Transcript Unit8_Reconstruction - amstudies-lhs

Reconstruction Era
(1863-1877)
President Lincoln’s 10%
Plan
*
“Loyal Rule”
*
Didn’t ask Congress for approval.
*
Pardon citizens
*
10% vote
*
Plan to re-admit states back into
Union
President Lincoln’s Plan
1864 “Lincoln Governments”
formed in LA, TN, AR
*
*
“loyal assemblies”
Weak; dependent on
Union Army for survival
*
Military Force
*
Minority Rule
Lincoln is Dead!
Lincoln is assassinated by
John Wilkes Booth in
Ford's Theater
*
“Sic Semper Tyrannus!”
*
Shot in the back of the head
*
Dies within the day
*
Andrew Johnson becomes
President; must continue
Reconstruction
th
13
Amendment
 Ratified in December, 1865.
 Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude,
except as punishment for crime whereof the
party shall have been duly convicted, shall
exist within the United States or any place
subject to their jurisdiction.
 Congress shall have power to enforce this
article by appropriate legislation.
 Ended slavery, DID NOT grant citizenship
Freedmen’s Bureau (1865)
 Bureau of Refugees,
Freedmen, and Abandoned
Lands.
 Northern Abolitionists
 Help slaves;
gain political power
 “Carpetbaggers”
Freedmen’s Bureau Seen
Through
Southern
Eyes
“Plenty to
eat and
nothing
to do.”
Johnson & Reconstruction
 Jacksonian Democrat
 From Tennessee
 White Supremacist
 Agreed with Lincoln
that states had never
legally left the Union
“Damn the negroes! I am
fighting these traitorous
aristocrats, their
masters!”
Johnson becomes President after Lincoln's assassination.
Pres. Johnson’s Reconstruction Plan:
I. The majority of voters in each Southern state must pledge their
loyalty to the U.S….
II. …and each state must ratify (approve) the Thirteenth Amendment.
• The Thirteenth Amendment, which banned slavery, was ratified on
Dec.6, 1865
Johnson's Reconstruction Plan
Amnesty for loyalty oath EXCEPT:
- Civil War Officers
- Former Plantation Owners
- Individuals w/ property over $20,000
New State Constitutions
Forbid slavery; secession
Pay back war debt to Feds.
Johnson chose (did not elect) new governors
Slavery is Dead?
Growing Northern Alarm!
 Many Southern state constitutions
fell short of minimum
requirements.
 Johnson granted 13,500
“special pardons”
 Plantation owners resume
political power
 Revival of southern defiance;
racism
BLACK CODES
Black Codes
 Purpose:
*
*
*
Guarantee stable labor
supply
Restore pre-emancipation
race relations
Assures whites will earn
more $$ than blacks
 Forced many blacks to
become sharecroppers
[tenant farmers].
Sharecropping
Black Codes laws that severely limited
the rights of freedmen.
…serving on juries.
…voting.
AfricanAmericans were
forbidden from…
…owning guns.
…running for political office.
Section 3. …it shall not be lawful for any freedman, free negro or
mulatto to intermarry with any white person; nor for any person to
intermarry with any freedman, free negro or mulatto; and any person
who shall so intermarry shall be deemed guilty of felony, and on
conviction thereof shall be confined in the State penitentiary for
life.
Section 5. Every freedman, free negro and mulatto shall…have a lawful
home or employment, and shall have written evidence thereof…if living
in any incorporated city, town, or village, a license from that mayor
thereof; and if living outside of an incorporated city, town, or village,
from the member of the board of police of his beat, …which license
may be revoked for cause at any time by the authority granting the
same.
Section 6. All contracts for labor made with freedmen, free negroes and
mulattoes for a longer period than one month shall be in writing…and if
the laborer shall quit the service of the employer before the
expiration of his term of service, without good cause, he shall
forfeit his wages for that year up to the time of quitting.
Congress Breaks with the President
 Congress bars S.
Congressional delegates.
 Joint Committee on
Reconstruction created.
 February, 1866
 President
vetoed the Freedmen’s
Bureau bill.
 March, 1866
 Johnson
vetoed the 1866 Civil Rights Act.
 Congress passed both bills over
Johnson’s vetoes 1st time in
U. S. history!!!!
Radical Reconstruction
(1866-1877)
14th Amendment
 Ratified in July, 1868.
*
Natural-Born Citizens.
*
Citizens Rights
*
Pay back for war debt
 Southern states would be punished
for denying the right to vote to black
citizens!
Radical Plan for Readmission
 Military supervision (Martial Law)
 States must:
 Ratify 13th, 14th Amendments
 Black Suffrage
 In March, 1867, Congress passed act
to have military enroll black voters!
Reconstruction Acts of 1867
 Military Reconstruction Act
*
*
10 S. states refuse to ratify 14th Amend.
Divide 10 “unreconstructed states” into
5 military districts.
Reconstruction Acts of 1867
 Command of the Army Act
*
All Reconstruction acts must go
through Army Commander
 Tenure of Office Act
*
President can not remove cabinet
member’s w/o Congress consent
 Is this law constitutional???
Edwin
Stanton
Sec. of War
President Johnson’s Impeachment
 Johnson removes Stanton Feb. 1868.
 Johnson puts pro-S. Generals in charge
 House impeaches Feb. 24th by vote of 12647.
The Senate Trial
11 week trial.
Johnson acquitted
35 to 19 (one short
of required 2/3s
vote).
African-Americans & Govt.
•
Free blacks able to vote/participate in
govt.
• White hysteria
• Fear of “black oppression”
• Southern states feel need to
“re-establish” white rule
Examples:
- Poll Taxes
- Ku Klux Klan
- Black Codes
- Lynchings
White
Hysteria:
Colored
Rule
in the
South?
The Balance of Power in
Congress
State
White Citizens
Freedmen
SC
291,000
411,000
MS
353,000
436,000
LA
357,000
350,000
GA
591,000
465,000
AL
596,000
437,000
VA
719,000
533,000
NC
631,000
331,000
Black & White Political Participation
Black Senate & House Delegates
Blacks in Southern Politics
 Core voters were black veterans from Civil War
 Some held political office
 However, blacks were politically unprepared.
 The 15th
Amendment
guaranteed
federal voting.
15th Amendment
 Ratified in 1870.
 Amendment 15: “The right of citizens of the United
States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the
United States or by any state
on account of race, color, or previous condition
of servitude.”
 IMPACTS:
- Forbid denying the right to vote based
on race
The Failure of Federal Enforcement
 Enforcement Acts of 1870 & 1871
[also known as the KKK Act].
 “The Lost Cause.”
 Little to no
enforcement,
abuse of blacks
remains in South
The “Invisible Empire of the South”
Abandoning Reconstruction
 Northern support decreases
 “Grantism” & political
corruption
 Panic of 1873
 Concern over westward
expansion and Indian wars.
 Congress leaves enforcement
up to states
 “Poll Taxes”
 Literacy Tests
 Grandfather Clause