Transcript Ch 16 SHI - Reconstruction

Chapter 16
Reconstruction
1865-1877
Possible Essays on Third Exam
1. How did the increased sectionalism
between the North and South from
1830 to 1860 lead to the Civil War?
2. What largely accounted for the
election of Andrew Jackson?
Discuss the Cherokee Removal and
its legacy.
3. Discuss the relative strengths and
weaknesses of the North and South at
the beginning of the Civil War as well
as each side’s general strategy for
winning the war.
4. Discuss the impact of
Reconstruction on the United States
and, on balance, whether you
consider it to have been a success
or failure. What was the most
important legacy of Reconstruction?
Reconstruction
 Rebuilding federal union & politics
and economy of the South
 How treat the defeated South?
 Future of over 4 million former
slaves?
 Who’s in charge? Federal
government or states?
Charleston, South Carolina
Atlanta, Georgia Train Station
• 1860: South generated 30% of
country’s wealth
• 1870: only 12%
• From 1860 to 1870: Northern
wealth increased by 50%, but
South fell 60%
Lincoln’s Approach
• Lenient
• “With malice toward none…to bind up
the nation’s wounds; to care for him
who shall have borne the battle, and for
his widow and orphan, to do all which
may achieve and cherish a just and
lasting peace among ourselves...”
Lincoln and VP Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson
• Born in dire poverty and only
learned to read as an adult
• Only senator from a Confederate
state that remained loyal to Union
• Similar lenient plan after Lincoln’s
death
Minimal Compliance from South
• Grudgingly abolished slavery in
state law, ratified 13th Amendment
abolishing slavery & renounced
secession.
• Every state rejected black suffrage.
• 11 of the 21 northern states still
denied suffrage to blacks.
Freedom for Former Slaves
• Created their own communities
and institutions
• Churches important; black
ministers became prominent
leaders for communities (later,
Martin Luther King, Jr.)
p. 395
Freedmen’s Bureau
• First federal government
effort to provide assistance
directly to people instead of
states
Sent agents to South to
negotiate labor contracts
between blacks & white
landowners. Northern whites
didn’t want to take whites’
• No redistribution of white property
• Sharecropping labor system
- Landowner provided land, seed
& tools
- Sharecropper gave a share of
crop
- many blacks preferred over
working for wages since not
supervised daily by whites
• Many women volunteers from
North as teachers in schools
Southern Whites React
• Defined a legally subordinate role
through black codes
• Violent reaction by Ku Klux Klan
to restore white supremacy
• KKK also against white
Republicans, Freedmen’s Bureau
agents and Roman Catholics
Congress Takes Over
• Johnson proclaimed
Reconstruction complete & the
Union restored.
• Most Republicans disagreed and
Congress took over
Reconstruction to use federal
power to protect free labor and
basic rights in South
Civil Rights Act
• Johnson had favored states’ rights.
Congress passed over his veto.
• Unprecedented expansion of
federal powers, challenging
traditional concepts of states’
rights
• (1960s civil rights movement)
14th Amendment
• Constitutional guarantee of
equality before the law.
• Extends Constitution & Bill of
Rights civil rights protection
against action by state government
14th Amendment - Citizenship
• “All person born or naturalized in
the United States, and subject to the
jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of
the United States…” (not Indians)
• With only two exceptions, everyone
born in the United States is a U.S.
citizen
14th Amendment Guarantees
“Without due process of law” and
“equal protection of the laws”
provisions used as basis of many
controversial Supreme Court
decisions:
- abortion
- same-sex marriage
Voting Rights for Blacks
• States still determined voting
rights
• In addition to moral reasons,
Republicans wanted guaranteed
black suffrage in South to help
them win presidential elections &
majorities in Congress
15th Amendment – Voting Rights
• Prohibited federal & state
governments from denying
suffrage on basis of “race, color or
previous conditions of servitude.”
• Loopholes: didn’t prohibit states
from limiting suffrage on other
grounds (literacy test, paying a poll
tax) and no suffrage for women
p. 402
Map 15-1, p. 404
End of Reconstruction
• Contested presidential election of
1876 (centennial of Independence):
Samuel Tilden (Dem) vs.
Rutherford B. Hayes (Rep)
• Compromise of 1877
- Hayes won presidency
- Promised to end Reconstruction
Legacy
• Abolished slavery and Constitutional
amendments guaranteed equal
treatment; new public schools
• Rights often violated, especially for
blacks. Southern Democrats
eliminated meaningful black
participation in politics – persisted until
1960s.
• 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments
provided the constitutional foundation
for all future efforts for equality & civil
rights
• Until Reconstruction, states were
responsible for protecting citizens’ civil
rights; now the federal government