The Civil War and Reconstruction

1. The Civil War and Reconstruction Ms. Smith US History Honor

2. Two Nations • When Uncle Tom’s Cabin was published in 1852, it sparked debates as Northerners began to worry about how slavery effected everyone and Southerners ardently defended it. • While slavery was the biggest issue between North and South it wasn’t the only one. • The North was more technologically advanced, having miles upon miles of railroad tracks that also had telegraph wires following them. • The South was slower to adopt both the railroad and the telegraph. • The North also was urban and had a higher population than the South. • As economic and political power shifted to the North, the South began to worry that they would lose their political voice.

3. The Mexican War and Slavery Extension • Western expansion surged in the 1830s-40s. • In 1836, the newly independent Texas voted be annexed by the US. • Southerners supported the move because they wished to create one or more slave states from the territory. • The Northerners opposed it. People in both areas worried that the move would begin a war with Mexico. • The treaty of annexation with Texas was signed in 1844, but was overthrown by the Senate two months later. • Before James Polk came into office in 1845, Congress finally approved annexation. • Mexico broke of diplomatic relations in March 1845. • War broke out in 1846 over the disputed southern border of Texas, which the US claimed was the Rio Grande. Mexico said it was the Nueces River farther north.

4. The Mexican War and Slavery Extension • The terms of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo included Mexico giving up its claim to Texas and setting the border at the Rio Grande, Mexico giving up California and New Mexico, and the US would pay Mexico 1.5 million dollars as well as taking on any claims made by American citizens against the Mexican government. • Five years later, Mexico would sell 30,000 miles of present day southern Arizona and New Mexico for $10 million in the Gadsden Purchase. • The war succeeded in bringing slavery to the forefront of American politics when David Wilmot attached a provisio to the bill about negotiating with Mexico saying that no territory from Mexico could become a slave state.

5. New Political Parties • The first attempt to address slavery in new territories was the Missouri Compromise of 1820. • The Compromise said that lands north of 36o 30’ N latitude would be free states. • After the Mexican War, the issues again came up when California asked to be admitted as a free state. • This action would upset the balance of free and slave states, and three of the most respected senators of the era ended up at the center of the debate: John C. Calhoun of SC, Henry Clay of Kentucky, and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts. • Clay called for a Compromise that would entail five laws. • First, California would be admitted as a free state. • Second, Utah and New Mexico would decide whether slavery would be illegal or legal in their own territory. • Third, Congress would abolish the sale of slaves, but not slavery itself. • Fourth, Texas would give up claims to New Mexico for $10 million. • Fifth, a Fugitive Slave Act would order all citizens of the US to assist in the return of enslaved people to their owners. It would also deny trial by jury to the escapee.

6. New Political Parties • ON March 4, 1850, John C. Calhoun – being so ill that he had to ask James Mason of Virginia to read his speech for him – stated one of the great summaries of the South’s view of the issue. • Calhoun said that the North had taken over the federal government due to the larger population giving the area more Representatives and votes in the Electoral College. • Calhoun also said that the southern states had the right to leave the Union if it was in their best interests, however, he said that the South did not actually want to leave. • Daniel Webster, a harsh critic of slavery expansion, surprised his audience by speaking in favor of Clay’s compromise. He was doing so in order to protect the Union. • This angered many of Webster’s supporters, but Northern businessmen feared the loss of Southern trade.

7. New Political Parties • Clay’s proposal passed and became the Compromise of 1850. • The Compromise ended up not solving anything, and only decided the fate of California. • During the 1850s, the two party system began to break down. At this time the two parties were the Whigs and the Democrats. • Nativism – movement to ensure that native-born Americans received better treatment than immigrants. • This led to the formation of the American party AKA the Know-Nothings, which supported making it harder for immigrants to become citizens and to work against Irish Catholic candidates. • Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois pushed through the Kansas-Nebraska Act which would allow the issue of slavery be decided by the people in each new state. IN effect, this repealed this Missouri Compromise of 1820. • This Act led to widespread protest in the North, as well as the launch of the new Republican Party.

8. The system Fails • Tensions between anti-slavery and pro-slavery factions exploded in Kansas after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska act. • Raids included looting of buildings, and in the case of one led by radical abolitionist John Brown, murder. • The violence caused the territory to be known as “Bleeding Kansas.” • The Brooks-Sumner Affair occurred not long after when Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts delivered a scathing speech on the subject, insulting Senator Andrew Butler of SC in particular. • Butler’s nephew, Preston Brooks of the House of Reps, entered the Senate chamber two days later and beat Sumner into unconciousness with a cane. • Across the South people supported Brooks, but Northerners were outraged. • In March 1857, the Supreme Court ruled in the Dred Scott case. Slave Dred Scott was suing his owner saying that because he and his wife had lived in a free state that they were free. • The decision said that slaves were not citizens, could not win freedom by living in a free state, and the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional.

9. The System Fails • The Lincoln-Douglas debates illustrated the two big principles in American government: majority rule and minority rights. • Senator Stephen Douglas believed that the majority could rule as they wished, including allowing slavery. • Abraham Lincoln believed that the majority could not deny the minority their rights. • Though Lincoln ulitimately lost the Senate race in 1858, he was set up for the Presidential run two years later.

10. A Nation Divided Against Itself • The Election of 1860 became the breaking point. • There were no national political parties. Southern Democrats nominated John C. Beckinridge, while Northern Democrats nominated Stephen Douglas. • The American and Whig parties became the Constitutional Union Party and nominated John Bell of Tennessee. • The Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln. • In the South the race came down to Bell or Beckinridge, while in the North it was between Lincoln and Douglas. • IN the end, Southerners became outraged when Lincoln got the Presidency without one electoral vote from the South. • In response to what they believed was an injustice, the South seceded, with SC being the first to do so on December 20, 1860. • In February 1861, the Confederate States of America were created.

11. A Nation Divided against itself • There were attempts at last minute compromises, but they ultimately failed. • Fort Sumter was a federal fort, but in January 1861, the Confederate troops would not allow a resupply ship to dock. • Lincoln had pledged not to be aggressive to the South unless provoked, but did also pledge to defend federal property. In April of that year he sent a message to the Governor of SC saying that he was sending supplies to the fort, but no soldiers. • Confederate President Jefferson Davis ordered General P.G.T. Beauregard to take the fort before supplies could arrive. • Major Robert Anderson of the Union refused to surrender, and this led to the bombardment of the fort, and the opening of the Civil War. • The four states of the Upper South then seceded after Lincoln called for volunteers to fight the Confederates. • The Border States of Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri, and newly created West Virginia were still uncommitted at that time.

12. From Bull Run to Antietam • FYI: Many Civil War battles have two names. In the South, they were usually known by the closest town, and in the North, by the closest body of water. For example, the Battle of Bull Run is also known as First Manassas. Most history books will use the name established by the North, with exceptions such as the Battle of Shiloh. • Both sides began the war believing that the war would be over shortly. • General Irvin McDowell was ordered to take his green army into the field even though he was convinced that they needed more training. • This army was undisciplined and new, so the march to the town of Manassas was slow. The march was further complicated by having reporters, politicians, and civilians following along. • The delay allowed General PGT Beauregard to strengthen his smaller Confederate force. • The Union army looked to win at first, but Virginians under General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson held out until a new set of Confederate troops arrived. • The Union ended up retreating back to Washington DC among a confused horde of citizens. • Thus the Confederates won the First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas).

13. From Bull Run to Antietam • The North was far more ready for war with more railroads and industrialization, a larger population, and an established government and military. • The South had better leadership since seven of the eight military colleges were in the South, and many officers sided with the South. • The South was also merely on a defensive stance, as well as having higher morale. • The Union placed a blockade on Southern ports hoping to prevent trade for needed goods as well as strategies to conquer the Mississippi River and Richmond, Virginia. • The South hoped to win via war of attrition. • War of attrition – type of war where one side inflicts continuous losses on the other to wear down its strength. • However both this and a self-imposed cotton embargo blew up in the Confederates’s faces – instead of causing the British and French industrialists to pressure their governments into helping the South, both countries simply went elsewhere for cotton.

14. From Bull Run to Antietam • Advanced weapons such as bullet-shaped ammunition and artillery shells meeting old school tactics contributed to the high amount of casualties. • The Union sent troops into Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee to take the Mississippi River, and this is referred to as the War in the West. These troops were led by Ulysses S. Grant. • The taking of Forts Henry and Donelson were the first major victories for the North. • The Battle of Shiloh between Grant and General Albert Johnston of the Confederacy was the bloodiest battle of its time. Over two days of fighting, 24,000 casualties piled up on both sides. • Eventually, the South only possessed two major posts on the Mississippi – Vicksburg, Mississippi, and Port Hudson, Louisiana. • In the east, the Confederates fought the blockade by developing the ironclad – an armored ship. The first ironclad was the Merrimack. • The Union shot back with the development of the entirely iron ship, the Monitor. • The fight between the Monitor and Merrimack changed naval warfare even though neither one came out the winner.

15. From Bull Run to Antietam • General McClellan attempted to take Richmond, but ultimately failed. Lincoln replaced him with General John Pope. • The Second Battle of Bull Run ended with another Confederate victory. General Pope was switched back out for McClellan. • After this, Robert E. Lee decided to invade the North. • At the Battle of Antietam, Lee was driven back into the South, but Antietam became the bloodiest day of the war with over 26,000 casualties from both sides.

16. Life Behind the Lines • The CSA experienced problems with their political structure. The government was similar to the USA, but they put stronger protections on states rights and slavery. • The CSA put a draft law into effect, for men 18-35. After Antietam, max age was raised to 45, and even later raised to 50. • The South desperately tried to find a foreign ally, but none would formally recognize them as a independent nation. • They were almost able to gain Britain’s cooperation, but the British were strongly opposed to slavery. • IN 1861, Congress passed the first federal income tax in American history. Congress also issued a national currency called greenbacks that were not backed by gold. • There was opposition to the war in the North. • The Copperheads were one such protest group. They warned that the Republicans would bring a flood of freed slaves into the North and they would take all the jobs. • Copperheads – Northern Democrats that opposed the Civil War. • Lincoln also had to worry about the slave states on his border – Kentucky, Missouri, Delaware, and Maryland.

17. Life Behind the Lines • Lincoln ordered the arrest of Maryland legislators who supported secession in order to prevent the state from leaving. • In Missouri, Lincoln supported an anti-Confederacy uprising and Kentucky was put under martial law. • Lincoln also had to deal with abolitionists attacking him for not making the war about freeing the slaves. • Lincoln personally disliked slavery, but did not think the Constitution gave him to the power to abolish it. His priority was the preservation of the Union. However, he came to see it as a strategy for winning the war. • ON January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. • The Proclamation did not directly impact slavery because it only applied to areas under Confederate control. The Border states did not lose their slaves. • During the war, slaves captured were considered contraband, and could be freed at the Union’s discretion. After the Proclamation they joined the Union army. • African Americans were not originally allowed to join the army. After the defeats of McClellan, Congress allowed them to join up. • The first African American to win the Medal of Honor was Sergeant William Carney of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry.

18. Life Behind the Lines • The South faced famine as food production declined during the war. • Southern women were left to run the farms. • Inflation and profiteering caused prices to skyrocket. • Prisoner of war camps were about the same on both sides, but the one Confederate officer tried for war crimes was the commander of the CSA Andersonville camp. The camp was built for 10,000 men but eventually held 35,000. • Medical care was also a big issue. Many men on both sides died from disease. • Thousands of women volunteered to help tend to the wounded on both sides. • One of these women was Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross. • Disease was further helped along by the sanitary problems of the camps.

19. The Tide of War Turns • Lincoln replaced McClellan again with General Ambrose Burnside. • Burnside advanced into Virginia, planning to march straight at Richmond. Lee responded by gathering his army at Fredericksburg, Virginia. • Burnside decided to cross the river directly in front of Lee’s forces. Lee let them cross, but during the Battle of Fredericksburg killed about 13,000 Union soldiers. • Burnside asked to be relieved of command soon after. • General Joseph Hooker tried next, planning on going behind Lee to attack from behind. • Lee found out and set a trap. Hooker’s forces were attacked by those under General Stonewall Jackson, who ended up being injured in a friendly fire incident. • This became known as the Battle of Chancellorville, and another Confederate victory. • After these two battles, some Northerners began to talk about making peace with the South. • In June 1863, Lee went again into the North, hoping to find supplies in Pennsylvania.

20. The Tide of War TUrns • General Hooker was replaced with General George Meade, just in time for the greatest battle ever fought in North America, the Battle of Gettysburg. • July 1, 1863 – A skirmish near the town grows into a full-scale battle. The Confederates push the Union south, and armies gather on both sides. Lee orders an attack on the Union position at Cemetery Ridge for the next morning. • July 2, 1863 – Confederate General Longstreet delays until late afternoon to attack southern end of Union line, giving the Union a chance to bring in reinforcements. Maine unit defends Little Round Top, and Union lines remain intact. • July 3, 1863 – Brief Confederate attack followed by long artillery exchange. Thinking the Union guns have been destroyed, Lee attacks only to be repelled by a Union artillery barrage. The Confederates prepare for retreat into Virginia. • The last charge by the Confederates is known as Pickett’s Charge for General George Pickett. It ended the bloodiest battle of the Civil War. All together the two armies lost upwards of 50,000 men.

21. The Tide Turns • Vicksburg, Mississippi was the last Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi River, and it was Ulysses S. Grant’s job to take it. • Vicksburg fell after a siege that lasted over a month. The Confederate Army in Vicksburg surrendered on July 4, 1863. This effectively cut the Confederacy in half. • As the tie turned, the South began thinking of making peace while the North celebrated its new victories.

22. Devastation and New Freedom • In March 1864, Lincoln finally made Ulysses S. Grant commander of the Union forces. Grant made William Tecumseh Sherman the commander of the Union Army of the West while he stayed East. • Grant’s strategy was to wear down the Confederate Army by using the North’s superior population and supplies. • After the Battle of the Wilderness, where Grant lost many of his men, he pushed South rather than retreating. • Grant attempted to get to Richmond, but after a lot of opposition, went around it to the town of Petersburg. • Grant then looked to the Shenandoah Valley, and ordered his troops to damage the crops and railroads. • General Sherman was taking the same tactic as Grant, with his goal being Atlanta, Georgia.

23. Devastation and New Freedom • By mid-July 1864, the Union was a few miles from Atlanta. • Sherman laid siege to the city, and Atlanta fell to Sherman that September. • Before leaving on his March to the Sea, Sherman ordered the city evacuated and burned. He did so under the philosophy that total war would prevent the conflict from dragging out. • Sherman’s next target was Savannah. His March to the Sea would cut a trail of destruction through Georgia destroying bridges, railroads, and factories, and seizing livestock and slaughtering them. • Sherman captured Savannah on December 21, 1864. • Lincoln’s reelection campaign in 1864 was saved by Sherman’s capture of Atlanta. He won reelection by an overwhelming majority. • This also showed increasing support for abolition, and the Thirteenth Amendment was ratified in December of 1865.

24. Devastation and New Freedom • In February 1865, Sherman moved North through South Carolina. • South Carolina and North Carolina had seen little fighting up until then, but Sherman was determined to destroy what was left of the South’s morale and supplies. • South Carolina was also treated more harshly than Georgia. Civilian property was utterly destroyed in SC, while its destruction was ceased once the army reached North Carolina. • At Richmond, Lee tried his best to defend the city, but desertions had drastically reduced his numbers. • As Lee tried to head south, Grant’s forces would cut him off. • ON April 9 they reached the town of Appomattox Court House in Virginia where the small Confederate force was surrounded. Lee surrendered. • The terms of surrender were generous, and the Confederates were allowed to leave. Grant also put a stop to celebrations since he pointed out that they shouldn’t revel in the misfortunes of their countrymen.

25. Devastation and New Freedom • After that, Confederate forces surrendered. • Lincoln did not live to see the official end of the war. He was assassinated on April 14, 1865.

26. Presidential Reconstruction • In the period between 1865 to 1877 the government enacted a program to repair damage to the South and reinstate the South to the Union. This program is known as Reconstruction. • The war had destroyed 2/3 of the South’s shipping industry and thousands of miles of railroad. Farmland lost most of its value. • One in three white males in the South had been killed. • All southerners were faced with economic hardships, and mass migrations happened in search of work. • Lincoln’s Reconstruction plan called for these things: • A pardon for an Confederate who would take an oath of allegiance. The pardon was not open to Confederate military and government officials and to southerners who had killed African American POWs. • Permitted each state to hold conventions to rewrite their constitutions after 10% of voters had taken the oath. These constitutions had to give suffrage to all adult males citizens. • States could then hold elections and participate fully in the Union. • This plan was considered by some to be too lenient and when Congress tried to pass a much stricter plan called the Wade-Davis Act. Lincoln let it die in a pocket veto.

27. Presidential REconstruction • Pocket veto – veto applied when the President does not formally sign or reject a bill within a certain time period after Congress has adjourned. • After Lincoln’s assisination, Reconstruction fell into Andrew Johnson’s hands. • Johnson had been born poor, and as a result hated the rich. • His plan included: • Pardon for Southerners who pledged allegiance to the Union. • Permitted each state to hold a convention without the 10% rule of Lincoln’s plan. • States were to void secession, abolish slavery, and repudiate the Confederate debt. • States could then hold elections. • Freed people began after the war to urge the federal government to redistribute land to the slaves since they had been the ones to clear it and farm it for generations. • Proposals to do so got little political support. Any redistribution happened on a small, local level. • African Americans also formed their own churches throughout the South. • Between 1865 and 1870, black educators founded 30 colleges, and teachers came to the South to start schools to teach freedmen how to read.

28. Presidential Reconstruction • Congress created the Freedmen’s Bureau in March 1865 to help black southerners adjust to freedom. • This was the first major federal relief agency in American history. • Although it only lasted until 1869, the Bureau gave out clothing, medical supplies, and meals to black and white war refugees.

29. Congressional Reconstruction • Under Johnson’s Reconstruction plan, former Confederates scrambled to pass laws the restricted the new freedoms of African Americans. These laws were called Black Codes. • Black codes – laws that severely restricted freedmen’s rights. • The codes generally included curfews, vagrancy laws, labor contracts, and land restrictions. • In 1866, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, but Johnson vetoed it. Congress overturned the veto, and went one step further. • IN June 1866, Congress passed the Fourteenth Amendment which guaranteed equal protection under the law. It was ratified in 1868. • Both Moderate and Radicals opposed Johnson’s Reconstruction policies and black codes, but Moderates were less enthused about granted freedmen civil rights. • Civil rights – citizen’s personal liberties guaranteed by law. • However support for civil rights grew when riots and violence against African Americans occurred.

30. Congressional Reconstruction • However, President Johnson lost a lot of support when he refused to support civil rights legislation. • This also allowed for many Radical Republicans to be voted into Congress during the 1866 Congressional elections. • This Radical Congress passed the Reconstruction Act of 1867: • The South was put under military rule with five districts. • Southern states would hold new elections for delegates to create new state constitutions. • Required states to allow universal male suffrage, and all eligble male voters were to participate. • Temporarily barred former Confederates from voting. • Southern states had to guaranteed equal righst to all citizens. • States had to ratify the 14th Amendment. • This opened up a power struggle between Johnson and the Radical Congress which would end with Johnson being brought up for impeachment after he violated the Tenure of Office Act by firing the Secretary of War without Senate approval. • Johnson would escape impeachment, but was not able to get anything done the rest of his term.

31. Congressional Reconstruction • In the 1868 presidential election Ulysses S. Grant was elected. • IN February 1869, Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment which gave all adult males the right to vote. • In the South, the Republican Party included carpetbaggers and scalawags. • Carpetbaggers were Northern Republicans who had moved South for various reasons. While the stereotype was of Northerners wanting to capitalize on Southern misery, most were well-educated people looking to help. • White Southern Republicans were considered traitors and referred to as scalawags. They included people who opposed secession, small farmers, and some planters.

32. Birth of the “New South” • After the war, the lack of slave labor created a problem. Planters had land but no labor, freedmen had labor but no land. • Thus sharecropping was born. Sharecroppers farmed a portion of a planter’s land with the payment of about half the crop and often, housing. • Sharecroppers worked under poor conditions and were often ended up in debt after the first year. Since they couldn’t leave as long as they were in debt, so the sharecropper ended up having to stay. • There was also tenant farming. Tenant farmers still didn’t own the land, but they paid rent and were able to choose what they planted. • These new practices caused a few changes to the South’s economy. • Changes in labor. After the war, 40% of the cotton crop was picked by white tenant farmers. • The emphasis was placed on cash crops so the South ended up having to import much of its food. • A cycle of debt developed. Rural southern farmers ended up having to use the year’s profits to pay the previous year’s bills. • Merchants became more numerous because they could sell to the tenant farmers and sharecroppers.

33. Birth of a “New South” • Factories sprang up around the South, as well as textile mills. • These factories did not usually make finished products. Instead they produced the lumber and pig iron used later in the process. • The South’s infrastructure also had to be almost completely rebuilt. • New services such as public schools were funded by heavy taxes that increased the financial burden of Southerners. • Corruption also ran rampant at the government level in the form of fraudulent loans and grants.

34. THE End of Reconstruction • The Ku Klux Klan was formed in 1866 by six former Confederates in Tennessee. • The Klan spread throughout the South, and its members were Confederates and other whites excluded from the political process. • The success of the Klan was due to the rage and fear felt by many of these people during the years after the war. • Klan violence was aimed mainly at African Americans and members of the Republican Party who were in power. The violence varied from place to place. • This violence caused the passage of the Enforcement Act of 1870 which prohibited the use of force to prevent people from voting. Other laws were passed that outlawed the Klan entirely. • However, by the mid-1870s, Reconstruction began to wane. • Voters became tired of the corruption inherent in Reconstruction legislatures as well as Grant’s own government. • Reconstruction legislatures also spent great sums of money that put states more heavily in debt.

35. The End of Reconstruction • A nationwide economic downturn also diverted attention away from the issue. • Withdrawing Federal troops also allowed for greater violence in the South. White Democrats used this to retake Southern governments. • The return of Democrats to power also caused many Reconstruction policies to be blocked. • Reconstruction politics took one final turn in the presidential election of 1876. • Rutherford B. Hayes lost the popular election to Samuel Tilden, but claimed to have one the electoral votes because of his wins in SC, Florida, and Louisiana. These three were still under Republican and federal control. • However, Tilden claimed to have won those states in another tally. • Congress set up a special commission, and the heavily Republican commission chose Hayes as the winner. • The Democrats still had enough power in the legislature to get the decision blocked. • The two parties made a deal. Hayes would get the win he didn’t deserve if he pulled federal troops from the southern states. • This allowed the Democrats to regain control of southern politics.