1. Radicals in Control

2.  By the end of 1865, every Southern state had formed a new government.  The 13 th Amendment, which abolished slavery, had been added to the Constitution.  In President Andrew Johnson’s view, Reconstruction was over.  When Congress met in December 1865, however, many lawmakers were of the opinion that Reconstruction had hardly begun.

3.  By 1866, Republicans had won a strong majority in Congress, but some felt more strongly about the issue of equal rights for African- Americans than others.  A group in Congress led by Thaddeus Stevens, called the Radical Republicans, were especially critical of Johnson’s plan.  This group had been abolitionists before the war, and now they were determined to reconstruct the nation on the basis of equal rights for all.  They managed to convince the more moderate Republicans to pass 2 bills designed help former slaves.  One gave the Freedmen’s Bureau greater powers, and the other, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, aimed to overturn the black codes.

4.  To Congress’s surprise, Johnson vetoed both bills.  He said the Freedmen’s Bureau was too costly and led blacks to become lazy, and that the Civil Rights Act of 1866 was a violation of states’ rights.  Republicans, however, gathered the 2/3 majority in each house needed to override Johnson’s vetoes, the first time in history this had ever happened!  Against Johnson’s wishes, Congress also passed the 14 th Amendment, making it illegal for states to deny anyone the rights of citizenship.

5.  In 1867, Congress laid out its plan for Reconstruction in a series of laws known as the Reconstruction Acts.  The South was to be divided into 5 districts, each controlled by federal troops.  Election boards in each state would register male voters, both black and white, who were loyal to the Union.  Southerners who had actively supported the Confederacy would not be allowed to vote.  The voters would elect conventions to write new state constitutions which had to grant African- Americans the right to vote.  The voters would then elect state legislatures which were required to ratify the 14 th Amendment.

6.  In addition, Congress also enacted 2 laws designed to keep Johnson from interfering with its Reconstruction plan.  The Command of the Army Act limited the president’s power as commander in chief of the army.  The Tenure of Office Act barred the president from firing certain federal officials without Congress’s permission.  Johnson was furious, and to prove his point, he fired Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton.

7.  2 days later, the House of Representatives voted to impeach Johnson, or put him on trial for breaking the law.  Johnson faced trial in the Senate, and if 2/3 of the senators found him guilty, he would be removed from office.  Johnson’s lawyers made it clear that if he was allowed to stay in office, he would not oppose Congressional Reconstruction anymore.  When the votes were cast, he escaped removal by a vote of 36 to 25, just 1 vote short of the 2/3 majority required.

8.  Johnson did not run for a 2 nd term in the 1868 election.  Instead, the Republican party nominated war hero, Ulysses S. Grant, who supported Congressional Reconstruction and the rights of freedmen.  He said that the job of the president was to carry out the laws that Congress passed.  His Democratic opponent, Horatio Seymour, promised to end Reconstruction in the South and return it to its traditional leaders.  Nationwide, Seymour won a majority of white votes, but Grant, however, won the popular vote with the help of a half a million black voters.

9.  Grant’s victory helped persuade Congress to pass the last of the Reconstruction amendments.  The 15 th Amendment stated that citizens could not be denied the right to vote based on “race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”  About 1/5 of the new leaders elected in the South were black.  Even so, the goals of the Radical Republicans were to make sure former Confederates stayed out of office, black voting rights were protected, and the Republicans kept a majority.  It was not their idea, however, that blacks should obtain offices of great political power.  Although a few African-Americans were elected to Congress, there were no black governors.