History Since 1877: Reconstruction Era Vocabulary

Antebellum Definition: Defined as "before the war".
Impact of Civil War: General Sherman's Union Army destroyed Southern infrastructure to cripple the region's war capacity and dismantle the antebellum way of life.
Core Debates: Reconstruction era debates centered on redefining citizenship, equality, and the rights of formerly enslaved people.
Political Visions:
- Republicans: Advocated universal equality, asserting all men possess inalienable rights under the Declaration of Independence.
- Southern Democrats: Opposed equal freedoms for African Americans despite claims of granting freedom.

Timeline: Reconstruction efforts began before the Civil War officially ended.
13th Amendment (1865):
- Abolished slavery across the United States, with an exception for punishment of a crime.
- Section 2 granted Congress enforcement power.
- Freed $4\text{ million}$ formerly enslaved people.
Aftermath of Lincoln's Assassination:
- Vice President Andrew Johnson assumed office in 1865 as a strict constructionist favoring states' rights.
Johnson's Reconstruction Plan:
- Required Southern governments to void ordinances of secession, repudiate Confederate debts, and ratify the 13th Amendment.
- Granted Southern state conventions autonomy without federal interference on other matters.
- Pardoned Southern rebels, exempting wealthy planters with property over $20,000.

Black Codes: Enacted by former Confederate states (such as South Carolina and Mississippi) to regulate and control Black populations.
- Rights Granted: Ownership of property, marriage, and making contracts.
- Rights Denied: Serving on juries and other civil rights.
Vagrancy Laws:
- Mississippi required all freedmen to carry papers proving employment.
- Lack of proof led to arrest or fines.
- Unpaid fines enabled sheriffs to hire freedmen out as forced labor to anyone willing to pay.

Republican Legislative Action:
- Enacted voting rights for freed men.
- Led by figures like Thaddeus Stevens who believed in racial equality, alongside broader party political interests.
14th Amendment:
- Approved on June 13, 1866.
- Prohibited state laws from denying due process or discriminating against groups of people.
- Enforced the Bill of Rights across all states.
Opposition and Impeachment:
- Presidential opposition attempted to block the passage of the 14th Amendment.
- Republicans responded by overriding presidential vetoes and attempting impeachment.

Presidential Election of 1868:
- Former Union General Ulysses S. Grant ran on the platform "Let us have peace," promising to protect the status quo.
- Democrat Horatio Seymour promised to repeal Reconstruction.
- Black Southern voters helped secure Grant's presidential victory.
Democratic Participation:
- In 1867, Southern states eliminated racial discrimination in voting, leading Black men to vote in large numbers.
- African Americans won elections across the South, transforming former all-white political structures.
- Over 2,000 Black men served in public office, including 14 in the House of Representatives and 270 in other government positions.

Freedmen's Bureau: Tasked with redistributing abandoned or confiscated federal lands to formerly enslaved people, though promises of land went unhonored.
Rebuilding Families and Community:
- Freed people placed newspaper ads searching for long-lost relatives and gained control over their children.
- Sought education for adults and children, established Southern Black churches, and built independent communities.
Women's Activism and Reconstruction:
- Advocates like Elizabeth Cady Stanton led women's rights campaigns, organizing the Women's Rights Convention on May 10, 1866, in New York.
- Southern white women established the Ladies Memorial Association (derived from Soldiers Aid societies) to bury and memorialize soldiers, contributing to the "Lost Cause" narrative.
- War aftermath caused widespread poverty and economic struggle across Southern families.

Resistance to Biracial Democracy: White Southerners used systemic violence to suppress Black free labor and political authority.
Three Forms of Racial Violence:
1. Black Political Authority: White conservatives attacked Republican rallies, conventions, and elections.
2. Interpersonal Fights: Major urban riots occurred in Memphis and New Orleans (1866) and South Carolina (1870).
3. Organized Vigilante Groups: Nightriders, Bushwhackers, and the Ku Klux Klan (organized in 1866 in Tennessee, spreading across the South by 1868) terrorized Black landowners, voters, and independent workers.
Enforcement Acts:
- Made depriving citizens of civil rights a federal crime and authorized US troops for protection.
- Federal opposition to terror groups weakened as Southern Democrats reestablished "home rule" by 1876.

Economic Aftermath:
- White planters lost wealth tied to enslaved labor and turned to sharecropping.
- US cotton faced international competition from new global plantations.
Redeemers and New Departure Democrats:
- Focused on business and economics, promising white local rule to win back Southern states.
- Secured political control in Tennessee, Virginia, and Georgia by 1871.
- Implemented the Mississippi Plan in 1875, using violence to suppress Black voters.
Depression of 1873:
- Economic collapse shifted national focus from civil rights to economic survival, helping Democrats win control of the House of Representatives in 1874.
Compromise of 1877:
- Contested presidential election between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel Tilden.
- A federal electoral commission voted 8–7 along party lines in favor of Hayes.
- Democrats conceded the presidency to Hayes on the condition that all remaining federal troops were withdrawn from the South, ending Reconstruction.