Reconstruction

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15 July 2006

Reconstruction

Reconstruction is the process by which the former states of the Confederacy were "reconstructed " into the United States . During the approximately fifteen years of the reconstruction process , the leadership of reconstruction changed twice . Initially begun by President Lincoln in 1863 and continued by Andrew Johnson after Lincoln 's assassination in 1865 , it was ultimately implemented , managed and completed under the authority and supervision of the Radical Republican Congress in 1877

The different

personalities and philosophies of the leaders were in many ways responsible for the protracted length of the process . Abraham Lincoln intended to use moderate policies to bring the Confederate States back into the United States as quickly and as easily as possible Andrew Johnson essentially continued these policies during his administration . However , when the Radical Republicans assumed the leadership of Reconstruction they sought , not a quick and moderate process , but "a far-reaching transformation in Southern society (Foner 62 . For the Radical Republicans universal male suffrage was a necessary provision of any reconstruction plan

The first military action in the Civil War began when Confederate artillery batteries fired on Fort Sumter , a Union fort located in Charleston Harbor , on December 26 , 1860 . Military hostilities effectively ended when Confederate Generals Robert E . Lee on April 9 1865 and Joseph E . Johnston on April 26 , 1865 , surrendered to Union Forces . Given this one might expect the Union military presence to end within a few months of these dates . However , it wasn 't until 1877 that President Rutherford B . Hayes , withdrew federal soldiers from the former Confederacy (Blair 388 . By the time of the military withdrawal , the South had been fighting with or occupied by United States federal troops for eighteen years , in effect an entire generation . It is no surprise then that the resentment and even hatred engendered by the Civil War between Southerners and its fellow citizens of the North was increased by Reconstruction

Lincoln began implementing his moderate Reconstruction plan on December 8 , 1863 , approximately 16 months prior to Lee 's surrender , with his Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction . It offered full pardon and a restoration of all rights except for the right to own slaves to all people who took a loyalty oath to the United States and accepted the abolition of slavery . A few groups were excluded : high ranking Confederate officers and civil officials (Foner 35

Commonly called the Ten Percent plan , it provided the means by which states could be reconstructed into member states of the United States Once 10 of the number of voters in the 1860 election had complied with these terms the minority could establish a new state government and write a new state constitution . The new constitution must abolish slavery . Any states so reconstructed were then entitled to representation in Washington D . C , subject to approval of the U . S Senate and the U . S . House of Representatives

Louisiana accomplished these requirements in 1864 with a new...