Reconstruction Era Vocab

RRR

Repair the south. Rebuild the relationship. Reconstruct the United States.

Reconstruction

The process of rebuilding the South after the Civil war. 1865-1877 and was broken into different phases.

Lincoln's Plan

Pardons all Confederates who swore allegiance to the US unless you harmed POW's. Forms a state government if 10% of the people swore an oath to the constitution.

Wade Davis Bill

Radical reconstruction plan that called for 50% of the people in the states to swear they never supported the Confederate State of America and uphold the constitution.

Pocket Veto

President doesn't say no to a law, he just 'forgets about it' and it expires.

Andrew Johnson

Tenn. Senator who becomes Lincoln's 2nd V.P. and successor.

Johnson's plan

1. Any Southern state had to ratify the 13th Amendment to come back into the Union. 2. All members of the Confederacy would receive a pardon for their crimes. Freedmen's bureau was created. Vetoed by Johnson but overridden by congress.

Freedmen's Bureau

Gave food, clothing, education, and basic necessities to all freed slaves in the South. Vetoed by Johnson - overridden by congress.

General Oliver O. Howard

Head of the Freedmen's Bureau.

Black Codes

Southern laws meant to restrict freed slaves access to Southern life and services including: voting, testifying against whites, carrying weapons.

Civil Rights Act of 1866

Passed to go against the Black Codes. Granted freedman all the rights and benefits of U.S. citizens and that federal troops would enforce these rights (helped enforce the 13th Amendment). Vetoed by Johnson, but overridden by Congress.

Thaddeus Stevens

Radical Republican leader who rejected Johnson's Reconstruction plans and refused to seat any of the new Congress.

Radical Republicans

Championed civil rights for African Americans.

13th Amendment (1865)

Abolished slavery and involuntary servitude in the United States except as punishment for a crime.

14th Amendment (1868)

Provides citizenship, due process, and equal protection under the law to ALL people of the U.S.

1st Reconstruction Act(s) (Radical Reconstruction)

All Southern states except Tenn. (who had accepted the 14th Amendment) were divided into 5 military districts, each controlled by a general who drafted a new state constitution that gave African Americans the right to vote.

Hiram Revels & Blanche K. Bruce

First 2 African American members of Congress; elected from the South.

Tenure of Office Act (1867)

Pres. must get 2/3rds of the Senate to approve before he removes any member of his Cabinet or military commander.

Election of 1868

Republican Grant defeats NY Democrat Horatio Seymore.

Impeach

Charging a public official of a crime while in office.

15th Amendment (1869)

No American could be denied the right to vote because of 'race, color, or previous condition of servitude.'

CarpetBaggers

Northerners who went to the South to profit from available land and Reconstruction.

Sharecropper

A tenant farmer who gives a part of each crop as rent.

Scalawags

Southern Republicans who supported Reconstruction/Reconciliation with the North.

Ku Klux Klan

Radical Southern group opposed to equal rights claimed to be ghosts of past Confederates.

Force Acts

Meant to curtail KKK violence, gave President Grant the power to declare martial law in any Southern state with Klan activity.

Amnesty Acts

Allowed Confederate officials back into the governments of the South and allowed them to vote in elections.

Redemption

Refers to the White southerners taking back control of their governments in the South after Congressional Reconstruction ended forever.

Poll Taxes, Literacy Tests, Grandfather Clause

Methods by which Southern governments keep African Americans from voting.