Reconstruction
American History
Ms. Costas
Post Civil War
• Questions that needed to be answered…
• How to rebuild a shattered southern
society and economy?
• What is the place of the 4 million freed
slaves?
• Is the federal government responsible for
helping them?
• How to treat the former Confederate
states?
• Who has the authority to answer all these
questions: the president or Congress?
Lincoln’s Plan
• Lincoln disagreed that the Confederate states actually left the Union
• Didn’t have the Constitutional ability
• Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction introduced in 1863
• Full presidential pardons for those who:
• Took an oath of allegiance to the Union
• Accepted the emancipation of slaves
• State government could be reestablished with 10% voter loyalty
• Wade Davis Bill (1864)
• Stricter policies proposed by Congress, pocketed by Lincoln
• 50% loyalty and no Confederate voters
• Freedmen’s Bureau
• Established by Congress in 1865 to aid former slaves
• Assassination, April 11, 1865
Johnson’s Plan
• Senator from Tennessee – remained loyal to the Union
• White supremacist
• Similar plan as Lincoln’s 10% plan
• Disfranchisement of
• All former leaders and officials of Confederacy
• Confederates with more then $20,000 in taxable property
• Pardoned many “disloyal” southerners
• All 11 states were readmitted
• None addressed voting rights to African Americans
• Did not address rights of the freedmen
Black Codes
• Adopted in the south – restricted rights of African
Americans
• Prohibited blacks from renting land or borrowing money to
buy land
• Forced freedmen as “vagrants” and “apprentices” to sign
work contracts
• Prohibited blacks from testifying against whites in court
• Contracted-labor system was no different than slavery
• Johnson vetoed two important bills
• Increase funding for the Freedmen’s Bureau
• Civil Rights Bill that nullifies Black Codes
Election of 1866
• Elections to the US House of Representatives
• Johnson took to the road in his infamous “swing around the
circle”
• Nickname for Johnson’s political speeches
• Hoped to gain Congressional support for Reconstruction
• Claimed equal rights for blacks would result in “Africanized”
society
• Republicans counter-attacked with campaign tactic “waving the
bloody shirt”
• Recalling the passion and hardship of the Civil War
• Republicans gain overwhelming majority in Congress
• 2/3 majority
Congressional
Reconstruction
• Second round of Reconstruction
• First were the plans enacted by Lincoln and Johnson
• Where 11 states reentered the Union
• After Johnson lost majority vote in both houses,
Congress came up with its own plan for
Reconstruction
• Harsher on southern whites
• More protective of freed blacks
Enacting the
Radical Program
• Led by Radical Republicans
• Equal rights for all citizens
• Under radical program major acts were passed
• Civil Rights Act of 1866
• Pronounced all African-Americans citizens
• Protected African Americans from Black Codes
• Fourteenth Amendment
• All people born in the United States were citizens
• States must provide “equal protection of the laws” and “due process”
• Reconstruction acts of 1867
• New State Constitutions
• Military Districts
• Ratification of 14th Amendment
Impeachment of
Andrew Johnson
• Tenure of Office Act (1867)
• Cannot remove a military or federal
official without Senate’s approval
• Designed to protect Radical Republicans
in the cabinet
• Johnson saw law as unconstitutional
• Removed Secretary of War, Edwin
Stanton
• Impeached by the House
• Impeach = to call into question the
integrity or validity of a practice
• Congress fell one vote short of the 2/3
majority
• 7 moderate Republicans voted with
Democrats
• Johnson was not nominated for reelection
Reforms After
Grant’s Election
• Election of 1868
• Republicans nominate Ulysses S. Grant
• African-American vote gave Grant the edge
• Ratification of Fifteenth Amendment
• Prohibited any state from denying a citizen’s right to
vote “on account of race, color, or previous condition
of servitude”
• Civil Rights Act of 1875
• Guaranteed equal accommodations in public places
• Courts cannot prohibit African-Americans from juries
• Poorly enforced
Reconstruction
Governments
• Whites were the majority of southern state governments
• Except South Carolina
• Freedmen controlled the lower house
• Many northerners headed to southern states
• Driven by hopes of economic gain
• Scalawags
• Southern Republicans
• Carpetbaggers
• Northerners relocated to the south
• African Americans gained positions of power in Congress
• Caused resentment from disfranchised ex-Confederates
Evaluating the
Republican Record
• Controversy surrounds legislative record of Republicans
• Did they abuse power for selfish reasons?
• Did they govern responsibly to protect public interest?
• Accomplishments
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Liberalized southern governments
Promoted internal improvements
Promoted state institutions
Improved and expanded education
• Failures
• Wasteful spending
• Corruption and bribery
• Poor ethics
African Americans
Adjusting to Freedom
• Needed to secure economic survival and political rights
• Building black communities
• Reuniting families
• Independent black churches
• Education
• Black colleges
• Communities in frontier states
• Sharecropping
• Landowners provided goods and supplies in return for a share
of the crop
• Gave poor opportunity to work land for themselves
• Often dependent on landowners
Greed and Corruption
• Growth of materialism changed the tide of
Reconstruction
• Crusade for civil rights got pushed aside
• Rise of the spoilsmen
• Congressmen played the game of patronage
• Giving jobs and government favors to their supporters
• Corrupt businessmen and politicians
• Grant often turned a blind eye to corruption
• Millions of dollars stolen from taxpayers
Election of 1872 & Panic of 1873
• Republican party splits
• Reform-minded Republicans nominate
Horace Greeley, editor of New York
Times
• Joined by liberal Republicans and
Democrats
• Radical Republicans countered with
“waving the bloody shirt”
• Grant reelected by a landslide
• Economic disaster hits in 1873
• Gave out too much federal funding
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Caused by post-war inflation
High investments in railroads
Large trade deficits
Property loss
End of Reconstruction
• Third and final phase of Reconstruction
• Southern conservatives (aka redeemers) took control of state governments
• Agreed on state’s rights, reduced taxes, reduced spending on social programs, and
white supremacy
• White Supremacy and the Ku Klux Klan
• Secret society to intimidate blacks and white reformers
• The Amnesty Act of 1872
• Removed last restrictions on ex-Confederates
• The Election of 1876
• Rutherford B. Hayes (R) beats out Samuel J. Tilden (D)
• The Compromise of 1877
• Hayes would become president on two conditions
• Immediately end federal support for Republicans in the south
• Build a southern transcontinental railroad