Congressional Reconstruction
• Congress convenes December 1865
– Johnson has readmitted former CSA states under
lenient terms
– They are passing black codes
– Memphis and New Orleans riots are on the way
• Report of the Joint Committee on
Reconstruction makes recommendations
(6/66)
Carl Schurz, Report on conditions in the South (1865) [to Andrew Johnson]
The interference of the national authority in the home concerns of the southern
States would be rendered less necessary, and the whole problem of political and
social reconstruction be much simplified, if, while the masses lately arrayed against
the government are permitted to vote, the large majority of those who were always
loyal, and are naturally anxious to see the free labor problem successfully solved,
were not excluded from all influence upon legislation. In all questions concerning the
Union, the national debt, and the future social organization of the south, the feelings
of the colored man are naturally in sympathy with the views and aims of the national
government. While the southern white fought against the Union, the negro did all he
could to aid it; while the southern white sees in the national government his
conqueror, the negro sees in it his protector; while the white owes to the national
debt his defeat, the negro owes to it his deliverance; while the white considers
himself robbed and ruined by the emancipation of the slaves, the negro finds in it
the assurance of future prosperity and happiness. In all the important issues the
negro would be led by natural impulse to forward the ends of the government, and
by making his influence, as part of the voting body, tell upon the legislation of the
States, render the interference of the national authority less necessary.
Carl Schurz, Report on conditions in the South (1865) [to Andrew Johnson]
(cont.) In the right to vote he would find the best permanent protection against
oppressive class-legislation, as well as against individual persecution. The relations
between the white and black races, even if improved by the gradual wearing off of
the present animosities, are likely to remain long under the troubling influence of
prejudice. It is a notorious fact that the rights of a man of some political power are
far less exposed to violation than those of one who is, in matters of public interest,
completely subject to the will of others. . . .
Frederick Douglass, “Reconstruction,” Atlantic Magazine (December 1866)
While there remains such an idea as the right of each State to control its own local
affairs,—an idea, by the way, more deeply rooted in the minds of men of all
sections of the country than perhaps any one other political idea,—no general
assertion of human rights can be of any practical value. To change the character of
the government at this point is neither possible nor desirable. All that is necessary
to be done is to make the government consistent with itself, and render the rights
of the States compatible with the sacred rights of human nature.
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, spite of all the laws the Federal
Government can put upon the national statute-book.
PARDON.
Columbia: “Shall I
trust these men.”
Thomas Nast in
Harper’s Weekly,
August 5, 1865
FRANCHISE.
“And not these
men?”
Thomas Nast in
Harper’s Weekly,
August 5, 1865
Civil Rights Act of 1866
all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding
Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States; and such
citizens, of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery
or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall
have been duly convicted, shall have the same right, in every State and Territory in
the United States, to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give
evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal
property, and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of
person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens, and shall be subject to like
punishment, pains, and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance,
regulation, or custom, to the contrary notwithstanding.
Civil Rights Act (1866)
• Intended to ensure that federal and state citizenship
were the same
– Closes a loophole opened in the Dred Scott case of 1857
• Defined new “civil” rights (i.e., those social rights
deemed sufficiently important for government to
protect – part of the meaning of “freedom”)
• Federal government becomes guarantor
– Because states could not be relied upon to do so
– A reversal of longstanding principles of federalism?
• Johnson’s veto (overriden)
The 1866 civil rights bill, which prohibited discrimination on the bases of race or previous condition of slavery, prefigured the 14th
amendment to the Constitution. In the foreground of the mural, former slave Henry Garnet is shown speaking with newspaper editor
Horace Greeley, who supported African American suffrage. In the background are the Columbus doors, which originally led to the
House Chamber but were later moved to the Rotunda entrance.
In all our history, in all our experience as people living under Federal and State law, no
such system as that contemplated by the details of this bill has ever before been
proposed or adopted. They establish for the security of the colored race safeguards
which go infinitely beyond any that the General Government has ever provided for the
white race. In fact, the distinction of race and color is by the bill made to operate in
favor of the colored and against the white race.
They interfere with the municipal legislation of the States, with the relations existing
exclusively between a State and its citizens, or between inhabitants of the same
State—an absorption and assumption of power by the General Government which, if
acquiesced in, must sap and destroy our federative system of limited powers and
break down the barriers which preserve the rights of the States.
It is another step, or rather stride, toward centralization and the concentration of all
legislative powers in the National Government. The tendency of the bill must be to
resuscitate the spirit of rebellion and to arrest the progress of those influences which
are more closely drawing around the States the bonds of union and peace….
14th Amendment
• To protect constitutionality of Civil Rights Act
of 1866
• Passes House and Senate June 1866
• Rejection by Johnson state governments (TX,
GA, NC, SC, KY, DE, MD, MI, VA)
• Ratified by 3/4 states July 9, 1868
Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United
States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,
are citizens of the United States and of the
state wherein they reside. No state shall make
or enforce any law which shall abridge the
privileges or immunities of citizens of the
United States; nor shall any state deprive any
person of life, liberty, or property, without due
process of law; nor deny to any person within
its jurisdiction the equal protection of the
laws.
14th Amendment, Article I
•
•
•
•
Citizenship clause
Privileges and immunities clause
Due process clause
Equal protection clause
Section 2.
Representatives shall be apportioned among
the several states according to their respective
numbers, counting the whole number of
persons in each state, excluding Indians not
taxed. But when the right to vote at any
election for the choice of electors for President
and Vice President of the United States,
Representatives in Congress, the executive and
judicial officers of a state, or the members of
the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the
male inhabitants of such state, being twentyone years of age, and citizens of the United
States, or in any way abridged, except for
participation in rebellion, or other crime, the
basis of representation therein shall be
reduced in the proportion which the number
of such male citizens shall bear to the whole
number of male citizens twenty-one years of
age in such state.
Section 3.
No person shall be a Senator or Representative
in Congress, or elector of President and Vice
President, or hold any office, civil or military,
under the United States, or under any state,
who, having previously taken an oath, as a
member of Congress, or as an officer of the
United States, or as a member of any state
legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer
of any state, to support the Constitution of the
United States, shall have engaged in
insurrection or rebellion against the same, or
given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.
But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of
each House, remove such disability.
Section 4.
The validity of the public debt of the United
States, authorized by law, including debts
incurred for payment of pensions and bounties
for services in suppressing insurrection or
rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither
the United States nor any state shall assume or
pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of
insurrection or rebellion against the United
States, or any claim for the loss or
emancipation of any slave; but all such debts,
obligations and claims shall be held illegal and
void.
Reconstruction Acts
• 4 measures passed 3/67-3/68 (key is “An Act to provide for
the more efficient Government of the Rebel States” 3/67)
• Former CSA states (except TN) divided into 5 military
districts
• To re-enter union, each state had to draft new state
constitution, to be approved by Congress
– Voting for delegates in the conventions = universal manhood
suffrage (no racial exclusion)
– Service as delegates open to all on same basis
– Stricter loyalty oath required
– The constitutional conventions had to ratify the 14th
Amendment
"I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm), in the presence of Almighty God,
that I am a citizen of the State of _____; that I have resided in said State for
_____ months next preceding this day, and now reside in the county of
_____ or the parish of _____, in said State (as the case may be); that I am
twenty-one years old; that I have not been disfranchised for participation in
any rebellion or civil war against the United States, nor for felony committed
against the laws of any State or of the United States; that I have never been a
member of any State legislature, nor held any executive or judicial office in
any State and afterwards engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the
United States, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof; that I have
never taken an oath as a member of Congress of the United States, or as an
officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an
executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the
United States, and afterwards engaged in insurrection or rebellion against
the United States, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof; that I will
faithfully support the Constitution and obey the laws of the United States,
and will to the best of my ability, encourage others so to do, so help me
God."'
Johnson’s reply
• Johnson vetoes the act (March 1867);
Congress overrides (as with FB extension bill)
• Congress passes Tenure of Office Act,
forbidding Johnson from removing cabinet
members without Congressional assent
– Johnson’s violation of this act, in dismissing
Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and replacing him
with Lorenzo Thomas, triggered impeachment
proceedings
"The situation". Print shows Ulysses Grant and Edwin Stanton near cannon labeled "Congress" aimed at
Lorenzo Thomas and President Johnson. Harper's weekly, v. 12, no. 584 (1868 March 7), p. 160.
Impeachment
• August 1867: Johnson demands Stanton’s resignation (over appointment
of military governors of Radical sympathies in the South)
• Stanton refuses to quite while Congress is away; Johnson suspends him
until Congress meets again (in December)
• January 1868: Congress disapproves and reinstates Stanton
• Johnson appointments Lorenzo Thomas to replace, but Stanton refuses to
leave office
• February: House impeaches Johnson for intentionally violating Tenure of
Office Act
• March: 3-month impeachment trial begins in Senate
• Johnson seeks to protect his office through dealmaking
• Final votes: 35 senators guilty; 19 not guilty -- 1 vote short of 2/3
necessary to convict
• 7 Republicans vote to acquit, including William Pitt Fessenden of Maine
The Senate as a Court of Impeachment for the
Trial of Andrew Johnson. Harper’s Weekly,
April 11, 1868.
Delegates to states constitutional conventions, 1867-1869
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Southern whites
Outside whites
Blacks
Unclassified whites
Unclassified delegates
Delegates to all ‘67-’69 constitutional conventions
8
Southern whites
38
Outside whites
257
Blacks
549
159
Unclassified
delegates
Southern
whites
8
17
45
Arkansas
Outside
whites
Blacks
Unclassified whites
10
35
Southern
whites
6
Outside whites
8
72
14
South Carolina
Blacks
68
Texas
Unclassified
whites