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I. The Struggle for National Reconstruction. Reconstruction questions : How should the South be readmitted? Should leaders be punished? Presidential Approaches: From Lincoln to Johnson Lincoln and Johnson had similar plans Amnesty (pardon) to most Confederates
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I. The Struggle for National Reconstruction • Reconstruction questions: • How should the South be readmitted? • Should leaders be punished? • Presidential Approaches: From Lincoln to Johnson • Lincoln and Johnson had similar plans • Amnesty (pardon) to most Confederates • States could be readmitted once 10% of voters in 1860 pledged loyalty and ratified 13th amendment • Confederate states rejected • Wade-Davis Bill – Congressional bill calling for a more strict 51% of loyalty • No rebels in government and permanent disenfranchisement of CSA leaders • Pocket-vetoed by Lincoln • Johnson • “Common man” from TN; loyal to Union during CW • Offered amnesty to all who swore allegiance, except a few CSA leaders • Used pardons heavily for former leaders like Lee and Stephens • Congress stepped in to take control of Reconstruction when: • South passed black codes - laws that restricted rights of free blacks • Georgia elected Alexander Stephens as their senator
I. The Struggle for National Reconstruction • Congress vs. the President: • Freedmen’s Bureau - Provided food, education, and assistance to former slaves and poor whites • Its biggest success was in education • Civil Rights Act of 1866 • granted citizenship to blacks and equal protection • Both bills vetoed by AJ but overridden by Congress • Fourteenth Amendment – • citizenship to all those born in US (made the Act of 1866 permanent) • Radical Republicans – • Charles Sumner in the Senate, Thaddeus Stevens in the House
I. The Struggle for National Reconstruction • Radical Reconstruction: Aimed to reform the South and increase federal power • Reconstruction Act of 1867 – divided the South into 5 districts • States must provide suffrage for blacks and deny it to ex-Confederates • The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson: • Violated the Tenure of Office Act: • President must get consent of Senate before removing cabinet members • House said he was “infringing on the powers of Congress” • Johnson is impeached, however, he is NOT removed from office • Election of 1868 and the Fifteenth Amendment: • Grant wins (war hero ) • 15th – Suffrage could not be denied based on “race, color, or previous condition of servitude” • Left room for poll taxes and literacy tests.
Struggle for National Reconstruction • Woman Suffrage Denied: • Most men opposed women’s suffrage0-even northern men • Abolitionists and women’s suffragists had been close allies before 1865 • 15th left out “sex” • Movement splits: • Lucy Stone and the American Women Suffrage Association hoped to achieve suffrage after Reconstruction • Stanton feared suffrage was not likely near, National Woman Suffrage Association advocated an amendment for women’s suffrage
II. The Meaning of Freedom The Quest for Land Freed Slaves and Northerners: Conflicting Goals • Many Northerners believed that wage labor would overtake the South-that cotton should still be the primary export and African Americans should be wage workers on plantations. • Former slaves wanted land; most Republicans did not want to confiscate land, though former slaves felt entitled to it; few states developed opportunities for freedmen to purchase land; most were economically vulnerable to discrimination.
Quest for Land… • Wage Labor and Sharecropping: • Many former slaves had to work for former slave owners since they had no land • **Sharecropping** • Renting land and paying via crops • If a drought or poor farming hit, tenants would be in trouble • Crop-Lien: • Receiving credit from a local store, usually at a HIGH rate (50-60%) • Usually led to debt for borrowers (former slaves)
II. The Meaning of Freedom Republican Governments in the South Rejoining the Union All southern states rejoined the Union between 1868 and 1871; Being protected by federal troops, Republican governments included African Americans The Southern Republican Party included whites and blacks In the late 1860s, African Americans made up the majority of voters in AL, FL, SC, and MS. Union League- a secret organization to pressure Congress for freedmen’s causes; Freedmen’s Bureau played key role in creating colleges for African Americans (Fisk, Tougaloo, and the Hampton Institute).
Scalawags and carpetbaggers Republican Governments in the South, cont’d… Scalawags and carpetbaggers • Scalawags: Southerners that favored Reconstruction (mostly for economic reasons) • Carpetbaggers: Northerners that moved South during Reconstruction: • Political opportunities for African Americans increased during Reconstruction: • Robert Smalls – former slave, and Civil War hero, became a Congressman • Hiram Revels – 1st African American in the Senate (Jefferson Davis’ seat)
II. The Meaning of Freedom C. Building Black Communities 1. Churches 2. “Race uplift”
III. The Undoing of Reconstruction Disillusioned Liberals – • Revolt emerged within Republican Party; led by “classical liberals” who advocated free trade, smaller government, and limited voting rights; formed the Liberal Republican Party in 1872; • Leader-Horace Greeley
Depression & Demands for Inflation • Panic of 1873 • Caused by unbridled capitalist expansion • Produced too much – price goes down, businesses collapse • Banks – loans were not being repaid • 15,000 businesses went bankrupt; including the Freedmen’s Savings and Trust Company ;black Americans lost some $7 million in savings. • Many argued for inflationary policies to make it easier to pay off debts.
Credit Mobilier Scandal – 1872 Railroad construction company formed by Union Pacific Over paid themselves Paid off members of congress Exposed by NY newspaper 2 congressmen censured VP accepted stock Whiskey Ring – 1875 Robbed treasury of millions in excise tax Grant’s private sec was involved Sec of War William Belknap – 1876 Pocketed money from suppliers to Indian resrvations. Corruption in Grant Adm.
III. The Undoing of Reconstruction • Counterrevolution in the South: • Redeemer” governments: • Local and state governments that ousted Republican governments • Often done through violence and intimidation • KKK terrorized blacks and Republicans • Enforcement Acts: 1870-1871 • Response to the KKK • Federal government could intervene to suppress terrorist activities. • President could use the military to protect individual rights
III. The Undoing of Reconstruction • Reconstruction Rolled Back • Democrats gained control of the House in 1874 • Most of the country (including the Grant administration) was no longer concerned with the South • The Supreme Court Rejects Equal Rights: • US v. Cruikshank – court ruled that only state violations of individual rights were a concern, not individual rights • Civil Rights Cases - 14th Amendment did not prevent private discrimination, only government discrimination
The Political Crisis of 1877: • Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) v. Samuel Tilden (Democrat) • Tilden received 184 electoral votes to Hays 165; 185 needed to win • 20 votes were in dispute • Eventually, all 20 were given to Hayes • Importance of the Compromise of 1877? • RECONSTRUCTION ENDS!, The military is withdrawn from the South
Constitution & Votes • Specifies that the electoral returns shall be sent to Congress & opened by president of the Senate • Who should count the votes? Constitution doesn’t say
Results of the Compromise • Officially ended Reconstruction • Violence was averted by sacrificing the black freedmen in the South • Republicans abandoned its commitment to black equality • Civil Rights Act of 1875 – last try by Republicans • Supposedly guaranteed equal accommodations in public places & prohibited racial discrimination in jury selection
Supreme Court • Declared Civil Rights Act of 1875 unconstitutional in 1883. • Declared that the 14th Amendment prohibited only government violations of civil rights, not the denial of civil rights by individuals
The Democratic South • Suppressed blacks • Blacks who tried to vote faced unemployment, eviction, & physical harm • 1890s – required literacy test, voter registration laws, & poll taxes • Blacks became economically dependant • Sharecropping & tenant farming
Compromise of 1877 • Created to solve the election deadlock • Electoral Count Act - passed by Congress • Set up electoral commission consisting of 15 men selected from the Senate, the House, & the Supreme Court • Not successful in solving the problem because there were 8 –R and 7-D • Democrats agreed to elect Hayes in exchange for: • Removal of all federal troops in the South • Subsidizing of a southern transcontinental railroad line – not kept
