From until his death, President Abraham Lincoln took a moderate position on Reconstruction of the South and proposed plans to bring the South back into the Union as quickly and easily as possible. Voters then could elect delegates to draft revised state constitutions and establish new state governments.
All Southerners, except for high-ranking Confederate Army officers and government officials, would be granted a full pardon. Lincoln guaranteed Southerners that he would protect their private property, though not their slaves.
By , Louisiana, Tennessee, and Arkansas had established fully functioning Unionist governments. This policy was meant to shorten the war by offering a moderate peace plan. Lincoln feared that compelling enforcement of the proclamation could lead to the defeat of the Republican Party in the election of , and that popular Democrats could overturn his proclamation.
Radical Republicans hoped to control the Reconstruction process, transform Southern society, disband the planter aristocracy, redistribute land, develop industry, and guarantee civil liberties for former slaves. Although the Radical Republicans were the minority party in Congress, they managed to sway many moderates in the postwar years and came to dominate Congress in later sessions.
The bill stated that for a state to be readmitted, the majority of the state would have to take a loyalty oath, not just ten percent. Lincoln later pocket vetoed this new bill. This agency provided food, shelter, medical aid, employment aid, education, and other needs for blacks and poor whites. It also attempted to oversee new relations between freedmen and their former masters in a free-labor market.
With the help of the bureau, the recently freed slaves began voting, forming political parties, and assuming the control of labor in many areas. However, Congress continued to pass more radical legislation. During this era, Congress passed three important Reconstruction amendments. The Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery was ratified in The Fourteenth Amendment, proposed in and ratified in , guaranteed U.
Congress also passed the Reconstruction Acts. These initially were vetoed by President Johnson, but later were overridden by Congress. The first Reconstruction Act placed 10 Confederate states under military control, grouping them into five military districts that would serve as the acting government for the region. One major purpose was to recognize and protect the right of African Americans to vote.
Under a system of martial law in the South, the military closely supervised local government, elections, and the administration of justice, and tried to protect office holders and freedmen from violence. Blacks were enrolled as voters and former Confederate leaders were excluded for a limited period. The Reconstruction Acts denied the right to vote for men who had sworn to uphold the Constitution and then rebelled against the federal government.
As a result, in some states the black population was a minority, while the number of blacks who were registered to vote nearly matched the number of white registered voters. In addition, Congress required that each state draft a new state constitution—which would have to be approved by Congress—and that each state ratify the Fourteenth Amendment to the U. Constitution and grant voting rights to black men. Lincoln is typically portrayed as taking the moderate position and fighting the Radical positions.
There is considerable debate about how well Lincoln, had he lived, would have handled Congress during the Reconstruction process that took place after the Civil War ended. The other camp believes that the Radicals would have attempted to impeach Lincoln, just as they did his successor, Andrew Johnson, in While Andrew Johnson favored punishment for Confederates after the Civil War, his policies toward the South softened during his presidency.
Both Northern anger over the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln as well as the immense cost of human life during the Civil War led to vengeful demands for harsh policies in the South.
When he became president, however, Johnson took a much softer line and pardoned many of them. Additionally, no trials for treason took place. Only Captain Henry Wirz, commandant of the prison camp in Andersonville, Georgia, was executed for war crimes. First, he sought a speedy restoration of the states, on the grounds that they had never truly left the Union, and thus should again be recognized once loyal citizens formed a government.
Unlike Radical Republicans, Johnson did not seek to make Southerners accountable for the war, but instead wanted to reintegrate them as easily as possible. Despite some of his rhetoric during his vice presidency, his actions as president reveal that he was not concerned with punishing the South.
Second, to Johnson, African-American suffrage was a delay and a distraction; it always had been a state responsibility to decide who should vote. Without a focus on providing explicit legal equality for the freed slaves, Johnson overlooked the actions of white Southerners and blocked the actions of Congress.
Despite the abolition of slavery, many former Confederates were not willing to accept the social changes. Southern state governments quickly enacted the restrictive Black Codes. The Black Codes indicated that the freedmen would have more rights than they had before the war, but still only a limited set of second-class civil rights. Additionally, freedmen were not granted voting rights or citizenship The Black Codes outraged Northerners, and were overthrown by the Civil Rights Act of , which gave freedmen full legal equality except the right to vote.
This helped freedmen force planters to bargain for their labor. Such bargaining soon led to the practice of sharecropping, which gave the freedmen both greater economic independence and social autonomy. However, because freedmen lacked capital, and because planters continued to own the tools, draft animals, and land, the freedmen were forced into producing cash crops, mainly cotton, for the landowners and merchants.
Widespread poverty, as well as the falling price of cotton, led to indebtedness among a majority of the freedmen, and poverty among many planters. Northern officials gave varying reports on conditions involving freedmen in the South. Eventually, the Radicals in the House of Representatives were successful in impeaching President Johnson, but he was acquitted in the Senate by 1 vote.
The Civil Rights Act of was an effort by the Radical Republicans to reinforce to the Thirteenth Amendment that abolished slavery and had been passed the year prior. With this Civil Rights Act, the radicals were also taking steps towards establishing citizenship for Blacks by defending their civil rights and granting them equal protection under the law. In , they were successful in passing the Fourteenth Amendment , which granted citizenship to Blacks.
The Reconstruction Acts were a renewed effort by the Radical Republicans to take control of reintegrating the previous Confederate states through harsher measures. Their previous attempt to control Reconstruction by means of the Wade-Davis Bill was vetoed by President Lincoln two years prior, but because they now had control of Congress, the Radicals pushed their agenda once more.
These new Reconstruction Acts were passed and called for each rebel state to draft a new constitution as well as ratify the new Fourteenth Amendment. Congress, meaning primarily Radical Republicans, would then have to approve these new state constitutions before readmitting the rebel state back into the Union. The Reconstruction Acts also disenfranchised previous Confederate leaders and established that the new Southern leaders would only be those who supported the Union during the Civil War.
Furthermore, they deployed military troops to the South to maintain order and to protect the rights of Black citizens. In , the Fifteenth Amendment was passed, granting Blacks the right to vote.
While the Radical Republicans dominated the late s, their power began to dwindle in the early s. At that point, many political leaders believed that the era of Reconstruction was successfully completed and no longer needed Radical supervision. Some Radicals, including Charles Sumner , agreed with this idea, believing they had succeeded in their goals, and left the Radical Republican faction to join the moderates.
The opposition to the Radicals became overwhelming as Democrats and moderate Republicans alike accused the Radicals of corruption and accepting bribes during the new Presidency of Ulysses S.
These opponents sought to undo some of the efforts made by the Radical Republicans over the past decades, including granting pardons to the disenfranchised ex-Confederates.
In , as their opposition grew stronger, and members deserted, the Radical Republican faction weakened and lost power in Congress. The remaining members of the faction were left to join other Republican groups, such as the Stalwarts. Hayes is certified the winner of the electoral count by a special committee in Congress. The "back room" agreement sometimes called America's second "corrupt bargain" made by that committee is that Republicans will withdraw the last federal soldiers from the South, officially ending Reconstruction.
Southerners had long resented Reconstruction, and many Northerners hoping for reconciliation tire of the continued federal involvement in Southern politics. Meanwhile, the federal withdrawal sparks large migrations of blacks out of the South and into the free state of Kansas in what is called the "exoduster movement. Skip to main content. The missouri-kansas conflict You are here Timeline.
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