Aftermath of War
Chapter 15
Reconstruction
 Confederate
 Southern
leaders
civilization collapsed
Economy
 Agriculture
 Slavery

Reconstruction Question
 Nothing
in Constitution!
 Had the South really
y seceded?
 If so, should Congress take action?
 If not, should President deal with it?
 separation of powers
Politics of
Reconstruction
Congress
Abraham Lincoln
 10%
Plan – December 1863
10% of 1860 voters - oath of loyalty
th Amendment
 13

 Wade
Wade--Davis
Bill – July 1864
50% take oath of loyalty
 gov’t – no one who fought
 no vote for Conf. leaders
 pocket
pocket--vetoed by Lincoln

1
Lincoln Resists
 April
11, 1865
 speech to Congress
appealed for flexibility
 no success
Lincoln’s Assassination
 April
14, 1865 – Good Friday
 Ford’s Theatre

John Wilkes Booth

 Lincoln’s
last speech
 Lincoln
died the next
morning – April 15th
Andrew Johnson
 Lincoln’s
death terrible for the
South
less cruel
 more bitterness from North

 1857
- Senator
from TN

Jacksonian
Democrat
 TN
seceded – refused
to give up his Senate
seat (only one)
2
Johnson’s Reconstruction
 1862
– TN captured
appointed military governor
 iron fist

 Recognized
some 10% governments
 May 1865 – own proclamation


 1864

– Lincoln’s VP candidate
attract southern Unionists

provisional governors
revoke secession
13th Amendment
 Amnesty
for all taking oath except top
officials & wealthy planters
Black Codes
 most
gov’ts set up within months
 Republicans seemed to approve
t t
treatment
t off leaders
l d
 states decide civil, political rights
 hoped for good treatment of blacks

 adopted

in South
Mississippi 1st
 labor
l b
contracts
t t
 social
discrimination
 sharecropping
Freedmen’s Bureau
Republicans Furious
 new
Congress elected
 former Confederates
9 Conf. Congress
 7 Conf. state gov’t
 4 generals, 4 colonels
 Conf. VP Alexander Stephens

 Refused
to seat southerners!
 created
 Gen.
Gen
March 1865
Oliver Howard
 Purpose

aid and supplies to freed slaves
3
 Limited

Lyman Trumbull
success
taught 200,000 blacks to read
 civil
rights bill
citizenship
 court access
 protection of person
and property
 state laws nullified if
no equal protection

 Failures
little land to blacks
 forced out of towns
 forced into labor contracts
 expired in 1872

Emancipation
 Uneven

freedom
resistance, loyalty
 Freedom
at last
celebrated freedom
 took to the road
 churches, schools, politics

Fight for Land
 Sherman
– 40 acres plots
 Freedmen’s Bureau
l d di
land
distribution
t ib ti
 Johnson’s amnesty plan - reclaim land
 Oct. 1865 – Johnson ordered Gen.
Howard to restore SC plantations

Resisting Wage Labor
 Freedom?
 returned
to plantations
l b contracts
labor
t t
 “dependency” but not freedom
 refused ganggang-labor
 whites
wanted to deny all rights to
blacks
 blacks beaten and murdered

 many
fled to towns & cities
 blacks
“would be just as well off
with no law at all or no gov’t”
- Freemen’s Bureau agent
4
Johnson Vetoes
Johnson Fights
Congress
 1866

- Freedmen’s Bureau recharter
Congress could not override
 Trumbull’s

Congress Responds
 April
1866 – Civil Rights Act passed
with 2/3 Congress vote


response to violence in South
Memphis riots
• 46 blacks dead
• churches, homes, schools destroyed
 July
1866 – renewed Freedmen’s
Bureau over Johnson veto
Johnson Hurts His Cause
14th Amendment
 mixed coalition to form new party
 Rep. – “waving the bloody shirt”
 opposed

called Democrats traitors
civil rights bill
quote – page 465
14th Amendment
 guarantee
citizenship
 equal protection of the laws
 established
constitutionality of the
Civil Rights Act
 Midterm
Election of 1866
 Johnson “swing around the circle”




broke custom against Pres. campaigning
shouting matches, insults
cost Dem seats in Congress
Rep. 3 to 1 majority
5
Radical Republicans
 Radicals
Radical
Reconstruction
Reconstr ction
Senate: Sumner (MA)
 House: Thaddeus Stevens (PA)

“remake” southern society
 full equal rights for blacks (suffrage)

Reconstruction Act of 1867
 South – 5 military districts
 except TN – readmitted in 1866
 thousands
lost voting rights
 ratify 14th Amendment
 guarantee black suffrage
Election of 1868
Johnson’s Impeachment
 Tenure
of Office Act – 1867
 Feb. 1868 - Johnson fired Sec. of
W Edwin
War
Ed i St
Stanton
t
 Johnson
impeached
 Senate: 1 vote short of removal
 Republicans

– Ulysses Grant
continue military reconstruction
 Democrats
 Grant
– Horatio Seymour
won by 52.7 %
500,000 black votes
 Rep. majority in both houses

6
15th Amendment
 voting
rights for blacks (not women)
for:
 allowed



poll taxes
literacy tests
property requirements
 passed

Feb. 1869
 Stanton

in 1870
& Anthony
blacks’ rights
 amendment

requirement for readmission
 ratified
Women’s Suffrage
“the Negro’s hour” – radical Repub.
 1869

left out women
– Equal Rights Association
issue debated
Movement Divided
 Moderates
- accepted 15th Amend.
Lucy Stone, Julia Ward Howe
 Am.
Am Woman Suffrage Assoc.
Assoc

 Stanton
Stanton--Anthony
group
Republican Rule
in the South
So th
Nat. Woman Suffrage Assoc.
 battled for fed. suffrage amendment

Rejoin the Union
 1868
– 1871 – all met stipulations
 Republicans
p
controlled g
gov’ts

ranged from months to years
Scalawags
 Southerners
who supported
Reconstruction
 ex
ex--Whigs,
Whigs exex-Dems,
Dems former slave
owners
 wanted northern capital
 opposed aristocracy
7
Carpetbaggers
 Whites

who came from the North
carried things in carpetbags
 some
wanted personal profit
 Union army vets impressed with
the South
 wanted to force emancipation
Blacks & Reconstruction
 Delegates
to draft constitutions
 Congress - 16
 State administrations – 20
 State Legislatures – over 600
Black Leaders
 1st
leaders were elite free blacks
from the South
 northern blacks
 ex
ex--slaves recruited for political roles
Republican Achievements
 modern
state constitutions
 no property requirements
 Black
Bl k C
Codes
d eliminated
li i t d
 rights for married women
 hospitals, asylums, penitentiaries
 road
road--building, RRs
Schools & Churches
Paying for Reform
 Taxed

planters (property)
slaves as tax collectors
 Huge
debt – states
bonds came due
 wasted spending
 pockets of public officials

 CORRUPTION!!
 Schools
important
Republicans
 blacks

 Churches
Ch h
grew
Southern Methodists and Baptists
 African Methodist Episcopal Church
 also served as schools, social
centers, political meeting halls

8
Land Grants
 SC
The Quest for Land

land commission
14,000 families got farms
 Southern
Homestead Act of 1866
80-acre grants
80 little land available (infertile regions)
 few homesteaders succeeded

Sharecropping
 blacks
could not afford land
 landowners problems
poor economy
 no money to pay wages until the
crop came in

 freedmen
worked for use of land,
house, seed, fertilizer, etc
Problems
 1/3
to 1/2 of crops to landlord
 no $ to get started
took liens on crops (debt)
 indebted to one storekeeper

Undoing of
Reconstruction
Reconstr ction
• high prices, high rates, corruption
often permanent indebtedness
 some eventually able to pay rent

9
Counterrevolution
 “redeem”
the South
led by planters
 resented northern involvement

 restore
Nathan Bedford Forrest
political power – Democrats
ex-Confed. voting rights
ex oppose black rule
 Deep South – large black populations

 TN
slaveslave-trader
 MS p
plantation owner
 wounded at Shiloh
 Fort Pillow Massacre

black troops
Ku Klux Klan
 Pulaski,
TN – late 1865 – 1866
 opposed Rep. governor Brownlow
 late
l t 1866 – Forrest
F
t became
b
Grand
G d Wizard
Wi d
 1868 – delegates to Dem. Nat. Conv.
 campaign of terror against Rep. supporters
 1869
– Brownlow left for Senate
 Klan disbanded in TN
 Klan grew in other states



murdered Republican politicians
burned black schools, churches
gained control across South
Federal Response
 1871
– Ku Klux Klan Act
enforce blacks’ rights
 arrests made
 1000s driven out

 PROBLEM:
must be enforced at
federal level!
Federal Failure
 KKK

white juries; unsympathetic judges
 U.S.
US

prosecutions difficult
vv. Cruikshank – 1876
state’s job to prosecute
 Grant’s
administration reluctant to
help troubled gov’ts
10
Reconstruction Fades
States “Redeemed”
 1870
– VA, NC
 1871 – GA
 1873 – TX
 1874 – AL, AR
 1875 – MS
 3 states left – LA, SC, FL
 1875
Civil Rights Law declared
unconstitutional in 1883
 Republicans losing control in South
 concerns about jobs
 North just lost interest
Election of 1872
 Republicans
– Grant
 Liberal Republicans – Horace Greeley
 Democrats – supported Greeley
 Grant won overwhelmingly
 LR forced Republicans to change

Scandal and
D
Depression
i
civil service reform; limited gov’t
D.C. Whiskey Ring
Panic and Depression -1870s
 Economic
 1875
 Treasury
T
robbed
bb d off $ millions
illi
 Grant’s secretary involved
 criminals unpunished
expansion too large
 Northern Pacific RR – bankrupt

federal subsidies
 Freedman’s
Savings and Trust Co.
ex-slaves depositors
ex bank failed – 1874
 no federal compensation

11
Republicans Divided
 Stalwarts

Roscoe Conkling
 Half
Half--Breeds

James Blaine
Election of 1876
 Republicans
– Rutherford Hayes
 Democrats – Samuel Tilden
 Results:
Irregular returns
LA, SC, FL still under Rep. control
 Tilden 1 vote short

The Debate Begins
2
sets of Electoral Votes
 Electoral Count Act
Compromise of 1877
 15 member commission
 Still

deadlocked
House stalled final count (Dem)

 Feb.

1877
LA, SC, FL votes to Hayes
 Agreement
reached
3 days before inauguration
 Hayes won (185–
(185–184)
 Reconstruction Ended

Effects of the Election
 North
abandoned black equality goals
 South suppressed
pp
blacks’ rights
g



poll taxes, literacy tests
1890s – Jim Crow Laws
1896 – Plessy v. Ferguson
12