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Reconstruction. 1865-1877. Banks have failed. Confederate money has no value. Major Questions. How do we bring the South back into the Union? How do we rebuild the South after its destruction during the war? How do we integrate and protect newly-emancipated black freedmen?
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Reconstruction 1865-1877
Major Questions • How do we bring the South back into the Union? • How do we rebuild the South after its destruction during the war? • How do we integrate and protect newly-emancipated black freedmen? • What branch of government should control the process of Reconstruction?
Wartime Reconstruction • Lincoln’s plan • 10% Plan • Proclamation of Amnestyand Reconstruction(December 8, 1863) • 1864 “Lincoln Governments” formed in LA, TN, AR.
Wade-Davis Bill (1864) • Required 50% of the number of 1860 voters to take an “iron clad” oath of allegiance (swearing they had never voluntarily aided the rebellion ). • Required a state constitutional convention before the election of state officials. • Enacted specific safeguards of freedmen’s liberties. • Lincoln kills bill with “pocket-veto”.
Lincoln’s Second Inaugural 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 lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.
Andrew Johnson • Rags to Riches Story • “Treason must be made odious” • Initially a darling of and later a disappointment to Radical Republicans • Reconstruction Plan (Proclamation of Amnesty—May 1865) similar to Lincoln’s
President Andrew Johnson • Jacksonian Democrat. • Anti-Aristocrat. • White Supremacist. • Agreed with Lincoln that states had never legally left the Union.
Southerners Don’t Get It • Elect ex-CSA leaders to Congress, including Alexander Stephens • Black Codes • Race Riots
Johnson’s Plan • Offered amnesty upon simple oath to all except Confederate civil and military officers and those with property over $20,000 (they could apply directly to Johnson) • In new constitutions, they must accept minimum conditions repudiating slavery, secession and state debts. • Named provisional governors in Confederate states and called them to oversee elections for constitutional conventions. • Effects • Disenfranchised certain leading Confederates. • Pardoned planter aristocrats brought them back to political power to control state organizations. • Republicans were outraged that planter elite were back in power in the South
Growing Northern Alarm! • Johnson granted 13,500 special pardons. • Many Southern state constitutions fell short of minimum requirements. • Revival of southern defiance.
Johnson the Martyr If my blood is to be shed because I vindicate the Union and the preservation of this government in its original purity and character, let it be shed; let an altar to the Union be erected, and then, if it is necessary, take me and lay me upon it, and the blood that now warms and animates my existence shall be poured out as a fit libation to the Union. (February 1866)
Freedman’s Bureau The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Land, often referred to as the Freedmen's Bureau, was established in the War Department on March 3, 1865. The Bureau supervised all relief and educational activities relating to refugees and freedmen, including issuing rations, clothing and medicine. The Bureau also assumed custody of confiscated lands or property in the former Confederate States, border states, District of Columbia, and Indian Territory. Built Schools—many of whom were forerunners of the “Historically Black Colleges” in the South.
13th Amendment • Ratified in December, 1865. • Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States or any place subject to their jurisdiction. • Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Congress breaks with Johnson • Congress bars SouthernCongressional delegates. • Joint Committee on Reconstruction created. • February, 1866 Presidentvetoed the Freedmen’sBureau bill. • March, 1866 Johnsonvetoed the 1866 Civil Rights Act. • Congress passed both bills over Johnson’s vetoes 1st in U. S. history!!
Radical Republicans: Thaddeus Stevens, Charles Sumner, Ben Wade
14th Amendment • National Definitions of Citizenship • Equal Protection Clause • Due Process Clause • High Confederate Official banned from national office • Confederate debt repudiated
15th Amendment • “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
Johnson’s “Swing around the Circle” 1866 Congressional Election • A referendum on Radical Reconstruction. • Johnson made an ill-conceived propaganda tour around the country to push his plan. • Republicans won a 3-1 majority in both houses andgained control of every northern state.
Radical Plan for Readmission • Civil authorities in the territories were subject to military supervision. • Required new state constitutions, including Black suffrage and ratification of the 13th and 14th Amendments. • In March, 1867, Congress passed an act that authorized the military to enroll eligible black voters and begin the process of constitution making.
Radicals Respond • Barely failed to override Johnson’s Veto of Bill to Extend Life of Freedman’s Bureau • Overrode Johnson’s Veto of CRA of 1866 • Enacted a new Freedman’s Bureau • Sent 14th Amendment to States—ratified by them in 1868 • Radical’s insisted on Civil Rights for former slaves and a federal enforcement mechanism
Radicals on a Roll—March 2, 1867 • Military Reconstruction Act • Command of the Army Act • Tenure of Office Act
Military Reconstruction Act--1867 • Divided South into Military District • Southern States—Tn. Excepted—would write new constitutions w/ Universal Adult Male Suffrage • States had to ratify 14th amendment • Subsequent legislation gave Army power to register voters and to disqualify “disloyal persons” from registering.
15th Amendment • Ratified in 1870. • The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. • The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. • Women’s rights groups were furious that they were not granted the vote!
Civil Rights Act of 1875 • Crime for any individual to deny full & equal use of public conveyances and public places. • Prohibited discrimination in jury selection. • Shortcoming lacked a strong enforcement mechanism. • No new civil rights act was attempted for 90 years!
Tenure of Office Act • The Senate must approve any presidential dismissal of a cabinet official or general of the army. • Designed to protect radical members of Lincoln’s government, such as Edwin Stanton (shown left) the Secretary of War. • Question of the constitutionality of this law.
Johnson Impeached • Johnson removed Stanton in February, 1868. • Johnson replaced generals in the field who were more sympathetic to Radical Reconstruction. • The House impeached him on February 24 before even drawing up the charges by a vote of 126 – 47! • Vote to remove was 35 to 18, one shy of the 2/3rds needed
Senate Trail • 11 week trial. • Johnson acquitted 5 to 19 (one short of required 2/3rd vote). • Radicals didn’t need to remove Johnson; by the time of his trial it was 1868, an election year; he could simply be ignored.
Freedmen’s World • Independent Churches • Political Participation—600 served in State legislatures down to the 1890s.
The arm of the Federal government is long, but it is far too short to protect the rights of individuals in the interior of distant States. They must have the power to protect themselves, or they will go unprotected, in spite of all the laws the Federal government can put upon the national statute-book. Frederick Douglass, 1866
Black Codes • Purpose: • Guarantee stable labor supply now that blacks were emancipated. • Restore pre-emancipationsystem of race relations. • Forced many blacks to become sharecroppers [tenant farmers].
