reconstruction and its effects chapter 12. reconstruction 1865 – 1877 rebuilding the country –...
TRANSCRIPT
Reconstruction
• 1865 – 1877
• Rebuilding the country – readmitting southern states
• Lenient or harsh?
• Would the Civil War have been for naught?
The Cast
• Radical Republicans – Supported abolition before the Civil War and the War –
Moral issue -- equality of rights for Blacks– Opposed Lincoln’s lenient reconstruction plan– Minority - worked w/Republican majority to impose harsher
plan
• Lincoln – Lenient plan• Johnson – follows Lincoln• Freed Blacks• Southern White power structure
Reconstruction Plans
Lincoln’s Plan Johnson’s Plan Radical Republican Plan
Amnesty to all but a few
10% Plan – 10% of a states voters in 1860 had to swear a loyalty oath before creating a new constitution
Organize a state government that bans slavery
Did not required black suffrage
Create a new Constitution w/o 10% rule
Officially denied pardons, but granted them
Did not require black suffrage
Disbanded the states that came in under Lincoln’s plan
Divided the South into 5 districts
Placed under military rule
Required Southern states to ratify the 14th Amendment
Required to guarantee suffrage
Reconstruction Plans
Lincoln’s Plan Johnson’s Plan Radical Republican Plan
Congress had the power to admit new states to the Union. Therefore in had the responsibility for Reconstruction
Presidential power to pardon placed responsibility for Reconstruction in the executive branch
Secession had been illegal so the states did not have to be readmitted to the Union
Executive Branch Argument Legislative Branch Argument
The states were “out of their normal relationship to the Union”
Radical Republicans Impeach Johnson
• Obstructing Radical Republican plan of Reconstruction
• Violated Tenure of Office Act
• One vote kept him in office
Carpetbagger/Scalawags
• Carpetbaggers – Northerners who moved to the South for “economic opportunity”
• Scalawags – Southern Democrats who joined the Republican Party after the Civil War
Amendments
• 13th Amendment
– Ended slavery• 14th Amendment
–Equal protection under the law -Civil Rights
• 15th Amendment
–right to vote
Freedmen’s Bureau
• Program set to help former slaves and poor whites
–Hospitals
–Schools
–Training programs
–Distributed clothing• Forty Acres and a Mule
Emancipated Slaves Exercise Freedom
• Traveled
• Reunited with families
• Organized schools, colleges, universities, churches
• Participated in politics
Sharecropping/Tenant Farming
• Sharecropping
–Use of land/tools/seed in exchange for portion of crop grown
• Tenant Farmer
–Cash paid for use of land• Cycle of poverty
1. Sharecropper is given land and seed by owner
2. Buys food and clothing on credit
3. Plants crop
4. Harvests crop and gives landowner his share
5. Sells remaining crop at market
6. Pays of debts
Farming methods deplete soil
At the mercy of the market
Crooked merchants charge unfair fines – Can’t leave until debts are paid.
Becomes Tenant Farmer if he has leftover cash
Southern Whites Regain Political Power
• Black Codes
–Curfews, vagrancy laws, Labor contracts, land restrictions
• Amnesty Act of 1872• KKK• Infighting within the Republican Party• Supreme Court Decisions
– Limited equal protection – to a few basic rights– Limited voting rights – what couldn’t be used to limit
voting rights– Northern support fades
Successes and Failures of ReconstructionSuccesses Failures
Union is restored. Many white southerners remain bitter
The South’s economy grows and new wealth is created in the North.
The South is slow to industrialize.
14th and 15th amendments Southern state governments and terrorist organizations deny African Americans the right to vote.
Organizations help many black families
Many remain caught in a cycle of poverty.
Southern states adopt a system of mandatory education.
Racist attitudes continue, in the South and the North.