Transcript Politics After the Civil War

Politics After the Civil War
Radical Republicans advocated extending full civil
rights to ex-slaves.
Conservative Republicans principally wanted to
pursue economic development.
Both the Radical and Conservative Republicans
agreed that African Americans should have legal
equality.
Texans sought to reestablish the Democratic rule
redolent of that before the war. Most urgent, for
them, was to find a way to keep a newly freed black
population (estimated by scholars to have numbered
about 250,000) in subordination. (See p. 148)
Federal Army Enters Richmond, 1864, by Harper’s Weekly, New York
Chaos in 1865
1. Disbanded soldiers
confiscated Confederate
property
2. Criminals committed acts
of violence and theft
3. State and local
governments were
powerless
News of the Confederate surrender in April 1865 resulted in the
disintegration of the army and government in Texas.
Servicemen deserted in large numbers, and as the army
dissolved, chaos erupted. Disbanding soldiers sacked arsenals
and government buildings and confiscated Confederate public
property of every sort. Scoundrels capitalized on the general
disorder to rob and recklessly kill innocent civilians.
Unidentified persons pillaged the state treasury on the night of
June 11. Simultaneously, government at the state and local
level staggered. (pp. 148-149)
General Gordon Granger - June 19, 1865
1. Declared the acts of the Texas Confederate
government illegal
2. Paroled members of the Confederate army
3. Announced that all slaves were free
General Gordon
Granger
Texas was in a stronger position than other
southern states
1. Slaves had been moved into the state
2. Trade with Mexico had helped Texas
businesses
3. Little wartime devastation
Problems at the end of the Civil War
1.
2.
3.
Financial distress
Property values depreciated
Legacy of hatred
PRESIDENTIAL RECONSTUCTION
President Andrew Johnson,
A Unionist Democrat from Tennessee,
succeeded to the presidency on April
15, 1865, after the Assassination of
Abraham Lincoln.
President Andrew Johnson
offered relatively mild terms for
those states which seceded to
reenter the Union. He called on
them to declare secession null
and void, to cancel the debt
accumulated during the war,
and to approve the Thirteenth
Amendment, which ended
slavery. However, he did not
press further to guarantee the
rights of African Americans.
Most white Texans who took the
oath of loyalty to the United
States, as required, could
participate in the restoration of
home rule. This lenient policy
permitted the majority of
Texans to assume previous civil
rights. (p. 150.)
Andrew Johnson's Restoration Plan
1.
2.
3.
4.
Declare secession null and void
Cancel the Confederate debt
Approve the Thirteenth Amendment
Amnesty program
Andrew Jackson Hamilton
Hamilton and his supporters worried
that those tied to the Confederate past
would attempt to regain their former
prominence, and duly block efforts to
realize civil rights for black persons.
On June 17, 1865, President
Andrew Johnson appointed
Andrew Jackson Hamilton,
a former U.S. congressman
from Texas and a Unionist
who had fled to the North,
as provisional governor of
Texas. As a part of his
ongoing plan to implement
what historians call
Presidential Reconstruction,
Johnson instructed
Hamilton to call a
convention and undertake
the necessary steps to form
a new civil government in
the state. (p. 150.)
Political Parties
•Republican Party
Position Regarding
Freedmen’s Civil Rights
Proposed basic civil rights for
the freedmen.
•Unionists
•Conservative Democrats
(formerly the Secessionist
Democrats)
•Conservative Unionists
Opposed granting any
freedoms to blacks beyond
emancipation; they favored
new legislation specifically
restricting the rights of African
Americans.
See pages 150-151.
James Webb Throckmorton
Convention Chairperson
Governor of Texas
On June 25, 1866, the
voters approved the
Constitution of 1866,
which essentially consisted
of an amended Constitution
of 1845…. (p. 152).
1866 Constitutional Convention
1. Declared secession illegal
2. Repudiated the war debt
3. Ratified the Thirteenth
Amendment
Federal mandates forced the convention to
grant certain rights to blacks
1.
2.
3.
4.
Purchase and sell property
Sue and be sued
Enter into contracts
Testify in court in cases involving blacks
The convention denied blacks
1.
2.
3.
4.
The right to vote
The right to hold public office
The right to serve on a jury
Public schools
The “Black Code” included a contract labor law
specifying that laborers wanting to work for more
than thirty days would have to enter a binding
agreement. Although the “black code” did not
mention race specifically, it clearly intended to
dictate the way the freemen would earn their living.
(p. 154.)
Black Code
Legislation
The black code legislation prohibited blacks from marrying
whites, holding office, and voting. African Americans suspected
of being truant from their jobs could be arrested and forced to
work on public projects without pay until they agreed to return
to their employer.
In dealing with whites, African Americans could not make
insulting noises, speak disrespectfully or out of turn, dispute
the word of whites, or disobey a command. Further, they had to
stand at attention when Whites passed, step aside when white
women were on the sidewalk, address whites "properly" and
remove their hats in the presence of whites. Whites insisted
upon this behavior because they continued to believe in white
supremacy.
To restrict the liberties of Blacks, the 1866 state legislature
enacted "black codes," which essentially were an attempt to
recreate slavery. A contract labor law specified that the
freedmen were to choose an employer and then sign a binding
contract if their work exceeded one month. A child
apprenticeship law provided that parents could indenture their
offspring to employers until the age of 21.
General Philip
Sheridan
Elisha
M.
Pease
Donald Campbell to Pease,
August 25, 1868
Freedmen’s Bureau
See page 155.
•White Texans detested the outsiders from
the North.
•“carpetbaggers” and “scalawags”
•With only about 70 field agents and
subordinates at its full manpower level, the
bureau lacked the personnel to help ex-slaves
successfully enter society as free persons.
•Many Texans saw the bureau as an
institution thrust upon them by the Radical
Republicans
•E. M. Gregory was transferred out of the
Texas Freedmen’s Bureau because white
Texans thought him too sympathetic to the
freedmen’s rights
Scalawags and
Carpetbaggers
Carpetbagger
or
Good Freedman Bureau Officer
A political
cartoon depicting
the KKK and the
Democratic party
as continuations
of the
Confederacy.
The Freedmen's Bureau, Alfred R. Waud, July 25, 1868
Reproduced from Harper's Weekly
George T. Ruby
Targets of white terrorism
1. Blacks
2. Freedmen's Bureau
agents
3. U. S. Army
A cartoon threatening that the KKK would lynch
carpetbaggers, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Independent
Monitor, 1868.
The Freemen’s Bureau supported the education of former
bondspeople. In 1865, the bureau began operating sixteen
schools for freedmen in Texas. (p. 155)
Texas v. White
In March 1869, the U.S. Supreme Court
ruled that a state’s secession from the
Union was unconstitutional.
Ab initio: the belief that all official acts
passed under secession to help the
Confederacy were null and void.
(p. 159.)
At the national level, Radical Republicans believed
1. Southerners should take an oath of allegiance
before voting or hold office
2. The southern states were "conquered provinces"
3. Blacks should have equal civil rights
Under Andrew Johnson's Restoration Plan
1. Ex-Confederates controlled the southern
governments
2. Black codes limited the right s of freedmen
3. White terrorism
A series of congressional acts in 1867
established Radical Reconstruction
1. Divided the South into five military districts
2. Abolished the Restoration governments
3. Required new constitutions with equality
for blacks
4. Restricted the political participation of
former confederate leaders
Edmund J. Davis first got involved in
military affairs in 1859, when as a
district judge in South Texas, he
accompanied the ranger unit of Captain
William G. Tobin during the Cortina wars
in Brownsville. As the Civil War
approached, he supported Sam Houston
and opposed secession. After secession,
he refused to take a loyalty oath to the
Confederacy and was removed from his
judgeship.
President Lincoln commissioned
Davis a colonel in the Union army. Davis
recruited and led the First Texas Cavalry
(U.S.), and saw action in Galveston,
Matamoros, and the Rio Grande Valley.
Promoted to brigadier general in
November 1864, he commanded the
cavalry of General Joseph J. Reynolds in
the Division of Western Mississippi. On
June 2, 1865, he was among those who
represented the Union at the surrender
of Confederate forces in Texas.
Source: Texas State Library and Archives
Commission (www.tsl.state.tx.us/
governors/war/davis-p01.html)
This photograph shows Edmund J
Davis in uniform as a brigadier
general in the federal army.
The Election of 1869
By the time of the election of 1869, the Republicans had split and
consequently fielded two candidates. The Radical Republicans
chose Edmund J. Davis, who supported the principle of ab initio and
the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. Seeking to attract
disaffected Democrats, the Moderate Republicans ran A.J. Hamilton,
even though he did not believe in much of their program. (p. 161.)
Radical Republicans vs.
Moderate Republicans
The Radical Republicans
marshaled the black vote
through the efforts of the
Union League, in which Ruby’s
registration efforts had paid
dividends.
Moderate Republican
A.J. Hamilton
Radical Republican
Edmund J. Davis
The Radical Republican Governor Edmund Jackson
Davis establishes a state policy to bring order to the
state, and also establishes the state’s first system of
public education.
Edmund Jackson Davis
Governor Davis organized a state
police as well as a state militia,
both to be under the governor’s
oversight. He also signed a bill
financing a public school system
with such progressive features
as a state superintendent and
compulsory attendance. Higher
taxes were imposed on property
to finance these efforts…. (p.
164.)
Governor of Texas from
January 1870 to January 1874
Radicals supported
1. Ab initio
2. Equality for blacks
3. State financing of public
schools
4. The use of eastern railroad
interests to build railroads in
Texas
5. Disenfranchisement of exConfederates
6. The division of the state
Matt Gaines
George T. Ruby
Republicans were
weakened by
1. Internal divisions
2. White terrorism
Governor Davis Faces Strong Opposition
Governor Davis’s opponents managed to mold public opinion
into associating the Radical administration with corruption and
extravagant spending. Recent research suggests that the
greatest percentage of the state’s revenue went to law
enforcement, the common school system, and frontier defense
and that the Radicals were not in fact wasteful with the
taxpayers’ money. But Texans (among them the members of the
planter class, allies of the Democrats), opposed what they
considered arbitrary taxation, while others condemned what
they believed to be a central government’s usurpation of local
autonomy. As Democrats campaigned in the special
congressional election of 1871, they stressed the issues of high
taxes, corruption, fraud, and misgovernment.
In November of 1872, the Democrats won a majority in both
chambers of the State Legislature. When the new legislature
met in 1873, it abolished the state police and overthrew Davis’s
public school system. (p. 165)
In the gubernatorial election in December 1873, Davis again ran on the
Republican ticket, while Richard Coke, an ex-Confederate, campaigned
as a Conservative Democrat. During the campaign, Davis highlighted the
programs he had initiated, while Coke and his followers talked of
“redemption,” of restoring strong states’ rights and of overthrowing the
coalition of Republicans and freedmen. Coke took the election 100,415
to 52,141.
Edmund Jackson Davis
Richard Coke
(1829-1897)
Composite photo of the 1875 Constitutional Convention, Archives and
Information Services Division, Texas State Library and Archives
Commission.
Wagon Trains from Tennessee and Alabama entered Texas after the Civil
War. Early day Blueridge settlers were looking for a fresh start, and
Texas seemed to be the best place to find it.
Coming of the Steam Train in 1873 put
Reagan, Texas on the Map! The old
Reagan Depot stood next to the Train
tracks until the 1960's.