Chapter 10 – Reconstruction
Notes
I. The Debate Over Reconstruction
A. The Reconstruction Begins
* The South in ruins – no agricultural output
1. Lincoln’s Plan – moderate
a. amnesty if – oath of loyalty, accept no slavery
b. state if – 10% take oath
2. The Radical Republicans
a. prevent Confed. leaders from returning to pwr.
b. Repub. Party more powerful in South
c. Blacks – right to vote
d. afraid of 3/5 Compromise ending
3. The Wade-Davis Bill
a. compromise between leniency and radicals
b. majority take oath
c. Lincoln pocket vetoes
B. Freedmen’s Bureau
1. provide food / clothes for refugees
a. some want more (40 acres & a mule) some less
C. Johnson Takes Office
1. Johnson’s Plan
a. much like Lincoln’s
i. former Confed officials elected as state rep
2. Black Codes
a. keep blacks “in their place”
b. curfew, living restrictions, labor contracts,
vagrancy laws
D. Radical Republicans Take Control
1. The 14th Amendment (Civil Rights Act of 1866)
a. citizenship if born here or naturalized
b. can’t deny life, liberty, property w/o due
process
2. Military Reconstruction
a. Johnson’s plan gone – 5 military districts
b. states must allow all males to vote & accept 14
c. Johnson impeached – Tenure of Office Act
d. Grant becomes pres.
e. 15th Amendment
i. right to vote- race, color, previous servitude
II. Republicans Rule
A. In the South (by 1870 all states rejoined)
1. Carpetbaggers & Scalawags
a. C- Northerners who move south
b. S- Southerner who support Reconstruction & Rep
2. Blacks and Politics
a. take full advantage of 15th Amend.
3. Republican Reforms
a. repealed black codes
b. hospitals, infrastructure, schools
c. graft and taxes
B. Black Communities
1. Churches – center of community
2. A Desire to Learn
a. Freedmen’s Bureau
b. Colleges, Universities, Trade
i. Booker T. Washington
C. The Ku Klux Klan
1. drive out Northerners & intimidate Blacks
a. want Dems to control South
b. also hate other minorities (Catholics)
2. The KKK Act does little
III. Reconstruction Collapses
A. The Grant Administration
1. The Republican Split
a. at first- continued Reconstruction
i. high tariff, rr, pay debts (sin tax)
b. Dems think wealthy have too much power
i. some liberal Repub join- Grant wins anyway
c. scandal in 2nd term
2. The Panic of 1873
a. Dems win H of R and gain strength in Senate
B. Reconstruction Ends
1. “Redeeming” the South
a. white (Dems) attempt to get South back from Rep
2. The Compromise of 1877
a. Hayes v. Tilden in 1876 election
i. Tilden wins more electoral votes
ii. fraud confuses results
b. Hayes wins after commission votes
i. pulls troops out of South
ii. dirty deal? – Reconstruction over
B. A “New South” Arises
1. not just agricultural elite
a. rr, industry, tobacco processing, cotton mills
b. still agrarian
2. Blacks return to “Old South”
a. tenant farmers, sharecroppers, crop liens, debt
peonage