The reconstruction of the Union began under President Lincoln before the end of the war, and carried on by President Johnson after the assassination of President Lincoln. After Lincoln’s death, the leadership of the nation bestowed upon Andrew Johnson of Tennessee. According to A. Brinkley (pg. 375), Johnson revealed his plan for reconstruction or “Restoration”, as he preferred to call it, soon after he took office and implemented it during the summer of 1865 when Congress was in recess. Like Lincoln, he offered some form of amnesty to Southerners who would take a pledge of loyalty to the Union. In most other respect, however, his plan resembled the Wade-Davis Bill. The next phase of reconstruction, known as the Congressional Plan or "Radical" modernization had begun, which undid everything started by Presidents Lincoln and Johnson. These radicals, mostly republicans, motivated by three main factors revenge, concern for the freedmen, and political concerns. The Radicals in Congress pushed through a number of measures designed to assist the freedmen, but also demonstrate the supremacy of Congress over the president. These events included the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the 14th Amendment, the Tenure of Office Act, and the Army Appropriations Act. The Radical Republicans prepared an effort in Congress to impeach the president Johnson as a payback for resisting their platforms. The vote in the Senate was 35-19 for conviction, one vote short of the necessary two-thirds. This was in turn to a few Republicans that had crossed over and voted with the Democrats, thus refuting the ultimate retaliation to the Radicals. If the removal of President Johnson had gone thru, it might have permanently weakened the executive branch. Congr... ... middle of paper ... ...ight for in order to mold this nation known as the Unites States of America. Works Cited 1. ALLEN BRINKLEY, Unfinished Nation a Concise History of the American People, Sixth edition (2010). 2. CIVIL WAR HOME, RECONSTRUCTION!!, 2002, retrieved February 13th, 2011, from http://www.civilwarhome.com/reconstruction.htm 3. HISTORY, American Revolution, 2011, retrieved February 21st 2011 from http://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/page5 4. MARTIN KELLY, Overview of United States Government and Politics Foundation and Principles, 2011, retrieved February 21st 2011 from http://americanhistory.about.com/od/governmentandpolitics/a/amgovoverview.htm 5. SON OF THE SOUTH, Slavery and the Framing of the U.S. Constitution, 2011, retrieved February 21st 2011 from http://www.sonofthesouth.net/slavery/slavery-us-constitution.htm
Readmission to the union was a dividing factor between Republicans in politics. Lincoln advocated for the "Ten Percent Plan". This demanded that only ten percent of voters in a state take an oath to uphold the values presented in the constitution in order to rejoin the union. Lincoln would then pardon all but Confederate government figures and rights of citizenship would be readmitted. Radical Republicans opposed this plan, claiming that it was too lenient. They then passed the Wade Davis Bill. This bill required that a majority of the population take an oath stating that they had never supported the Confederacy. The Wade Davis Bill also required more rights for freedmen including the right to vote, hold office, own property and testify in court. Lincoln, wanting an easy transition into a unified country, used a pocket veto so he could continue with his plan. Lamentably, Lincoln was assassinated months after his decision and his successor, Andrew Johnson, took on the role of president. Johnson, having grown up in a poor southern household, sympathized with the south yet, abhorred the planter class. In his Reconstruction plan he issued a blanket pardon to all southerners except important confederate figures who would have to personally meet with the pres...
Following Lincoln’s tragic assassination, President Andrew Johnson took on the accountability of making Reconstruction a reality. Andrew Johnson wanted to use Lincoln’s ideas of reconstruction but in a modified form. Since Congress would be in recess for eight more months Johnson decided to go ahead with his plan. Johnson's goal in reconstruction was to grant amnesty to all former Confederates (except high officials), the ordinances of secession were to be revoked, Confederate debts would repudiate, and the states had to ratify the Thirteenth Amendment. Once the states swore to a loyalty oath to abide by the conditions they would be allowed to return to the Union. After swearing to the oath Confederate States would be allowed to govern themselves. With this power the states implemented the creation of a system of black codes that restricted the actions of freed slaves in much the same way, if not exactly the same way, that slaves were restricted under the old law. The end result of his plan was a hopeless conflict with the Radical Republicans who dominated Congress, passed measures over Johnson's vetoes, and attempted to limit the power of the executive concerning appointments and removals.
loyalty oath. If this happened then that state could setup a new state government. Under
Chapter sixteen begins with the reconstruction period of the civil war. From previous history classes I have learned more in depth about the war and why the North was fighting against the South, but overall I think the most important part to look at from the civil war is the end of it and what was to come after it, which was the reconstruction era. Lincoln had just released his emancipation proclamation and freed the slaves. As happy as this may seem it was actually quite the opposite. Attitudes of white southerners towards black in the south hadn 't changed a bit after the Emancipation Proclamation. In 1865 Carl Schurz was sent by President Andrew Johnson to investigate the current conditions of the confederacy after they were defeated in the civil war. While there he shared in his “Report on the Condition of the South” that southerners have a belief “so deeply rooted… that the negro will not work without physical compulsion”. Overall this just shows how the attitudes of white southerners were no different. They truly believed that the blacks weren 't able to work or function without force. Many northerners and abolitionists, such as Wendell Phillips, at this time saw this and actually said that Lincoln didn 't do enough. They wanted him to do a complete overhaul of southern society. Personally I understand where these people were coming from. They were people who really wanted all the issues to be resolved. Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was a step in the right direction, but he could have done more. Schurz even noted that “negroes who walked away from the plantations, or were found upon the roads, were shot or otherwise severely punished”. Former slaves weren ...
Shortly after the Civil War, there were multiple plans offered for reconstruction in the nation. This probably would have been different if Lincoln had not been assassinated. Once Lincoln was assassinated, it left Andrew Johnson as president. Johnson was a former slave owner as well as a southerner. He also had no college education and was in a vulnerable state. Many wondered how Johnson was going to live up to Lincoln’s plans and aspirations. After the Civil War, congress was taken over by an organization known as the Radical republicans. The Radicals listened to Lincoln because he had proposed a reconstruction plan that looked to treat the South badly. These radicals looked at reconstruction as an opportunity to discipline the South. Lincoln, if he had survived, would have been able to command the Radical Republicans with his traditional wisdom. However, due to his death, there was no one to take the place of a leader. Seeing as Johnson was a southerner created an enormous irony. The radical Republicans despised President Johnson even before he was president. Johnson attempted to create a plan similar to Lincolns but congress was not impressed. Johnson was not a man who held strong positive relationships. He was hated and unfit to be president. Because of Lincoln’s untimely death, Johnson created bad relationships and effected many of Lincoln’s ideals and
The American Civil War came to a terrible and bloody end with six hundred thousand casualties and the North winning and the South losing. Southern soldiers returned from the war and found their home in ruins. Lots of people lost their homes, land, businesses, and their way of life. Many Southerners faced starvation due to the high food prices and the widespread of crop failure. The Confederate money that was used by Southerners was now useless. Numerous banks collapsed, and the merchants went bankrupt because people couldn’t pay their debts. The people of the South were penniless and broken. (“Post”)
Was the original Constitution a “pro-slavery” document? Did it do “more to feed the serpent than to crush it?” Was it Frederick Douglass’s “Glorious Liberty Document?” By accommodating slavery did it eventually crush its head through permanent union with economically dynamic free states and Civil War? Could slavery have been abolished at the founding? When would abolition have occurred if union had never been created? Three states would not join a union forbidding the slave trade. Many abhorred it. A slaveholder himself, Jefferson’s draft Declaration charged the King with its introduction. Slavery was a five hundred pound gorilla the Founders accommodated, constructing a “house divided,” in the hope it would strategically enable independence and endure until slavery withered. But twenty additional years of the trade and invention of the cotton gin delayed that hope for more than 500,000 and their offspring. By 1812 the accommodation secured independence for a perpetual union. But the promise of the Declaration’s preamble remained unfulfilled until Lincoln rediscovered its relationship to the Constitution. At the founding, “Join or Die” meant kicking the can down the road regarding “other persons.”
The Civil War was a devastating war for the country, especially in the South. Rebuilding the nation after the war was more difficult than the actual war itself. The reconstruction was a success because it unified the United States once again as one country and abolishes slavery, but it also was unsuccessful because it failed to protect the blacks’ rights and discrimination against them.
...The Radical Republicans of Congress did not agree with Johnson and his plans for “Restoration.” They had different beliefs about the South and started “Radical Reconstruction.” The disagreement between the President and Congress heightened and eventually led to the impeachment of President Johnson. There were also great scandals during Grant’s presidency, which caused a similar effect in with the politics in the South. As a result of the corruption the North lost interest in Reconstruction completely.
Andrew Johnson, who became President of the U.S. in 1865, had his own Reconstruction plan, but it turned out to be unsuccessful largely because of the unfair ways in which blacks were treated. According to his plan, pardons would be offered to all southern whites except wealthy Confederate supporters and the main Confederate leaders. Conventions were to be held by the defeated southern states and new state governments were to be formed. These new governments had to make a vow of loyalty to the nation and abolish slavery in order to rejoin the Union. However, this plan did not offer the blacks a role in this process; he left the responsibility of determining the black people’s roles to the southern states. Under his plan, new state governments were organized throughout the South during the summer and fall of 1865. These states governments passed a series of laws known as the Black Codes. These codes allowed employees to whip black workers, allowed states to jail unemployed blacks and to hire out their children, and forced blacks to sign labor contracts that required them to work a job for a full year. The Republicans in Congress believed that Johnson’s plan was a failure, not only because of the Black Codes that were passed, but because when Congress reassembled in December of 1865, numerous newly ele...
...ights for African Americans as well as a political rights for the people, his goal was to abolish slavery and felt that “all men created equally” should uphold for everybody, everybody that was man at least. Johnson the president, in the beginning proved to be loyal to his radicals by chastising the confederacy making sure there would be repercussions for their actions. Also his amnesty plan to reinstate the south states was far harsher than that of Lincoln's. Johnson’s sanctions deprived confederacy officers, people in high power, and anyone who owned valuable assets could be subject to confiscation. The purpose was to shift political power in south and reward it to freed blacks and white southerners who stayed neutral during the war. Hahn states in his article that, “During reconstruction, black men held political offices in every state of the former confederacy”
The Reconstruction period was from 1865 to 1877 after the Civil War, which ended in the year of 1865. The purpose of the Reconstruction Era was to increase the number of slaves to freedom. However, the trial of James Byrd proves the problems caused by slavery and the Civil War was not fixed. The KKK members believe that just because they are white that they are above all other races. Therefore, three guys that believe in white supremacy dragged James Byrd across the cement as he was tied up to their car. James Byrd’s trial was after his death in 1998. Also, these three men were involved in his murder. Furthermore, two ended up being sentenced to death and one was sentenced to prison. The problems of the Reconstruction are still not fixed ‘till
During Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proposed the Ten Percent Plan. Not finding Lincoln’s plan good enough, many Republicans of Congress came together and proposed the Wade-Davis Bill. Neither were taken as the initial reconstruction policy. When the Civil War ended, the responsibility of discovering a policy was now in the hands of President Andrew Johnson. This being, Johnson’s Reconstruction Plan came to be. Under this plan, in order to be readmitted into the Union, a Confederate State had to take an oath of loyalty to the Union and Constitution. All former military and civil officers of the Confederacy and those who owned property worth $20,000 or more had to make their estates liable to confiscation. They had to abide by the 13th Amendment and abolish slavery. By the end of 1865, the Confederate states expect for Texas where readmitted to the Union. This was a great accomplishment, because of Johnson’s Reconstruction policy, The U.S stood together once
Knowles, H. J. (2007). The Constitution and Slavery: A Special Relationship. Slavery & Abolition, 28(3), 309-328. doi:10.1080/01440390701685514
Wilson, James Q., John J. DiIulio, Jr., and with Meena Bose. American Government: Institutions & Policies. 12th ed. Boston, MA.: Wadsworth Publishing, 2011.