Restoration

US Reconstruction Era Overview

• Lincoln’s Plan

• Johnson’s Plan

• Radical Reconstruction Plan

• Stage 1

• Stage 2

• Results

• Slavery → Segregation

Lincoln’s Plan

• Lenient in the eyes of Radical Republicans

  • goal was to get south to rejoin union + rebuild south (infrastructure, economy, etc.)

  • did not want to punch south

• Ten percent plan: during election of 1860, 10% of voters from each southern state had to take oath of allegiance and abide by Emancipation Proclamation

  • only voters, high-ranking officers + officiants could not be pardoned

• enslaved people who fought for union + literate African Americans could vote

• could not be put in place since he was assassinated

• 13th Amendment: no slavery except as punishment

Johnson’s Plan

• Johnson was a southen Democrat with slaves, disliked by Radical Republicans → strategic move done by Lincoln to promote unification

• lenient

• offered pardon to former southern citizens who took oath of loyalty and returned their property

  • excluded large plantation owners

    • had to beg for Johnson’s forgiveness

  • former Confederate states had to revoke Ordinance of Secession, ratify 13th Amendment, and reject all Civil War debts

• passed Black Codes

Radical Reconstruction Plan

• in Congress

• rejected Johnson’s plan + impeachment of Johnson

• more punishing towards southerners → believed they were responsible for so much violence

• continued Freedman’s Bureau

  • provided basic needs for African Americans

  • some displaced southerners took advantage of opportunities

• Iron Clad Oath: 51% of state needed to swear oath of allegiance to union to be admitted back into union

• Military Districts + Martial Law (Reconstruction Act of 1867): split south into 5 military districts that were governed by union military personnel

  • each district needed to create constitution, which was approved by Congress

• passed 13th, 14th, 15th Amendments

  • 13th: no slavery except as punishment

  • 14th: enslaved people became citizens; Confederate leaders could no longer vote + hold office

  • 15th: emancipated men could vote, own property, hold office, have rights, and pursue education

• Civil Rights Act of 1866: first United States federal law to define citizenship and affirm that all citizens are equally protected by the law

Stage 1

• Carpetbaggers: Northerners who moved to the south after the Civil War to get rich + gain political power

  • put belongings in a carpet bag

  • got elected into office and gave close friends + family jobs in government

    • corrupt + inexperienced

• Scalawags: Southerners who did not own enslaved people. Fought for the north during Civil War. Supported Reconstruction.

  • seen as traitors in south

• Freedman’s Bureau: continued → provided support for African Americans + displaced white people

Stage 2

• complete change in voting demographics

  • people died and new generation replaced them

    • many young people in south grew up around bigotry
      + people pushing back against reconstruction → adopted those views

• Ku Klux Klan: group of creeps that aimed to take down Republicans + Reconstruction

  • extremely anti-black → rode at night to lynch + kill black people

  • prevented African Americans from protesting, voting, and entering public spaces

  • worse white robes + masks to conceal identity

• Black Codes

  • severely limited African Americans’ rights

    • prohibited them from renting land and borrowing money to buy land

    • placed them in semi-bondage contracts

    • could not testify in court

    • vagrancy laws: made unemployment a crime → African Americans had to make long-term contracts with white employers or be arrested for vagrancy

  • limitations restricted rights and movements of Freedmen

• Jim Crow Laws: racial segregation laws

  • segregation of public schools, public areas (restaurants, drinking fountains, etc.), public transportation

  • NAACP - organized by William Du Bois, tried to end Jim Crow Laws

• Sharecropping: planting system that exploited small farmers

  • most African Americans knew how to farm

  • farmers rented land from plantation owner → had to give owner share of their crop

  • needed to rent cabins, land, seeds, tools, etc. → very difficult to pay back debts

  • many went into debt and were bonded to the land

Results of Reconstruction

• 13th: no slavery except as punishment

• 14th: enslaved people became citizens; Confederate leaders could no longer vote + hold office

• 15th: emancipated men could vote, own property, hold office, have rights, and pursue education

  • circumvented

  • literacy tests, poll tax, grandfather clause

  • black codes

Plessy v. Ferguson

• “separate but equal“

• ruled that racial segregation did not violate Constitution because the facilities permitted to black people and white people were equal (spoilers: they weren’t)

• overturned in 1954 after Brown v. Board

Blanche K. Bruce + Hiram R. Revels

first black senators