Reconstruction after The Civil War - Essay Example

Reconstruction After The Civil War Andrew Johnson was a war democrat that opposed secession. In 1864 Johnson was tapped by Republican President Abraham Lincoln as his running mate to balance the Union ticket. He became president following Lincoln's assassination in April 1865, just days after the Civil War ended. As president, Johnson's desire to scale back Lincoln's Reconstruction legislation following the Civil War angered the Radical Republican majority that sought to punish the former rebels of the Confederacy.

The stage was set for a partisan fight that would ultimately center around a single act. In February 1868, Johnson fired Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, who was sympathetic to the Radical Republicans and who was overseeing the military's Reconstruction efforts. A year earlier, Congress had passed the Tenure of Office Act, which prohibited a president from dismissing any officer confirmed by the Senate without first getting its approval. With Stanton's firing, the call for Johnson's impeachment began.

I do not believe the House of Representatives quest to impeach Andrew Johnson was called for. It was nothing more than political opportunism. He was opposed to congressional Reconstruction so he blocked it. The Republicans decided this was a strong enough basis to throw him out so they tried though they were ultimately unsuccessful. There was corruption in the government after the Civil War. Many ex Confederate soldiers and members of the old planter class joined the Ku Klux Klan which targeted blacks who owned land, prospered, and any educators of the black people.

Their goal was to keep them powerless and this supported the Democratic Party's desires. The Democratic platform in 1868 had called reconstruction policies "unconstitutional, revolutionary, and void." It demanded that Freedmen's Bureau be shut down. The white robed, gun-toting, horse riding Klansmen attacked Republicans. In every county where the Klan was active, Republican voters stayed away from the polls. The support for Radical Reconstruction was mainly due to the northern states need for racial equality.

In 1876 the Democratic Party chose Samuel J. Tilden, governor of New York, to run for President. The Republicans nominated Rutherford B. Hayes, governor of Ohio. Under the Compromise of 1877, Hayes was elected President. In return, Hayes agreed to remove the last troops from the South. As soon as he became President, Hayes did just that. The last few Reconstruction governments collapsed. With them went black southerners' best hope for equality. Reconstruction ended in 1877 and was effective in reaching its goal which was to improve the South socially, politically, and economically.

Although the South did not fully recover, many of the problems that arose after the Civil War were solved. The Confederate states met various requirements for readmission, and all rejoined the Union by 1870. Congress passed laws and proposed constitutional amendments to protect the rights of the former slaves and to give them the right to vote. However, the Reconstruction governments failed to win enough support from Southern whites to survive without aid from the North. Most Southern whites considered these governments illegal, and some whites used violence to prevent blacks from voting.

Many blacks ended up working for whites because sharecropping created economic inequality. As a result, many blacks lost their political power as well. Reconstruction didn't totally recover the South, but it did help to improve the South and was an important part in U.S. history since it still effects our lives today.