Reconstruction

1. Reconstruction 1865 through 1877 A time for rebuilding the South and reuniting the country.

2. Reconstruction Plans: Abraham Lincoln’s Plan • Lincoln wanted generous terms and leniency for former Confederates: “with malice toward none…” • He wanted to pardon southern supporters if they took oaths of loyalty to the United States. • His plan: recognize and welcome states back into the Union when ten percent (10%) of the people took oaths of allegiance to the Union and the states adopted new constitutions abolishing slavery. This was called the “10% Plan”. • Although Lincoln was open to suggestions from Congress, his assassination in 1865 meant that he would never carry out his program.

3. Reconstruction Plans: Andrew Johnson’s Plan • Andrew Johnson became president when Lincoln was assassinated and intended to follow broad outline of Lincoln’s plan. • Radical Republicans, who controlled Congress, wanted harsher terms for Confederates and Johnson’s failure to consider congressional views on Reconstruction and his attempts to block their plans led Republicans to try to impeach him. • President Johnson was charged with “high crimes and misdemeanors” and was impeached in 1868- although he was not removed from office because the Senate fell ONE vote short required to remove the president from office.

4. Reconstruction Plans: Radical Republicans in Congress • Now the Republican-controlled Congress dictated terms of Reconstruction. The main features of the Radical Republicans plans were: • The division of south into five (5) military districts controlled by U.S. Army while new state governments and constitutions were being set up. • The requirement that new constitutions had to give African American MEN the right to vote. • Southern states also had to ratify (approve) the 14th amendment which granted African Americans U.S. citizenship. The amendment also prohibited former Confederate officials from holding elected office.

5. State Governments During Reconstruction • White Southerners tried to regain control of state governments and wanted to limit the freedom and movement of former slaves (now called freedmen). They did not like Radical Republican Reconstruction plan because they were barred from holding office and voting. • Only a few white southerners supported Radical Republicans and served in the new southern state governments. They were branded, by former southern sympathizers, as scalawags (scoundrels) and Republican northerners who came south to take part in Reconstruction were called carpetbaggers. • Terror and violence were used to keep African Americans from participating in government.

6. The Freedmen’s Bureau • An organization created by Congress in 1865 to help former slaves (freedmen). It existed from 1865-1871. • At the end of the war, the bureau provided emergency food, housing, and medical care to former slaves and helped reunite families. • It helped former slaves adjust to freedom. Its main job was setting up work opportunities and supervising employment contracts with private landowners. It also helped former slaves get an education and established many schools for young African Americans.

7. Civil War Amendments During Reconstruction, states had to ratify these amendments to the Constitution: 13th Amendment: (1865)  Abolished slavery in the United States. 14th Amendment: (1868)  African Americans were made citizens of the United States- all native-born people. 15th Amendment: (1870)  Gave African American MEN the right to vote- and declared that state governments could not DENY the right to MEN based on race, color, etc…

8. President Ulysses S. Grant: 1868-1877 • Another president during Reconstruction was former Civil War General Ulysses S. Grant. Grant ran for president as a Republican and won the 1868 election. • Grant’s strengths were that of a military leader, not a politician. Scandals and corruption damaged his reputation and his presidency. • The most notorious scandals were: • Crédit Mobilier Scandal: railroad officials took money from the railroad companies, then bribed members of Congress to block any investigation. • Whiskey Ring: whiskey distillers took money for themselves and put it in their own pockets rather than paying federal tax collectors the money owed from tax on liquor.

9. The End of Reconstruction: 1877 • As corruption in the Grant Administration grew, Democrats began to gain power in the South and would dominate the southern U.S. for years to come…this gave rise to the term “the Solid South”. • Election of 1876: Samuel Tilden (D) v. Rutherford B. Hayes (R) -- Tilden won the popular vote, but the electoral votes were disputed. Four states had disputed election returns. -- A commission was appointed to count the votes, the Republican majority on the commission gave the disputed electoral votes to Hayes, thus guaranteeing his victory.

10. The End of Reconstruction: 1877 Compromise of 1877 Democrats agreed go along with the decision of the commission in return for Hayes promise to do the following: • Withdraw federal troops from Southern states • Hayes had to name a southerner to his cabinet • Spending money for internal improvements in the South • The Compromise of 1877 ended Reconstruction and allowed many southern leaders to regain power in southern state governments. White leaders actively worked to curb the rights of African Americans.

11. Reconstruction: Was it a failure? Ongoing violence continued against freedmen (former slaves) with the rise of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). • Segregation: separating people based on race • Jim Crow laws: segregation laws passed in the South. Legal separation of African Americans and whites in schools, public parks and buildings, and railroad cars. • Black Codes: laws passed in the Southern states to control freedmen and enable plantation owners to exploit African Americans: curfews, beatings, and contract work.

12. Reconstruction: Was it a failure? Voting Obstacles for African American Men: • Poll taxes: Southern laws that required registered voters to pay to vote. They were intended to keep poor people away from the polls, in particular, African Americans, who did not have any money. • Literacy tests: Designed by the southern states, these tests were designed to keep African Americans from voting…the tests were difficult and many former slaves were illiterate. • Grandfather Clause: allowed the son or grandson to vote if their grandfather voted before 1866. Since African Americans could not vote before that time, they were not allowed to vote.

13. Supreme Court Rules:Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) • In 1890, Louisiana passed a law called the Separate Car Act. This law said that railroad companies had to provide separate but equal train cars for whites and blacks. Blacks had to sit with blacks and whites had to sit with whites. This is called segregation. Anyone who broke this law would have to pay $2500 or go to jail for 20 days. • Two groups challenged the constitutionality of the Separate Car Act. A group of black citizens raised money to overturn the law and worked together with the East Louisiana Railroad Company, which sought to terminate the Act largely for monetary reasons. They chose a 30-year-old shoemaker named Homer Plessy, a citizen of the United States who was one-eighth black and a resident of the state of Louisiana. On June 7, 1892, Plessy purchased a first-class passage from New Orleans to Covington, Louisiana and sat in the railroad car for "White" passengers. The railroad officials knew Plessy was coming and arrestedhim for violating the Separate Car Act. Well known advocate for black rights Albion Tourgee, a white lawyer, agreed to argue the case for free. • Plessy argued in court that the Separate Car Act violated the 13th and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The Thirteenth Amendment banned slavery and the Fourteenth Amendment required the government treat people equally. John Howard Ferguson, the judge hearing the case, stated in a previous court decision that the Separate Car Act was unconstitutionalif applied to trains running outside of Louisiana. In this case, however, he declared the law was constitutional for trains running within the state and therefore found Plessy guilty. • Plessy appealed the case to the Louisiana State Supreme Court, which affirmed the decision that the Louisiana law was constitutional. Plessy then took his case, Plessy v. Ferguson, to the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the country. Judge John Howard Ferguson was named in the case because he had been named in the petition to the Louisiana State Supreme Court, not because he was a party to the initial lawsuit.

14. Supreme Court Rules:Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) • Who: Homer Plessy (1/8th African American: in Louisiana he was considered 100% African American) • What & Where: Plessy was jailed for sitting in a “white’s only” car on a train in Louisiana. • When: 1896 • Decision in the Case: Segregation was upheld as a law (legal) as long as African Americans had access to “separate but equal” facilities. Hence, segregation was legalized on trains, in schools, theaters, etc… • In Reality: Separate was RARELY, IF EVER, equal.