RECONSTRUCTION1865-1877

Why?

Congress enacted this plan for two reasonsSouth needed rebuilt after the war

Sherman’s March

Needed a way for Confederate states to be allowed back in Union

Lincoln’s 10% Plan Lenient Wanted to pardon Confederates if they

would take an oath swearing allegiance to the UnionHigh- ranking officials were excluded

Once 10% of voting population had taken the oath, they would be readmitted and also regain their seats in Congress

Not enacted he was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth

Wade-Davis Bill

Created by Radical RepublicansVery severe

Ironclad oath that they never supported Confederacy

Wanted slavery

abolished

Johnson’s Plan

Same as Lincoln’s except he wanted to ban all high-ranking officials AND wealthy plantation owners

Did not agree with Radical Republicans Felt that Congress had gone beyond

anything “contemplated by the authors of the Constitution”

Felt that white men alone must manage the South

Congressional Reconstruction Passed the 14th

Amendment which stated that all people born in the United States were equal

Created the Freedmen’s Bureau Act Gave Freedmen Rights

○ Schools for children○ Distribution of Land

Provided protection in the courts

Created Civil Rights Act Guaranteed citizen rights to

everyone no matter what color, race or previous condition

Problem with All Plans

Southerners did not always mean the oath

Many were rich, political figures that stated the oath to get back into Congress to repeal the Radical Republican’s legislations

Johnson’s Impeachment Johnson fired Secretary

of War which was against the Constitution

Did the Radical Republicans have a legitimate reason or were they just looking for a way to get rid of Johnson?

Grant was elected to President and passed the 15th amendment which could keep no one from voting

Reconstruction Begins Conditions in South

Economically devastated

Low population○ 400,000 died

Republicans started setting up public works programs to clean up

Troops sent to South to monitor

Politics in South Three types of

Republicans in South Scalawags –

Southerners who were Republican○ Small farmers

Carpetbaggers – Northerners who moved South after the war

African Americans Created Controversy

Former Slaves New Life

“We are not prepared for this suffrage. But we can learn. Give a man tools and let him commence to use them and in time he will earn a trade. So it is with voting. We may not understand it at the start but in time we shall learn to do our duty” ~~~ William Beverly Nash

African American Successes Hiram Revels

1st African American US Senator

Voting Rights Citizen Rights

Frederick Douglass Supported rights for all

citizens including Women, Native American and Blacks

Spent reconstruction era traveling around giving speeches about sufferage

African American Hardships Black Codes

Used before 14th and 15th amendments

Voided with their creation○ Blocked African

Americans from serving as jurors and testifying against white men

○ Forced them to sign a yearly work contract

○ Barred them from acquiring land

Jim Crow Laws Poll Tax Grandfather Clause Literacy Test

Sharecropping Never ending cycle

Klu Klux Klan Wanted to destroy

Republican Party Killed 20,000 men,

women, children including whites

Many by lynching

Southerners Gain Control Congress passed the Amnesty Act that

allowed 150,000 Confederates to vote Were able to gain power from

Republicans in Congress Let Freedmen’s Bureau expire Support for Reconstruction fades under

Southern controled Congress

End of Reconstruction

1876 – Reconstruction officially ends Presidential election 1876

Samuel Tilden and Rutherford Hayes○ Tilden is short one electoral vote ○ South agrees to vote in Hayes on one

condition

Compromise of 1877If Hayes agrees to withdraw troops from

South he will win

Aftermath of Reconstruction Plessy v. Ferguson

Paved the way for African Americans today○ Separate but not so equal