Changes During Reconstruction Research Paper

There is a subject matter that is at crossroads right now. We know that Reconstruction means to rebuilt, re-gain and to improve. The Reconstruction era was in the time period of 1863-1877. To re-built from something, one has to be destroyed in some sense. That “destruction” was the Civil War of 1861 to 1865. Through these four long years, there was huge separation and debate on slaveholding. The North fought for the belief and want to free slaves while the south didn’t. In 1860 President Lincoln was elected, Abraham Lincoln believed and wanted the best for our great country. In 1862 he issued his preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, in which declared that all slaves in states in rebellion against the Union "shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.". This meant slaves in states in rebellion and authorizes the enlistment of black troops. President Lincoln's proposed plan for reconstructing the Union was to

When Johnson let the South back into the Union he helped to make all the people who had died for the right to equality for all worthless. President Johnson was from the south originally. He had been a poor white living in Kentucky, and so had learned to hate the rich, white Plantation owners. But he always felt above the slaves which later influenced his decision to let the very people he had grown up hating back in to the Union. When congress passed the 13th Amendment banning slavery many of the people in the south feared what would happen to them. Johnson, who related to the poor white folk, knew that they needed someone who they could say "at least I'm better than you" about. The only way he saw to do that was by letting the South have their lands and rights back so that they could do something about their former slaves. So the pardons started rolling out of the Round Office like a printing press. The Radical Republicans weren't happy about it but at that point they couldn't stop him. The south began to return to the way it was.

Despite its achievements, Reconstruction faced tremendous challenges, mostly due to white resistance. While Abraham Lincoln’s objective was reunion and reconciliation, Andrew Johnson resisted and believed that African Americans had no role to play in Reconstruction. Johnson’s

After the Civil War, the United States had many problems to solve. The country had to figure out how to integrate newly freed slaves into society and bring the former Confederate states back into the Union. Reconstruction was period of time after the civil war in which the United States addressed these problems. Reconstruction had two different phases: Presidential Reconstruction took place from 1865 to 1867, and Congressional Reconstruction took place from 1867 to 1877. Presidential Reconstruction began with Abraham Lincoln, who proposed the Proclamation of Amnesty and the ten percent oath plan. Lincoln was focused on leniency and forgiveness; under his plan southerners would take an oath of loyalty to the Union, and after only ten percent of a state’s voters had taken this oath, the state could be readmitted. After Lincoln’s assassination, Andrew Johnson took over Reconstruction. Johnson wanted to punish landowners, but liberally handed out pardons, as he greatly enjoyed the power that he had over southerners. Under Johnson, former confederates were re-elected, and southern states discriminated blacks. Eventually, Congress took over Reconstruction. During Congressional Reconstruction, the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments were passed, and the freedman’s bureau was created. Overall, the failures of Reconstruction outweighed the failures because it took a very long time for it to achieve its goals, and the South was still able to

Something that President Johnson did to start the period of Reconstruction was to pardon all Confederates soldiers if they plead loyalty and alliance to the Union. No one was held accountable for what happened, one man was murder. Also he demanded that the states in the south abolish slavery and change their constitution in order to be accepted into the United States. Those were Andrew Johnson terms for Reconstructions. Not very efficient because it leaves all these defeated soldiers, filled with anger and violence in the streets. Then Congress tried to pass the Civil Rights bill and the 14th amendment which

After the conclusion of America’s Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln pitched the idea of “Reconstruction,” which would bring the southern states back into the Union. President Lincoln, according to many radical Republicans, was too gentle on the south. The government was divided on how to solve the issue of readmitting the southern states back into the Union. In addition to that, the government was not certain on what rights to enumerate to the newly emancipated slaves. These issues became more difficult to solve after President Lincoln was murdered. Lincoln’s successor, Vice President Andrew Johnson, was a Tennessee Democrat that lacked respect of the Republican Congress. The legislative and executive branches of the American government

During reconstruction, blacks were no longer forced to work as slaves however they still needed to work to support themselves and their families. Not many blacks had skills outside of farming so most worked the lands of the wealthy white landowners but not as slaves. They had the right to do whatever they wanted and the landowners could do nothing about it. Wealthy landowners still needed work hands and blacks needed an income so former slaveholders established the sharecropping system. Land owned by a white person would be farmed by black families and they shared the crop yield. This often resulted in the white person taking more than their share and the black families struggled to support themselves. Sharecropping did little to help economic advancement for blacks and was a way the white man could prevent blacks from making enough money

During the reconstruction period after the Civil War Radical Republicans fought for the freedpeople on a political level. They believed that the blacks deserved the same freedom and political rights as the whites. The Radicals resonated closest with President Lincoln and his views which were similar, but not limited to his words in his second inaugural address; “let us strive to finish the work...to bind up the nation’s wounds.”1 The radicals had some similar views to the moderate Republicans, however, they took it a step farther and wanted to completely uproot the current economic and social system; “but most considered the South a new frontier to be conquered culturally, politically, and economically.”2 Their main objectives were to advocate suffrage and voting rights along with the redistribution of land to the freed slaves.

How did slaves rights change in the South during the reconstruction era? Well, they didn’t, not by much, at least. The era after the Civil War was known as reconstruction. The Civil War was fought by the North wanting equal rights for everyone, most specifically equal rights African American slaves in the South and the South not wanting for that to happen. The North wanted all people to have the same rights. For everyone to be treated equally, no more discrimination. Slaves in the South were being treated poorly and living conditions were horrible. The North wanted to change that, which is the reason why the Civil War was fought.

Reconstruction produced enormous tensions among the political parties, and between the president and Congress. After the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, his vice president, Andrew Johnson, became the following president after the Civil War. Andrew Johnson wanted the South back to full pledged membership in the union as rapidly as possible. Johnson quickly set his plans in motion while congress was not in session which then became known as the Presidential Reconstruction. It seemed that he wanted a rapid lenient restoration of the union. His aim was to bring the white south and white north back together. African Americans do not play a role in Johnson's vision of the postwar South other than to go back to work, be landless, and rightless plantation

Lincoln would have wanted full voting rights for African Americans. Lincoln would have wanted newly freed slaves to travel West and start a new life as farmers or railroad workers. The South may have gotten rid of the racism much sooner if African Americans would have received more rights and freedoms. The Civil rights movement may have happened one hundred years earlier. Lincoln would not have been as harsh on the South and would have done more to help the growth of the economy in the South. The South wouldn't have become as angry and anti-negro

If Lincoln hadn’t died, a question that every student has come across while learning about the civil war, but what if he hadn’t died had reconstruction would had been better? Had former slaves gained better civil rights? Although these questions have no real answers and all we can come with are speculations, in Eric Foner’s essay he seems to address these questions with some acceptable reasons that made me come to the conclusion that if Lincoln hadn’t been assassinated the period of reconstruction would have been better than it was under Johnson.

I think the most important problem the government faced in Reconstruction was racial violence and intimidation. In the South, white people will continue to hold on to their racist ideas and beliefs. White supremacist groups, lynchings, and race riots will continue to cause problems for the freed slaves of the South. Another problem is dealing with the absence of cheap labor the slaves provided in the Antebellum. Instead of giving freed slaves a fair job, white landowners will force them into new kinds of slavery like sharecropping and logging camps? I predict that it will take a long time for the South to heal and get back on its feat economically.

The differences between both presidents was that Lincoln wanted equality for all and wanted reconstruction of both South and North states. While Lincoln felt that way about how the North and South should act with equality, Johnson believed the Union should stay intact but, give slaves limited opportunities. Johnson’s view made many citizens dislike him because of slavery and what states should agree with what. The government knew that with Johnson as President nothing would come out of him being in the presidency because instead of reuniting the nations he was parting them in different ways.