Despite some of his rhetoric during his vice presidency, his actions as president reveal that he was not concerned with punishing the South. Second, to Johnson, African-American suffrage was a delay and a distraction; it always had been a state responsibility to decide who should vote.
Without a focus on providing explicit legal equality for the freed slaves, Johnson overlooked the actions of white Southerners and blocked the actions of Congress. Despite the abolition of slavery, many former Confederates were not willing to accept the social changes.
Southern state governments quickly enacted the restrictive Black Codes. The Black Codes indicated that the freedmen would have more rights than they had before the war, but still only a limited set of second-class civil rights. Additionally, freedmen were not granted voting rights or citizenship The Black Codes outraged Northerners, and were overthrown by the Civil Rights Act of , which gave freedmen full legal equality except the right to vote.
This helped freedmen force planters to bargain for their labor. Such bargaining soon led to the practice of sharecropping, which gave the freedmen both greater economic independence and social autonomy.
However, because freedmen lacked capital, and because planters continued to own the tools, draft animals, and land, the freedmen were forced into producing cash crops, mainly cotton, for the landowners and merchants. Widespread poverty, as well as the falling price of cotton, led to indebtedness among a majority of the freedmen, and poverty among many planters. Northern officials gave varying reports on conditions involving freedmen in the South.
One harsh assessment came from Carl Schurz, who documented dozens of extra-judicial killings in states along the Gulf Coast.
He also reported that at least hundreds, perhaps thousands, of other African Americans had been killed in this area. In Selma, Alabama, Major J. Houston noted that whites who killed 12 African Americans in his district never came to trial. Several other killings never culminated in official cases. Black women were particularly vulnerable at this time, as convicting a white man of sexually assaulting a black woman was immensely difficult.
Because black women were considered to have little virtue, some in white society held that they could not be raped. This racist mindset contributed to numerous sexual crimes against black women. Black men were construed as being extremely sexually aggressive, and their supposed threats to white women often were used as a pretext for lynching and castrations. During the autumn of , the Radical Republicans responded to the implementation of the Black Codes by blocking the readmission of the former rebellious states to Congress.
Johnson, however, pushed to allow former Confederate states into the Union as long as their state governments adopted the Thirteenth Amendment which abolished slavery. The amendment was ratified by December 6, , leading Johnson to believe that Reconstruction was over.
Although Johnson had sympathies for the plights of the freedmen, he was opposed to federal assistance. An attempt to override the veto failed on February 20, In response, both the Senate and House passed a joint resolution, disallowing any congressional seat admittance until Congress declared Reconstruction finished. Illinois senator Lyman Trumbull, leader of the moderate Republicans, recognized that the abolition of slavery was worthless without the protection of basic civil rights, and thus proposed the first Civil Rights Law.
Congress quickly passed this Civil Rights bill. The impeachment of Andrew Johnson was one of the most dramatic events that occurred during the Reconstruction era in the United States, and was the first impeachment in history of a sitting U. Johnson was impeached because of his efforts to undermine congressional policy; the impeachment was the culmination of a lengthy political battle between the moderate Johnson and the Radical Republicans who dominated Congress and sought control of Reconstruction policies.
Johnson was acquitted by one vote. Johnson was impeached on February 24, , in the U. Specifically, he had removed Edwin M. Stanton, the secretary of war whom the Tenure of Office Act was largely designed to protect , from office and attempted to replace him with Brevet Major General Lorenzo Thomas.
The House agreed to the articles of impeachment on March 2, Chase presiding. Although Lincoln approved of the new constitution, Congress rejected it and refused to acknowledge the state delegates who won in Louisiana in the election of These Radical Republicans hoped to control the Reconstruction process, transform southern society, disband the planter aristocracy, redistribute land, develop industry, and guarantee civil liberties for former slaves.
Although the Radical Republicans were the minority party in Congress, they managed to sway many moderates in the postwar years and came to dominate Congress in later sessions. SparkTeach Teacher's Handbook. Page 1 Page 2.
Louisiana Drafts a New Constitution White southerners in the Union-occupied state of Louisiana met in —before the end of the Civil War—to draft a new constitution in accordance with the Ten-Percent Plan. It writes the Republican vision of how post-Civil War American society should be structured into the U.
Constitution, out of the reach of partisan politics. The amendment defines citizenship to include all people born or naturalized in the U. It stops short of guaranteeing blacks the right to vote. The controversial amendment will take over two years to be ratified. July: Congress re-passes its supplemental Freedmen's Bureau Bill. President Johnson vetoes it again, and Congress again overrides the veto, making the bill a law.
July Riots break out in New Orleans, Louisiana: a white mob attacks blacks and Radical Republicans attending a black suffrage convention, killing 40 people. August "The swing around the circle. He asks popular Union general Ulysses S. Grant to come along. When crowds heckle the president, Johnson's angry and undignified responses cause Grant -- and many Northerners -- to lose sympathy with the president and his lenient Reconstruction policies. Fall: Following the president's ruinous campaign, the mid-term elections become a battleground over the Fourteenth Amendment and civil rights.
Johnson's opponents are victorious, and the Republicans occupy enough seats to guarantee they will be able to override any presidential vetoes in the coming legislative session. March 2: The new session of Congress begins to pass additional reconstruction laws, overriding President Johnson's vetoes and beginning a more hard-line attitude toward the South. Known as Radical Reconstruction, the new policies divide the South into military districts and require the states to adopt new constitutions, introduce black suffrage, and ratify the Fourteenth Amendment.
Grant that he intends to fire Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, who has been a consistent opponent of the president and is close to the Radical Republicans who dominate Congress. Stanton has refused to resign and Congress has supported him through the Tenure of Office Act, which requires the consent of Congress to removals. At the same time, Congress has weakened the president's control of the army through the Command of the Army Act, which requires that all military orders of the President have the approval of the general of the army Grant.
Johnson believes the Tenure of Office Act is unconstitutional, and hopes to defeat the effort to force Stanton upon him by employing the popular Grant.
President Johnson believes that Grant has betrayed him; Grant now openly breaks with Johnson. Winter: Black and white lawmakers begin to work side by side in the Southern states' constitutional conventions, the first political meetings in American history to include substantial numbers of black men.
May Having infuriated the Republicans, Andrew Johnson becomes the first president to be impeached by a house of Congress, but he avoids conviction and retains his office by a single vote. He will not get the Democratic nomination in the upcoming presidential election.
Blair, Jr. July The Fourteenth Amendment to the U. Constitution, defining citizenship to include all people born or naturalized in the U. September: Black elected officials are ousted from the Georgia state legislature; "The Negro is unfit to rule the State," the Atlanta Constitution declares. Title Page, Copyright pp. Contents pp. Tables pp. Preface pp. Abbreviations pp. Prologue: Mr.
Lincoln's Model of Reconstruction pp. War and Social Change: Benjamin F. Butler and the Assertion of Federal Power pp. The Failure of Conciliation: Nathaniel P.
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