Postbellum Reconstruction:

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Postbellum Reconstruction:
Immediate Success, Long Term Failure

by

Thesis
Both the presidency and Congress passed several reforms to attempt to solve all of these problems, however the progress that was made during Reconstruction was for the most part shot down by the Compromise of 1877.

Outline of the Contents
I. Intro—Thesis
II. Condition of the South Immediately Following the Civil War
III. The Presidential Reconstruction Plan
IV. The Congressional Reconstruction Plan
V. Economic Reform
VI. Social Strife
VII. Conclusion
VIII. Bibliography

When General Lee surrendered to the Union army in the Appomattox Courthouse on April 9, 1865, the period of Reconstruction began. The Civil War had settled the issue of slavery and the question of states’ rights, but several problems remained in the torn nation. First, the Union had to be successfully reunited and control of the Southern states’ governments had to be nurtured back to the national consensus. Second, the South was in a social chaos. Southerners’ spirits had been broken by the war, and the pervasive issue of racism still had to be addressed. Newly emancipated slaves were without refuge, had little education, and their economic status was uncertain. Third, the South was in economic shambles: all of the wealth invested in slaves was gone, plantations lay in ruins, and railroads and cities were torn to shreds by the Union army. Both the presidency and Congress passed several reforms to attempt to solve all of these problems, however the progress that was made during Reconstruction was for the most part shot down by the Compromise of 1877.
The Civil War left the South in ruins. Once beautiful plantations were torn apart, and cities were burnt to the ground. Economic investment in banks, factories, or any other business were squandered, mostly due to General Sherman’s march. Transportation was completely disrupted, and the entire economy of the South essentially came to a halt. Most devastating to the South’s economic problems was the loss of billions in economic of slaves, which were wiped away by emancipation. Southerners were bitter, some were homeless, and Union troops occupied the South as it would a conquered territory. Yet somehow, a feeling of loyalty to the Union had to be r...

... middle of paper ...

... the Compromise of 1877, freedmen lost all that they had gained in the twelve years between the Appomattox surrender and President Hayes’s inauguration, and faced another century of political, economic, and social strife.
Bibliography

Class notes, US History AP per.1 , Mr. Eddy, 1/00.

Katz, William Loren. An Album of Reconstruction. Franklin Watts, Inc.: New York,
1974.

Murphy, Richard W. The Nation Reunited: War’s Aftermath. Time-Life Books:
Alexandria, Virginia, 1987.

Nash, Gary B., Julie Roy Jeffrey, John R. Howe, Peter J. Frederick, Allen F. Davis, and
Allan M. Winkler. “The Union Reconstructed.” The American People:
Creating a Nation and a Society. Longman, New York. 1998. Ch. 16, 538-573.

Nash, Howard P., Jr. Andrew Johnson: Congress and Reconstruction. Associated
University Presses, Inc.: Cranbury, New Jersey, 1972.

Randall, J.G. and David Donald. The Civil War and Reconstruction. Little, Brown and
Company: Boston, 1969.

Smith, Page. Trial by Fire. McGraw-Hill Book Company: New York, 1982.

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