
holding any state or federal office. Only Congress
with 2/3 of the vote could lift that ban
Andrew Johnson
• President Johnson supported votes for Black
army veterans in 1864 and 1865
• By 1866, however, Johnson broke with the
moderate Republicans and aligned himself with
the Democrats who opposed equality and
opposed the Fourteenth Amendment
• “swing around the circle” – President Johnson
went
on
a
tour
of
the
North
fighting
against
the
14th amendment.
• This however hurt Johnson in the Congressional
vote of 1866.
• Radicals attacked Johnson’s policies, especially his
10% Plan and his veto of the Civil Rights Bill for
the Freedmen
Congressional Vote
• The election of 1866 dramatically changed the
balance of power in congress, giving the
Radical Republicans enough votes to
overcome Johnson's vetoes
• Though he avoided (by one vote) the Radical
Republican attempt to impeach him Johnson
remained almost powerless regarding
Reconstruction policy
Radical Republicans
• Led by Charles Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens, the
Radical Republicans wanted the Southern states to be
punished for their treasonous behavior
• They called for harsh punishment of Confederate
officers and soldiers and equal rights for Freedmen
• Thaddeus Stevens- wrote a plan that would give 1/10th
of the lands taken in the war to freedmen and sell the
rest to help Union’s veterans’ pension, compensation
and payment of federal debt
• Plan failed in Congress
Radical Republicans
• Radical Republicans implemented a federal
reconstruction plan
• They used the Army to combat the effect of
black codes and enforce new laws that
guaranteed rights to African Americans in
Southern states
• Federal reconstruction took the vote away
from 10,000 to 15,000 white men who had
been Confederate officials or soldiers
Civil Rights Act of 1866
• The Civil Rights Act of 1866 gave rights to freed
slaves including the rights to make contracts,
sue, witness in court, and own private property
• President Johnson vetoed the bill saying it would
"operate in favor of the colored and against the
white race“
• Congress overrode the presidential veto in April
of 1866
• The act declared that all persons born in the U.S.
were now citizens, without regard to race, color,
or previous condition of servitude, excluding
Indians
Reconstruction Act of 1867
• Spilt South into 5 military districts
– Confederate leaders designated in the 15th
Amendment were banned from voting in state
elections or constitutions
– All southern states had to accept the 13 and 14th
amendment
– Majority of southern men had to take a oath to
come back into the Union
Impeachment of Johnson
• Congress passed the Tenure of Office Actwhich only allowed Congress to dismiss a
Cabinet member – 2/3 override.
• Johnson tried to remove Secretary of War
Stanton. With that attempt, the Judiciary
Committee in the House started the
impeachment process of Johnson
• However the Senate did not get the necessary
vote to remove Johnson from power
Election of 1868
• (r) Ulysses S. Grant defeated (D) Horatio
Seymour.
• Grant supported Congressional reconstruction
and black suffrage in the South
• However a lot of African American were not
allowed to vote because of Southern Black
Codes, most voted for Grant
• This sparked Congress to write the 15th
Amendment
15th Amendment
• Forbade states to deny the right to vote “on
account of race, color, or previous conditions
of servitude”
• However it did leave open the possibility for
states to create countless qualification test to
obstruct voting in the future
– Poll taxes, literacy test, Grandfather laws
Carpetbaggers
• Northerners who moved down to the South
during the Reconstruction area to buy cheap
land and create a business and get involved in
politics
• Scalawags- Southerners who allied themselves
with the Republican views on reconstruction
• Most scalawags were the farmers who did not
own slaves and felt that under the
Confederacy they could not advance
KU KLUX KLAN (KKK)
• A terrorist organization that formed in 1866 in
Tennessee
• Used violence against the African Americans to
stop the spread of Reconstruction and the 13,14
and 15th Amendments
• African Americans who were assigned to
Constitutional Conventions were attacked and
often times murdered.
• It hurt the Republican Party in the south and put
a fear of involvements in African Americans