RECONSTRUCTION 2

RECONSTRUCTION continued (14TH AMENDMENT CONTINUED, AND 15TH)

I. THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT

President Andrew Johnson felt that Congress had no authority to pass the Freedman's Bureau bill or the Civil Rights Act or the 14th Amendment. In his view a Congress with 11 states unrepresented was illegitimate. He urged the South to reject the 14th Amendment. In the fall of 1866, in the off-year elections, Johnson campaigned against Congress. But he was repudiated at the polls. The Republicans won control of every Northern state legislature; won every Northern gubernatorial contest; and gained more than a 2/3rds majority in both Houses of Congress.This was a veto-proof majority.

Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment also excluded high ex-Confederates from serving as a Congressman or Senator, or holding any civil or military office. This exclusion was designed to punish ex-Confederates. Specifically, the Section said "No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States or under any state, who as an officer of the U.S. or any state legislature or as an executive officer or judicial officer of any state, took an oath to support the Constitution of the U.S. and then violated that oath by engaging in insurrection or rebellion against the U.S. or gave aid and comfort to the enemies of the U.S." In plain English, if you were a military officer, U.S. Congressman, U.S. senator, state legislator, state senator, or governor or judicial officer (such as a judge) before the Civil War, and you violated your oath to defend the Constitution of the U.S., by participating in secession and civil war, you are excluded from holding any public civil or judicial office. This disability could be removed by a two-thirds vote of Congress, and was eventually removed in 1872.

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment repudiated the Confederate debt. No debt incurred by the Confederacy or any of the 11 Confederate states during the period of secession was valid, and would not be repaid. This would punish those who aided the Confederacy financially. It was estimated that this debt was worth $1 billion.

Comment on meaning: If a state denies some of its male citizens the right to vote, that state shall lose a percentage of its seats or representation in Congress. It will lose a percentage equal to the percentage of disfranchised eligible male voters in the state.

For example, imagine that half or 50% of the men in South Carolina are black. South Carolina refuses to let them vote. Then South Carolina would lose 50% of its representation or seats in Congress.

If, hypothetically, South Carolina had 10 seats in Congress, it would lose half of its representation or 5 seats.

Southerners, however, said that this was awfully convenient for the North.

Ninety percent (90%) of black people lived in the South until 1900. South Carolina in 1860 had 291,300 white people and 412,320 blacks. Blacks were the majority in South Carolina. A state like South Carolina would lose at least half of its representation under the provisions of Section 2 of the 14th Amendment if it refused to allow blacks to vote.

To look at a few Northern examples:

In 1860

New Jersey had 646,699 whites and

25,318 blacks

Pennsylvania had 2,849,259 whites and

56,949 blacks

New York had 3,831,590 whites and

49,005 blacks.

Blacks were only a small percentage of Northern population. If a Northern state refused to let black men vote, Northern states would lose only a small percentage of their representation in Congress. For New Jersey, less than 1/25th of the population was black (something like 4 percent).

The point is that this formula wouold hurt the South far more than the North. Therefore it seemed a little partisan and one-sided to Southern whites. They felt that the North was being hypocritical.

Section 2 of the 14th Amendment was designed to encourage the white South to allow blacks to vote by punishing it if it did NOT. The harsh penalty or price that the South would have to pay if it did NOT let blacks vote was meant to be an incentive.

However, since most Southerners were by now Democrats, this section of the 14th Amendment would in effect reduce the number of seats of the Southern Democrats - almost by half. This would hurt the Democrats and weaken their political power, and help the Republicans.

We should note that the 14th Amendment, as originally passed, DID NOT GUARANTEE to blacks the right to vote. It provided that if a state denied the vote to any of its adult male citizens then it would have its representation in Congress reduced in proportion to the number of persons disfranchised. This way the North might exclude blacks and pay a low price, but the South would pay a higher price. But if black voting was so odious to the South it COULD have denied blacks the right to vote--as long as it was willing to pay the price for doing so and so long as it was willing to have its own representation reduced.

If the Southern states HAD accepted the 14th Amendment in the summer of 1866 they could have been re-admitted to the Union without having to adopt black suffrage. But their stubborn defiance of the moderate Republicans caused the moderates to go over to the so-called Radicals, whose terms were much higher. The rejection of the 14th Amendment by the Southern states pushed the moderates into the Radical camp.

If the South had compromised with the Moderates in 1866 it might have avoided Radical Reconstruction. But in 1866, at the urging of Andrew Johnson, 10 of the 11 seceded states rejected the 14th Amendment (all but Tennessee). In retrospect, for the South, it was a missed opportunity.

II. RADICAL OR MILITARY RECONSTRUCTION

The Congressional elections of November 1866 were a referendum on the debate between Johnson and the Congress, and the North gave the Republicans a more than 2/3rds majority in both Houses of Congress. All hope of compromise between Johnson and the Moderates was dead. Now the president and the South had to contend with the implacable Charles Sumner of Mass., Thaddeus Stevens of PA, and George Julian of Indiana. Before it was all over, President Andrew Johnson would come within 1 vote of being impeached and driven from office. The Radical Republicans regarded the South, especially the planter elite, as positively evil. They believed the South, and especially the elite, should be punished for having committed treason and for having engaged in armed rebellion against the United States. They viewed the South as a vanquished enemy, entitled to no special consideration. Sumner and Stevens By rebelling, they had forfeited any rights they might otherwise have been entitled to. Punishment was the price the South had to pay for losing the war. What followed was a power struggle between North and South. The North was the victor, therefore it threw its weight around and dictated the terms of reunion. And the Radical Republicans said in essence, we are going to go back to the beginning and start Reconstruction all over again. And this time you're going to do it our way.

THE MILITARY RECONSTRUCTION BILL

In February 1867 the Republicans passed the Reconstruction Act, which Johnson vetoed. Early in March Congress overrode his veto. This act is sometimes called the Military Reconstruction Act, or First Reconstruction Act. The bill provided that:

1. The South was out of the Union. It would be treated as conquered provinces.

2. It was to be divided into 5 military districts, under military governors.

3. The governments previously approved by President Johnson were disbanded.

4. Each Southern state (except Tennessee) must elect delegates to a new state constitutional convention to draft new state constitutions.

5. Blacks would be eligible to vote for the DELEGATES who would actually attend the state constitutional convention.

6.Ex-confederates would NOT be eligible to vote for the delegates to the state constitutional conventions.

7. The state constitutional conventions in these 10 states were REQUIRED to adopt black suffrage in the state constitutions.

8. When the voters of the state had ratified the new state constitution

9. And the new state legislature had ratified the 14th Amendment (REQUIRED to do so)

10. The state would submit its constitution to Congress for its approval.

11. IF Congress approved of the state constitution, the state would be re-admitted or restored to the Union, and the federal army of occupation withdrawn. If Congress didn't like the state constitution it would give it back to the state and tell them to change it. And basically the army of occupation would remain in the state indefintely until the state complied.

1864-65 1866 1868-1870

13th Amendment 14th Amend. 15th Amendment

Lincoln and Johnson Moderate Rep's Radical Rep's

(Emancipation) Citizenship Voting Rights

In 1866 the moderate Republican position was that the South could deny blacks the right to vote IF it was prepared to pay the price for doing so. But in March 1867 the Military Reconstruction Act of 1867 gave the South no choice. The Southern states MUST- they were now REQUIRED- to write black suffrage into their state constitutions. This is what they might have avoided if they had settled with the moderate Republicans and accepted the 14th Amendment in 1866. Of course the Republicans assumed, correctly, that blacks would vote Republican, out of gratitude to the party of Lincoln and emancipation.

III. BLACK POPULATION

A) IN THE NORTHERN STATES

The question of voting rights for blacks was explosive in the South in a way that it was not in the North. Ninety percent of blacks still lived in the South. Only a handful of blacks lived in the North before 1900.

State Number of whites Number of blacks

Conn. 451,000 8,600

Delaware 90,000 21,600

Washington, DC 60,700 14,300

Illinois 1,704,000 7,600

Indiana 1,338,700 11,400

Iowa 673,000 1,000

Kansas 106,000 627

Maine 626,900 1,327

Mass. 1,221,000 9,600

Michigan 736,000 6,799

New Hampshire 325,000 494

New Jersey 646,699 25,336

New York 3,831,000 49,000

PA 2,849,000 56,949

California 323,000 4,086

Oregon 52,000 128

B) IN THE SOUTHERN STATES

State Number of Whites Number of Blacks

Alabama 526,000 437,770

Arkansas 324,000 111,000

Florida 77,746 62,677

Georgia 591,550 465,698

Kentucky 919,000 236,000

Louisiana 357,456 350,373** about 50%

Maryland 515,918 171,131

Mississippi 353,899 437,404 **blk majority

Missouri 1,063,000 118,000

N. Carolina 629,900 361,000

S. Carolina 291,300 412,320 **blk majority

Tennessee 826,722 283,019

Texas 420,800 182,921

VA (and W.VA) 1,047,000 548,900

IV. BLACK VOTERS FOR THE STATE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTIONS

In the South as a whole, with the ex-Confederates excluded, (Potter, p. 191) there were 703,000 black voters and 627,000 white voters. In 5 states -- South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana--blacks were a majority of the voters for the state constitutional conventions.

State No. white (male) voters No black (male voters)

(with ex-Confederates

excluded)

S. Carolina 46,000 80,000 (black majority)

Mississippi 46,000 60,000 (black majority)

Louisiana 45,000 84,000 (black majority)

Florida 11,000 16,000 (black majority)

N. Carolina 106,000 72,000

Alabama 61,000 104,000 (black majority)

Georgia 96,000 95,000 (almost equal)

Virginia 120,000 105,000

By 1868, seven (7) Southern states complied with the terms of the Military Reconstruction Act and adopted black suffrage and were re-admitted to the Union. They were:

North Carolina
South Carolina
Florida
Louisiana
Arkansas
Alabama
Georgia.

Again, all were required to write black suffrage into their state constitutions and to ratify the 14th Amendment.

After Georgia was re-admitted, the white Democrats in the state legislature voted to expel the black Republican members of the legislature. Congress then revoked its admission of Georgia and kicked Georgia back out of the Union.

Thus, as of 1868, four (4) states were still out of the Union. They were Virginia, Mississippi, Texas and Georgia.

IV. THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT

1. DEMOCRATIC RESURGENCE

In the state elections of fall 1867 the Republicans lost the governorships of Connecticut and California to the Democrats. In Ohio and New Jersey the Democrats captured control of both houses of the state legislatures, and in New York they won 1 house.

But if 1867 was troublesome, the election of November 1868 was deeply alarming to the Republicans. The Democrats nominated Governor Horatio Seymour of New York, and the Republicans nominated General Ulysses S. Grant. Grant won, but the Democrats carried New York and New Jersey; in Pennsylvania Seymour lost by less than 5% of the vote; and in Connecticut and Indiana he lost by less than 3% of the vote.

2. THE REPUBLICANS BEGIN TO BE AFRAID

As Potter argues (p. 191), the Republicans were appalled. He writes, "If the party of treason and rebellion could give the party of Union and freedom this kind of competition, less than 4 years after the Union's military victory, and with the immensely popular "Hero of Appomattox" at the head of the Republican ticket, the Republicans had something to worry about."

3. THE REPUBLICANS DECIDE THEY NEED THE BLACK VOTE

As Potter argues on pp. 196-197, the prospect of a resurgent Democratic Party in the North in the aftermath of the election of 1868 led the Republican Party to look again at the question of black suffrage.

Idealists such as Charles Sumner had always supported black suffrage. But he was one of a small handful before 1868. However now many Republicans embraced black suffrage. It was a matter of political expediency and party interest. The Republicans perceived that they stood to gain and benefit from the black vote. The Republicans felt they positively needed the black vote in order to remain in power. Not only did they need the black vote in the South, but they also needed it in the North. If the margin of victory between Republicans and Democrats was 3% here and 5% there, the black vote might be the swing vote in some Northern states. It was estimated that enfranchising blacks would add 146,000 voters in the North, including 10,000 in New York, 5,000 in New Jersey and 14,000 in Pennsylvania. In close elections this would make the difference. Now the mass of Republican politicians came around to Sumner's view. The Republicans now moved toward the 15th Amendment, which would provide for black voting nationwide, not only in the South.

4. ALTRUISM AND PARTISAN POLITICAL INTEREST

In short, from a utopian perspective, the Republicans did the right thing for the wrong reason. They embraced black suffrage nationwide NOT out of pious concern for blacks but rather for considerations of partisan political interest and advantage.

In the real world, especially in politics, people do things because they perceive it is in their interests to do so. The name of the game is interests.

5. PASSAGE OF THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT

In the elections of 1866 the Republicans had gained more than a 2/3rds majority in both Houses of Congress. But in the new Congress elected in Nov. 1868, which would take office in March, the Republicans would no longer have a 2/3rds majority. But an amendment to the Constitution requires a 2/3rds vote of both houses of Congress, and ratification by 3/4ths of the states. Therefore the Republicans had to push the Amendment through before the new Congress was seated in March 1869. And with only four working days left, in February 1869 the Republicans approved the 15th Amendment.

The Amendment specified that the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the U.S. or any state on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude. And Congress shall have the power to enforce the Amendment by appropriate legislation. The effect was to give the vote to black men. Women as a group still could not vote.

6. WHY A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT RATHER THAN REFERENDA?

The Republicans chose to go the route of a constitutional amendment for several reasons.

We must realize that in 1869 only 7 Northern states allowed blacks to vote (NY, Maine, Vermont, NH, Mass, Iowa and Minnesota).New Jersey, PA, Conn, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and numerous other Northern states did not permit blacks to vote. No Northern state before 1860 permitted blacks to serve on juries, and 17 free states had segregated public schools or exclude blacks from the public schools all together. Thus there was prejudice against blacks in the North just as there was in the South. In general the North didn't let blacks vote either. But by 1868 Congress had mandated that blacks must be allowed to vote in the South, but they still didn't in most of the North.

The Republicans feared that if they put the issue before the voters of the North state by state, in referenda, it would probably fail. But the Republican Party felt that it needed those black votes. It MUST have them. And they were determined to get them.

The strategy of a constitutional amendment would place the issue before the state legislatures, in Harrisburg, Trenton, Albany. The Republican politicians would understand and appreciate considerations of party interest. The Republicans avoided going directly to the people because they were afraid the people did not favor black suffrage.

The Republicans also now REQUIRED Virginia, Mississippi, Texas and GA to ratify both the 14th Amendment AND the 15th Amendment in order to be restored to the Union. By Feb. 1870 the required 28 out of the 37 states (or 3/4ths) had ratified the Amendment. With ex-Confederates excluded from voting, most of the Southern states had Republican governors and Republicans controlled the legislatures. However we should realize that this was an artificial situation. These states of course ratified the 15th Amendment. And Nevada, West Virginia, Illinois, Michigan, PA, Conn, Indiana, Missouri, Kansas, Ohio, Wisconsin and Nebraska ratified. To repeat, it was a matter of some altruism and a lot of political expediency.

The Republicans did it in part for the benefit of blacks. But they also did it to benefit themselves. As is often the case in politics, it was a matter of mutual use and mutual advantage. Had it not been seen as advantageous to the dominant political powers, it would not have happened.

By July 1870 Virginia, Miss., Texas and Georgia were re-admitted to the Union and military Reconstruction came to an end.

V. THE TERM RECONSTRUCTION

The term Reconstruction has two meanings. One is the period of military occupation and rule. Military rule was ended in all of the ex-Confederate states by 1870, and the military governors replaced by elected civilian governments.

However persons who had taken an oath of allegiance to the Union prior to the Rebellion, and then violated that oath by becoming an officeholder in the Confederacy or by supporting the Confederacy, were still excluded from voting and holding office. They were finally pardoned in 1872, by an act of Congress.

However, although military Reconstruction ended in 1870, the traditional date for the end of Reconstruction is 1877. This is because the term Reconstruction also came to refer to the period of the Republican state governments or regimes in the South after the Civil War. The last three (SC, LA, Florida) fell in 1877. Once the last ex-Confederates were pardoned in 1872 they could vote again, and they voted Democrat and helped to bring down the Republican Party in the Southern states.