Chapters 22 and 23

And I dont want no pardon for what I was or am, I wont be reconstructed and I dont give a damnChapters 22 and 23Chapter 22The Ordeal of ReconstructionIntroductionAfter the war, many questions remained;How would the South be rebuilt after all the war damage?How would liberated blacks fare as free men and women?How would the Southern states be reintegrated in the Union?Who would direct the process of Reconstruction the Southern states themselves, the president, or Congress?The Problems of PeaceAnother question was, what should happen to all the Confederate ringleaders who were captured during the war?Most, including Jefferson Davis, served some jail time, but were released in part because no VA jury would convict them.Cities like Charleston, Richmond, and Atlanta, once beautiful, were reduced to rubble.The Problems of PeaceEconomic life was also dismal as banks and businesses had been crippled by runaway inflation.The transportation system was in shambles. In Columbia, SC 5 different railroad lines converged before the war. Now, the nearest usable rail was 29 miles away.Agriculture was not much better as the slave-labor system had collapsed and left the massive cotton fields unattended.Freedmen Define FreedomMany blacks faced slavery and freedom at different times (one former slave estimated that he had been freed 12 times).Many attempted to escape to freedom after being emancipated, only to be lynched by angry slave owners.Many planters argued, more legalistically, that slavery was still legal until state legislatures or the Supreme Court decided otherwise.Freedmen Define FreedomMany slaves resisted liberation out of loyalty to their masters.Others joined the Union army in pillaging their former masters possessions (one slave laid 20 lashes on the back of his former master).The Freedmens BureauReality began to set in that freedmen were overwhelmingly unskilled, unlettered, without property or money, and with little knowledge of how to survive as free people.On March 3, 1865 Congress created the Freedmens Bureau, which was intended to be a kind of primitive welfare agency.It provided clothing, food, medical care, and education to both freedmen and white refugees.The Freedmens BureauThe Bureau taught more than 20,000 blacks how to read.Sometimes the Bureau, supposedly giving 40 acres of Confederate land to blacks, sold the land out from under the freedmen.President Andrew Johnson, repeatedly tried to kill the Bureau, and it expired in 1872.Johnson: The Tailor PresidentNo man has ever come from more humble beginnings to become president than Johnson.He was born into poverty in NC and never attended school, but was apprenticed to a tailor at age 10.Johnson did eventually learn how to read and his wife taught him how to do simple math and write a little bit.Johnson: The Tailor PresidentJohnson was seen as a man without a country;A Southerner who didnt understand the North.A Democrat who was never accepted by Republicans.A president who was never elected.Presidential ReconstructionLincoln never believed that the Southern states had legally withdrawn from the Union.Accordingly, Lincoln in 1863 proclaimed his 10 percent Reconstruction plan, which decreed that a state could be reintegrated into the Union when 10% of its voters in the presidential election of 1860 had taken an oath of allegiance to the U.S. and pledged to abide by emancipation.Presidential ReconstructionIn reaction, Radical Republicans pushed the Wade-Davis Bill (named after Benjamin Wade of OH and Henry Winter Davis of MD) through Congress in 1864.The bill required that 50% of a states voters take the oath of allegiance and demanded stronger safeguards for emancipation that Lincolns as the price of readmission to the Union.Lincoln pocket-vetoed this bill by refusing to sign it after Congress had adjourned.Presidential ReconstructionRepublicans were outraged and refused to send delegates to VA when they reorganized its government in accordance with Lincolns 10% plan.Congress, unlike Lincoln, felt the southern states had left the Union and forfeited their rights.The Lincoln assassination did nothing to appease Congress, as Johnson stepped in and upheld Lincolns 10% plan.Presidential ReconstructionOn May 29, 1865 Johnson issued his own Reconstruction proclamation in which states who complied with his conditions would be swiftly readmitted to the Union.The terms were;Repeal the ordinances of secessionRepudiate (drop) all Confederate debtsRatify the 13th AmendmentThe Baleful Black CodesThe Black Codes were laws designed to regulate the affairs of the emancipated blacks, much as the slave statutes had done in pre-Civil War days.These codes varied from state to state, but they all wanted a stable and subservient labor force.King Cotton would not rise again without white control over the black field hands and plow drivers from the days of slavery.The Baleful Black CodesBlacks worked under labor contracts that committed them to work for the same employer for one year, at very low wages.Anyone who violated their contracts would be made to forfeit back wages and could be forcibly dragged back to work by a Negro-catcher.The Codes also sought to restore as nearly as possible the pre-emancipation system of race relations.The Baleful Black CodesSome freedmen were allowed to marry and were technically free, but they were not allowed to serve on a jury, rent or lease land in some areas, or vote.With nothing to offer except their labor, many blacks and landless whites slipped into a status of sharecropper.Congressional ReconstructionThe Republicans were rudely awakened when they returned to the Capitol in 1865.Used to having their way in Congress during the war with the South not represented, the Republicans were not looking to give up their power that allowed them to pass legislation that favored the North, such as the Morrill Tariff, the Pacific Railroad Act, and the Homestead Act.Johnson Clashes with CongressAfter Johnson vetoed the extension of the Freedmens Bureau, Congress passed the Civil Rights Bill, which conferred on blacks the privilege of American citizenship and struck at the Black Codes.Johnson vetoed this bill, but in April 1866 Congress pushed it through and assumed the dominant role of controlling government.Johnson Clashes with CongressRepublicans now tried to pass the 14th Amendment which said;It conferred civil rights, including citizenship to the freedmen.Reduced proportionately the representation of a state in Congress and in the Electoral College if it denied blacks the ballot.Johnson Clashes with CongressDisqualified from federal and state office former Confederates who as federal officeholders had once sworn to support the Constitution of the United StatesGuaranteed the federal debt, while repudiating all Confederate Debts.They were afraid that the Southern states might one day win control of Congress and repeal the hated law.Republican Principles and ProgramsIn the election of 1866, Republicans won 2/3 majority in both houses of Congress, which allowed them to have virtually unlimited control over Reconstruction policy.The radicals in the Senate were led by Charles Sumner who worked tirelessly not only for black freedom but for racial equality.In the House, the most powerful radical was Thaddeus Stevens who was an unwavering friend of blacks and a foe of rebellious white southerners.Republican Principles and ProgramsThe radicals were in favor of keeping the Southern states out as long as possible and using federal power to force them into drastic social and economic transformation.The moderates were more attuned to policies that restrained the states from abridging citizens rights in the South.One thing both sides could agree upon was the necessity to enfranchise black voters.Reconstruction by the SwordAgainst the backdrop of vicious and bloody race riots that had erupted in several Southern cities, Congress passed the Reconstruction Act on March 2, 1867.Essentially, the South was split into five military districts, each commanded by a Union general and policed by Union soldiers.

Reconstruction by the SwordCongress also laid down a strict set of guidelines for Southern state readmission into the Union.States were required to ratify the 14th Amendment.The main purpose was to get the electorate to vote the Southern states back in and alleviate the federal government from direct responsibility for the protection of black rights.

Reconstruction by the SwordRadical Republicans were worried that without federal intervention the Southern states would, once they were readmitted, amend their constitutions so as to withdraw the ballot from blacks.The only ironclad safeguard was to add black suffrage in the federal Constitution.This goal was achieved with passage of the 15th Amendment in 1869 and ratified by the states in 1870.No Women VotersThe passage of the three Reconstruction-era Amendments (13th, 14th, and 15th) delighted abolitionists, but deeply disappointed advocates of womens rights.Even though they considered womens rights and black rights one and the same, female rights activists put their issues on the back burner to work wholeheartedly for emancipation.The Womans Loyal League gathered nearly 400,000 signatures on petitions asking Congress to pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting slavery.No Women VotersWhen the 14th Amendment was passed and defined equal national citizenship for the first time including the word male, women were shocked to see they were not included.When the 15th Amendment proposed to prohibit denial of the vote on the basis of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, women wanted the word sex added to the list.Fifty years would pass before the Constitution granted women the right to vote.The Realities of Radical Reconstruction in the SouthBoth Presidents Lincoln and Johnson wanted to gradually give selected blacks the ability to vote if they qualified through education, property ownership, or military service.Having gained their right to suffrage with the 15th Amendment, Southern black men began to organize politically.

The Realities of Radical Reconstruction in the SouthThe primary vehicle for blacks was the Union League, which was originally a pro-Union organization based in the North.Assisted by Northern blacks, freedmen turned the League into a network of political clubs that educated members in their civic duties and campaigned for Republican candidates.Soon, the leagues mission expanded to building black churches and schools, representing black grievances before local employers and government, and recruiting militias to protect black communities from white retaliation.The Realities of Radical Reconstruction in the SouthBlack women held a large role in helping rally voters to campaign functions, but free black men held the greater political authority.The sight of former slaves holding office deeply offended their onetime masters, who lashed out at the freedmens white allies, calling them scalawags and carpetbaggers.The Realities of Radical Reconstruction in the SouthScalawags- Southerners, often former Unionists and Whigs.Carpetbaggers- Were supposedly sleazy Northerners who had packed all their worldly goods into a carpetbag suitcase at wars end and came to the South to seek personal power and profit. Most were just people who wanted to play a role in modernizing the new South.The Ku Klux KlanOut of the new success of black legislators and political corruption, many secret organizations came forth.The most notorious of these groups was the Invisible empire of the South, or Ku Klux Klan, which was founded in Tennessee in 1866.Besheeted nightriders, their horses hooves muffled, would hammer on the door of an upstart black family.The Ku Klux KlanThe riders, in a ghoulish tone, would ask for a bucket of water and pretend to drink it while actually pouring its contents into a rubber attachment concealed beneath his mask and gown.When finished, he would smack his lips and declare that to be the first drink hed had since he was killed at the Battle of Shiloh.The Ku Klux KlanThe main goal of the Klan was to scare the upstart blacks away from the polls.In 1868 in LA, whites in two days killed or wounded 200 victims.Congress passed the Force Acts of 1870 and 1871, but the Invisible Empire had already done its work of intimidation.Johnson Walks the Impeachment PlankRadicals hatched a plan to get Johnson out of the White House by saying that he had a harem of dissolute women.In 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, over Johnsons veto, as usual.The principle part of this Act was that the president had to secure the consent of the Senate before he could remove his appointees once they had been approved by that body.Johnson Walks the Impeachment PlankThe purpose was to freeze the secretary of war, Edwin M. Stanton, into office.Stanton was a holdover of Lincoln and although outwardly loyal to Johnson, he was secretly serving as a spy and informer for the radicals.Johnson Walks the Impeachment PlankJohnson dismissed Stanton in early 1868, which gave the radicals the pretext to impeach him.The House voted 126 to 47 to impeach Johnson for high crimes and misdemeanors, as required by the Constitution, charging him with various violations of the Tenure of Office Act.

A Not-Guilty Verdict for JohnsonJohnsons attorneys argued that Johnson felt the Tenure of Office Act was unconstitutional and fired Stanton merely to bring a test case before the Supreme Court.The House prosecutors, Benjamin Butler and Thaddeus Stevens, had a harder time building a compelling case for impeachment.The radicals failed to muster the 2/3 majority vote to impeach Johnson by 1 vote.The Purchase of AlaskaBy 1867, the Russians were inclined to sell the vast and chilly expanse of land now known as Alaska.In 1867 Secretary of State William Steward, an ardent expansionist, signed a treaty with Russia that transferred Alaska to the U.S. for $7.2 million.Sewards Folly was not met with great enthusiasm by Sewards fellow countrymen.The Purchase of AlaskaIn a country bent on Reconstruction, why did they feel it necessary to expand their borders?Russia had been very nice to the North during the Civil War and they did not feel they could be rude to their friend, the tsar.The area was rumored to be teeming with furs, fish, and gold, not to mention oil and gas.Political Paralysis in the Gilded AgeChapter 23IntroductionOver 39 million people in the U.S. as of 1870 census (26.6% more than in 1860).U.S. was the 3rd largest nation in the Western world, behind Russia and France.The Bloody Shirt Elects GrantAfter all the issues between Congress and President Johnson, people were convinced a good general would make a good president.Ulysses S. Grant was the most popular Northern war hero.People in 3 states raised money to build him a home and New Yorkers wrote him a check for $105,000 as a thank you for his help in the Civil War.The Bloody Shirt Elects GrantRepublicans enthusiastically nominated Grant for president in 1868 and Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour.Republicans whipped up enthusiasm for Grant by waving the bloody shirt, reviving gory memories of the Civil War.Grant won 214 electoral votes to 80, but only won by 300,000 majority votes (500,000 former slaves voted Grant).The Era of Good StealingsPost War America was a place rife with corruption.Men like Jubilee Jim Fisk and Jay Gould concocted a plot to corner the market on gold in 1869.The plan would only work if Grant ordered the Treasury to not sell gold as Gould and Fisk bid up the price.The Era of Good StealingsContrary to Grants assurances, Treasury released gold and the prices plummeted.Grant was cleared of any wrongdoing except for acting stupidly, but many honest people lost their lifes savings.Boss Tweed employed bribery, graft, and fradulent elections to milk NY of as much as $200 million.The Era of Good StealingsTweed was outed by the New York Times (although they were offered $5 million not to run the story).Tweed died behind bars.Grant was surrounded in his cabinet by grafters and incompetents.His extended family also reaped benefits from his status.The Era of Good StealingsIn 1872, Grant was tarred by the Credit Mobilier scandal.Union Pacific Railroad insiders formed the Credit Mobilier construction company and then hired themselves at inflated rates to build the railroad, earning dividends (off of stock) as high as 348%.They gave kickbacks to key Congressmen too keep the government off their backs.2 Congressmen and the vice president were revealed to have accepted payments.The Hayes-Tilden StandoffGrant, urged by his hangers-on, ran for an unprecedented 3rd term, but was derailed 233 electoral votes to 18.The House passed a resolution that sternly reminded the country- and Grant- of the anti-dictator implications of the two-term tradition.The Republicans elected Rutherford B. Hayes who was the 3 term governor of Ohio and Democrats elected Samuel J. Tilden, the man who blew the whistle on Boss Tweed.The Hayes-Tilden StandoffTilden racked up 184 of the needed 185 electoral votes, but with 20 votes doubtful due to irregular returns (some came back as Democrats winning the majority in the state and others came back as Republicans winning).The Constitution specified what should happen, the president of the Senate should open the results in front of the House and the Senate.The Constitution was silent on who should count the results (the president of the Senate or the Speaker of the House).The Hayes-Tilden StandoffThe deadlock would be broken by the Electoral Act passed early in 1877, which was an electoral commission consisting of 15 men selected from the Senate, House, and Supreme Court.Hayes came out on top and reluctantly, he was accepted by Democrats if he removed federal troops from LA and SC.The Hayes-Tilden StandoffThe Republicans assured the Democrats of a southern trans-continental railroad line in return.Peace came at a price as the civil rights of blacks was sacrificed and the Tilden-Hayes deal led Republicans to abandon its commitment to racial equality.The Birth of Jim Crow in the Post-Reconstruction SouthFor the now friendless blacks in the South, reconstruction was officially over.Blacks who tried to assert their rights faced unemployment, eviction, and physical harm.Many blacks were forced into sharecropping and tenant farming, pitting former slaves against former masters who were now their land lords and creditors.The Birth of Jim Crow in the Post-Reconstruction SouthWith white southerners back in charge, informal separation of blacks and whites developed into a system of state-level legal codes of segregation known as Jim Crow laws.Southern states also enacted literacy requirements, voter-registration laws, and poll taxes to ensure full-scale disfranchisement of the Souths freedmen.The Birth of Jim Crow in the Post-Reconstruction SouthThe Supreme Court validated the Souths segregationist social order in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), which ruled that separate but equal facilities were constitutional under the 14th Amendment.Blacks were segregated in inferior schools and separated from whites in virtually all public facilities, including railroad cars, theaters, and even restrooms.Blacks who dared to violate the Souths racial code were dealt with harshly.Class Conflicts and Ethnic ClashesRailroad owners were reaping the benefits of the work being done, but they decided in 1877 to cut workers salaries by 10%.This led to workers strikes in cities from Baltimore to St. Louis as President Hayes called in troops to help quell the unrest.The failure of the railroad strikes exposed the weakness of the labor movement in the face of opposition such as government, militias, U.S. Army, federal courts, etc.Class Conflicts and Ethnic ClashesEthnic struggles also broke out between the Irish and the Chinese immigrants in California.The mostly single male Chinese immigrants could not get any work after the railroad was finished and the gold ran out.Without any children to help their assimilation, they faced beatings and other violence from the Irish who lived among them and worked for less.Class Conflicts and Ethnic ClashesIn 1882 Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act prohibiting nearly all further immigration from China.The Chinese Exclusion Act slammed the door until 1943.Garfield and ArthurThe Republican party sought a new standard bearer for 1880 and settled on dark horse candidate James A. Garfield from electorally powerful Ohio.Garfield barely squeaked out a victory over Democratic candidate and Civil War hero, Winfield Scott Hancock.Garfields secretary of state James G. Blaine became ensnared in a conflict with Senator Roscoe Conkling, a member of the Stalwart faction.Garfield and ArthurAs the Republican factions dueled, tragedy struck; a deranged office seeker named Charles J. Guiteau shot President Garfield in the back in a Washington railroad station.Guiteaus attorneys argued that he was not guilty because of his incapacity to distinguish right from wrong- an early instance of the insanity defense.Garfield lay in agony for 11 weeks until he finally died.Garfield and ArthurOne good thing did result from Garfields death; the shocking of politicians into reforming the shameful spoils system.In 1883 The Pendleton Act was passed, which was known as the Magna Carta of civil-service reform.Compulsory campaign contributions from federal employees became illegal.Established the Civil Service Commission to make appointments to federal jobs on the basis of examinations rather than pull.The Blaine-Cleveland Mudslingers of 1884James G. Blaine was nominated as the Republican candidate for President in the election of 1884.Blaine was blessed with almost every political asset except a reputation for honesty.Victory starved Democrats turned to noted reformer, Grover Cleveland.The Blaine-Cleveland Mudslingers of 1884Known as a man of principles, it was soon discovered that Cleveland had been involved with a Buffalo widow with whom he had an illegitimate child.Despite this, Cleveland squeaked into office with 219 to 192 electoral votes.Old Grover Takes OverCleveland in 1885 was the first Democrat to take the oath of presidential office since Buchanan, 28 years earlier.The biggest question was, could the party of disunion be trusted to govern the Union?

Cleveland Battles for a Lower TariffAs it was for decades, the topic of the tariffs in the U.S. was a heated debate.Republicans, controlling most of the factories in the North wanted higher tariffs to support domestic business and keep prices up.The Treasury was running an embarrassingly high surplus of $145 million, most of which came from the tariff.Cleveland Battles for a Lower TariffThe debate continued on through the 1888 election where the Democrats, seeing no alternative, re-nominated Cleveland.Eager Republicans turned to Benjamin Harrison, whose grandfather was former president William Henry Harrison.On election day Harrison nosed out Cleveland, 233 to 168 electoral votes.The Drumbeat of DiscontentPolitics was no longer as usual in 1892, when the newly formed Peoples party, or Populists, burst upon the scene.Rooted in the Farmers Alliance of frustrated farmers, they demanded inflation through free and unlimited coinage of silver at the rate of sixteen ounces to one ounce of gold.The Drumbeat of DiscontentThey further demanded a graduated income tax; government ownership of railroads, telegraph, and telephone; direct election of U.S. senators; one-term limit on the presidency; the adoption of the initiative and referendum to allow citizens to shape legislation more directly, a shorter workday (12 hour down to 8 hour); and immigration restriction (immigrants were working for less and taking jobs).The Populists nominated General James B. Weaver as their candidate for president.

The Drumbeat of DiscontentThe Populists worked to stage strikes throughout the country, including one at Andrew Carnegies Homestead steel plant.The Homestead Strike pitted workers angry over pay cuts against U.S. troops employed to break the strike.The Populists made a remarkable showing in the election of 1892 where they gained 22 electoral votes for Weaver and 1,029,846 popular votes.The Drumbeat of DiscontentThe Populists looked to gain support from black farmers in the South as well as white farmers in the South and West.Unfortunately, the Populist inspired reminder of potential strength of African American voters led to the near-extinction of what little suffrage African Americans had in the South.White Southerners more aggressively than ever used literacy tests and poll taxes to deny blacks the ballot.The Drumbeat of DiscontentThe notorious grandfather clause exempted from those requirements anyone whose forebear had voted in 1860- when, of course, black slaves had not voted at all.The conservative crusade to eliminate the black vote also had dire consequences for the Populist party.After 1896 the Populist party lapsed increasingly into vile racism and staunchly advocated black disfranchisement.Cleveland and DepressionIn 1893, Grover Cleveland became the only president ever to be reelected after defeat.Hardly had Cleveland seated himself in the presidential chair when the devastating depression of 1893 burst out.Lasting 4 years, it was the most punishing economic downturn of the nineteenth century.Contributing causes were the splurge of overbuilding and speculation, labor disorders, and the ongoing agricultural depression.Cleveland and DepressionAbout eight thousand American businesses collapsed in six months.Alarmingly, the gold reserve in the Treasury dropped below $100 million, which was popularly regarded as the safe minimum for supporting about $350 million in outstanding paper money.After tense negotiations at the White House, a group of bankers led by J.P. Morgan agreed to lend the government $65 million in gold with a commission of $7 million.