8/31- Reconstruction

Period 5: 1844-1877, Topic 10- Reconstruction

Student Learning Objective- Students will be able to explain the effects of government policy during Reconstruction on society from 1865 to 1877.

“Since the surrender of the armies of the confederate States of America a little has been done toward establishing the Government upon true principles of liberty and justice; and but a little if we stop here. We have broken the material shackles of four million slaves. We have unchained them, from the stake so as to allow them locomotion, provided they do not walk in paths which are trod by white men. . . . But in what have we enlarged their liberty of thought? In what [ways] have we taught them the science and granted them the privilege of self-government? . . .

“Unless the rebel states, before admission, should be made republican in spirit, and placed under the guardianship of loyal men, all our blood and treasure will have been spent in vain. . . . There is more reason why [African American] voters should be admitted in the rebel states. . . . In the states they form the great mass of the loyal men. Possibly with their aid loyal governments may be established in most of those states. Without it all are sure to be ruled by traitors; and loyal men, black and white, will be oppressed, exiled, or murdered.

“I believe, on my conscience, that on the continued ascendency of [the Republican] party depends the safety of this great nation. [If there is not African American suffrage] in the rebel states then every one of them is sure to send a solid rebel representative . . . to Congress, and cast a solid rebel electoral vote. . . . I am for Negro suffrage in every rebel state. . . . every man, no matter what his race or color; every earthly being who has an immortal soul, has an equal right to justice, honesty, and fair play with every other man; and the law should secure him those rights.”

Thaddeus Stevens, member of Congress, speech to the House of Representatives, 1867

Discussion Question #1- How does Stevens feel about the Federal government's role in aiding formerly enslaved peoples?

Discussion Question #2- Is that true?  Why or why not?

Discussion Question #3- What is Stevens' claim in the last paragraph of the excerpt?

Discussion Question #4- Is this true?  Why or why not?

Discussion Question #5- Would Abraham Lincoln have agreed with the concepts of Reconstruction?  Do you?

"The time has come when the American people should understand what crime is, and that it should be punished, and its penalties enforced and inflicted.  Treason must be made odious, and the traitors must be punished and impoverished, their great plantations must be seized, and divided into small farms, and sold to honest, industrious men.  I say, as to the leaders, punishment.  I say leniency, conciliation, and amnesty to the thousands whom they have misled and deceived." -Andrew Johnson

Discussion Question #6- What point of view is being expressed?

Discussion Question #7-  Who do you think is the intended audience of this speech?  Why?

Discussion Question #8- What do you think the purpose of this is?  Why?

Discussion Question #9- What was the outcome?

Discussion Question #10- Evaluate the validity of this speech.

Period 5: 1844-1877, Topic 11- Failure of Reconstruction

Student Learning Objective- Students will be able to explain how and why Reconstruction resulted in continuity and change in regional and national understandings of what it meant to be American.

“After [the Confederate surrender at] Appomattox the South’s political leaders saw themselves entering an era of revolutionary changes imposed by the national government, which many viewed as an outside power. Continuing a long pattern of American . . . behavior, many whites found an outlet for their frustration by attacking those deemed responsible for their suffering: white Republicans and blacks. . . .

“Frustrated at their inability to bring their states back to Democratic control, some southerners turned to the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist organizations, using terrorism to eliminate opposition leaders and to strike fear into the hearts of rank-and-file Republicans, both black and white. . . .

“[Violence] in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Carolina exposed the impotence of the Republican party in the South and the determination of Democrats to defeat their opponents by any means necessary. The final triumph of the counterrevolution awaited the withdrawal of northern Republican support from the so-called ‘carpetbag regimes’ in 1877. The inconsistency of federal Reconstruction policy and the strength of southern resistance seem to have doomed the Reconstruction experiment to inevitable collapse. Although Americans have often been loathe to concede that violence may bring about [political] change, terrorism in the Reconstruction era was instrumental in achieving the ends desired by its perpetrators.”

George C. Rable, historian, But There Was No Peace: The Role of Violence in the Politics of Reconstruction, published in 1984

“In its pervasive impact and multiplicity of purposes, . . . the wave of counterrevolutionary terror that swept over large parts of the South between 1868 and 1871 lacks a counterpart . . . in the American experience. . . .

“By 1870, the Ku Klux Klan . . . had become deeply entrenched in nearly every Southern state. . . . In effect, the Klan was a military force serving the interests of the Democratic party, the planter class, and all those who desired the restoration of white supremacy. . . .

“Adopted in 1870 and 1871, a series of Enforcement Acts embodied the Congressional response to violence. . . . As violence persisted, Congress enacted a far more sweeping measure—the Ku Klux Klan Act of April 1871. This for the first time designated certain crimes committed by individuals as offenses punishable under federal law. . . . If states failed to act effectively against them, [these offenses could] be prosecuted by federal district attorneys, and even lead to military intervention. . . .

“Judged by the percentage of Klansmen actually indicted and convicted, the fruits of ’enforcement’ seem small indeed, a few hundred men among the thousands guilty of heinous crimes. But in terms of its larger purposes—restoring order, reinvigorating the morale of Southern Republicans, and enabling blacks to exercise their rights as citizens—the policy proved a success. . . . So ended the Reconstruction career of the Ku Klux Klan. . . . National power had achieved what most Southern governments had been unable, and Southern white public opinion unwilling, to accomplish: acquiescence in the rule of law.”

Eric Foner, historian, Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877, published in 1988

Discussion Question #1- From the Foner source, what impact did Federal legislation have during Reconstruction?

Discussion Question #2- Going further than the Foner source, what happened when Reconstruction ended in 1877 in relation to Foner's point about Federal legislation and enforcement during Reconstruction?

Discussion Question #3- What is a difference in point of view between the Rable and Foner sources?

Discussion Question #4- What is a similarity in point of view between the Rable and Foner sources?