Transcript Reconstruction - Somerset Independent Schools

Reconstruction
Reconstruction
•The
•
•
•
•
Civil War is over
•Answer the following questions
How will you bring the former Confederate states
back into the Union?
Will there be any restrictions? Any requirements for
them?
What will you do with the former Confederate
soldiers? Generals? Political leaders?
There are now 4 million African Americans who were
once slaves who are now free. They have no homes,
no property, no jobs. What will you do with them?
Plans for Reconstruction
The Main Idea
Northern leaders had different ideas for dealing with the
many issues and challenges of restoring the southern
states to the Union.
Reading Focus
• What challenges faced the South after the Civil War?
• What actions did Union leaders take during wartime to
reconstruct the nation after the war’s end?
• How did Lincoln’s assassination affect the nation?
• Why did President Johnson and Congress differ over
Reconstruction?
Challenges after the Civil War

Much of the South in ruins
 Over

4 million African Americans free
 No

1/5 of population dead
education, no job, no money
Former Confederate States
 Conquered

territories or states again?
Former Confederate officers
 Forgive
or punish?
Cost of the War: The South
94,000 KIA, 164,000 to disease, 194,026
wounded
 Spent $2,099,808,707 on war
 Livestock killed: 40%
 Farm machinery destroyed: 50%
 Drop in total property wealth: 66%
 Total national wealth, 1860: 30%
 Total national wealth, 1870: 12%

Cost of the War: The North
110,100 killed in action
 224,580 to disease
 Of every 1,000 Federals in battle, 112
were wounded
 Spent $6,190,000,000 on war

 $2.5
million daily
Presidential Reconstruction
Lincoln’s 10% Plan
 Dec 1863: Proclamation of Amnesty and
Reconstruction

Forgiveness to all southerners who
pledged loyalty to Union & support of
emancipation
 except


high-ranking officers
When 10% took oath could organize new
state government banning slavery
3 states readmitted before end of war
 Arkansas,
Louisiana, & Tennessee
Lincoln’s Inaugural Speech
March 4, 1865
“With malice toward none, with charity for
all, with firmness in the right as God gives
us to see the right, let us strive on to finish
the work we are in, to bind up the nation's
wounds, to care for him who shall have
borne the battle and for his widow and his
orphan, to do all which may achieve and
cherish a just and lasting peace among
ourselves and with all nations.”
Congress upset with Lincoln’s plan
 Readmitting
states a power of Congress
 Secession illegal; southern states never
left the Union
 States should go through same admission
process as territories
 1864 Wade-Davis Bill


Military governors to rule southern states
Majority of white males pledge loyalty before
elections could be held
• South should be treated as conquered province

Lincoln pocket vetoed the bill
Lincoln’s Assassination
April 14, 1865 at Ford’s Theater
 Watching Our American Cousin with wife
and two guests
 Actor John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln

Part of a conspiracy
 “Sic Semper Tyrannus”


Vice President Johnson & Sec. of State
William Seward were also targets
Johnson was not attacked
 Seward was stabbed in bed

Lincoln’s Assassination
Lincoln died at 7:22 a.m. on April 15
 Booth was killed while hiding in a barn
 8 of his co-conspirators were tried & found
guilty


4 were hanged
 Mary
Surratt, Lewis Powell, David Herold, and
George Atzerodt


4 were sentenced to prison
Andrew Johnson became president
Johnson’s Plan
Similar to Lincoln’s plan
 Confederate leaders & wealthy
southerners had to apply for pardon
 State must ratify 13th Amendment



Outlawed slavery
Republicans in Congress displeased with
Johnson’s plan
Congressional Reconstruction
Southern reaction to Johnson’s
plan
Welcomed Johnson’s plan
 New state governments were formed
 Former Confederate officials were elected
to public office



Black Codes were passed


Some were sent to Congress
Kept former slaves from attaining equality
Resented Freedman’s Bureau &
occupying troops
Radical Republicans

Unhappy with presidential reconstruction
because of:
Former Confederate leaders holding office
 Black Codes

Wanted tougher rules for restoring state
governments
 Wanted to reshape southern society



Give Freedmen political & economic equality
Wanted to punish the South
Congressional Reconstruction

1866 Congress passed two bills
Continued support of Freedman’s Bureau
 Civil Rights Act of 1866

 Gave
blacks citizenship & outlawed discrimination
Johnson vetoed both bills
 Angered moderate Republicans who then
supported Radical Republicans

Radical Reconstruction

14th Amendment


Granted blacks citizenship & made Bill of
Rights apply to state governments
4 Reconstruction Acts were passed over
Johnson’s veto
Divided South into 5 military districts
 Set 3 conditions for state’s readmission

ratify 14th Amendment
 New state constitutions guaranteeing black vote
 Form new gov’t. elected by all male citizens
 Must
Radical Reconstruction

Tenure of Office Act, 1867
Senate approval to remove any appointed
official that Senate had approved
 Johnson challenged the law by firing Sec. of
War Edwin Stanton
 Congress impeached Johnson

1

vote shy of removing him
Fifteenth Amendment

Protected voting rights of African-American
males
Radical Reconstruction
Johnson’s impeachment
The Fifteenth Amendment

Edward Stanton, Lincoln’s secretary of
war, had stayed on in Johnson’s
cabinet.

During the impeachment trial,
Republicans nominated General Grant
as their presidential candidate.

Stanton supported congressional
Republicans and prevented Johnson
from undermining Congress’s
program. In response, Johnson fired
him.

The 1868 election was close, but the
African American vote in the South
gave Grant an electoral college
victory.

Republicans pushed through the
Fifteenth Amendment, which
extended suffrage to all African
American males nationwide.

This brought millions of potential new
voters to the Republican Party and
aimed to protect freedmen from
pardoned former Confederates.
However, it did not ban denial of
suffrage for reasons other than race.

The House of Representatives voted
to impeach Johnson for violating the
Tenure of Office Act.

The Senate failed to convict by one
vote, and Johnson remained in office.

Although no longer in control of
Reconstruction, Johnson continued to
issue pardons, and by the end of 1868
the rights of almost all Confederate
leaders had been restored.
Radical Governments

Political power in the South shifted

Carpetbaggers


Scalawags


Southerners who supported Radical Reconstruction
Freedmen



Northerners who were in the South
700 African Americans served in state legislature
16 elected to Congress
Created first public schools, eliminated property
requirements for voting, illegalized
discrimination, repealed Black Codes
Freedmen
• Some:
– Sought long-lost relatives
– Owned land or got a job
– Moved to cities
• Faced discrimination & low pay
– Moved West
• Soldiers & cowboys
– Sought education
• Freedman’s Bureau established 4000+ schools
– Established churches
• Most remained in the South
Freedmen
• Sharecropping
– Work for someone in exchange for a share of
the crop
– By late 1870s most freedmen were
sharecroppers
– Employer provided land, seed, tools, etc.
• Tenant farming
– Renting land from the landowner
– Grow any crop
Violence




South very violent during Reconstruction
KKK & others attacked black leaders & members
of the Freedman’s Bureau
Southerners wanted to restore the old political &
social order
Congress passed Enforcement Acts, 1870-71


Set heavy penalties for trying to prevent someone
from voting
Gave army & federal courts power to punish the KKK
Discontent with Reconstruction
People were dismayed that the army
remained in the South
 Republican governments appeared
ineffective, insufficient, & corrupt
 Blacks were unhappy: still impoverished &
no land reform
 South’s poor economic condition

End of Reconstruction

By 1870s support for Reconstruction was
declining
Thaddeus Stevens & Charles Sumner died
 Lawlessness was increasing in the South
 Northerners were getting tired of South’s
problems

Election of 1876



(R) Rutherford B. Hayes v. (D) Samuel J. Tilden
Tilden won popular vote & led in majority of
electoral votes
Votes in South were disputed, so Tilden lacked
majority of electoral votes


Two sets of returns from some states
Compromise


Republican congressional commission gave votes to
Hayes
Republicans agreed to pull troops out of the South
ending Reconstruction