The Reconstruction
Essay Preview: The Reconstruction
Report this essay
When the fighting was over the American people, North and South, faced the challenge of peace. One of the main questions burning on the minds of most Americans was who would direct the process of Reconstruction-the president or Congress? Both of their policies regarding Reconstruction were at total odds with each other. In the end however, Congress assumed control over the Reconstruction policy because of their anger towards the Black Codes, the Southern election of former Confederates, and President Johnsons personality and actions.
The passage of the Black Codes infuriated the sympathetic Congress who felt that the legislation would virtually re-enslave the newly freed African Americans. The Black Codes in essence were a measure by southerners to ensure a stable and subservient labor force. As a result dire penalties were set in place for former slaves who violated their working contracts which usually kept them working for their former masters. These laws permitted “Negro-catchers” to hunt down these violators and drag them back off to work. Congress was further infuriated by the fact that such oppressive laws mocked the ideal of freedom “Ðso recently purchased by buckets of blood.” The “baleful” codes forbade blacks for instance, from exercising certain basic rights such as the right to serve on a jury and the right to rent or lease land. Congress however was exceptionally angry at the fact that it was Johnsons very own ten percent governments in the south who had passed this legislation. The Congress, led by moderate and radical Republicans, was therefore impelled to take control of Reconstruction in order to preserve these rights for blacks. These sentiments were later echoed in the passage of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments which granted blacks citizenship and later the right to vote.
The southern election of former Confederate officers also created a sense of shock and disgust among the rest of the members of Congress. Congress did not warmly embrace the newly elected southern representatives who for the most part were Democrats because in the absence of the southern element the Republican Congress had a free hand to pass legislation such as the Morrill Tariff, the Pacific Railroad Act, and the Homestead Act which solely benefited the North. The Republicans also feared that the South would become stronger in the arena of national politics because of the fact that the newly freed slaves would count as one person as opposed to being counted as 3/5s of a person as they had been before the Civil War. As a result the southern states would be entitled to 12 more votes in Congress, and 12 more presidential electoral votes. Congress was fearful of such an event because the Southerners might cooperate with Democrats in the North and win control of Congress and maybe even the White House. If this growth in power were to occur the Southern and Northern Democrat majority could very well have perpetuated the Black Codes, virtually re-enslaving blacks. They could also have destroyed the Republican economic plan by lowering tariffs, rerouting the transcontinental railroad, repealing the Homestead Act, and possibly repudiating the national debt. Due to the loss of power the Republicans would be experiencing, they staunchly opposed this type of rapid admittance of rebel states into the Union and wanted to keep the Southern states out of the Union for as long as they could. The reason being was that the radicals in Congress wanted to use federal power to bring about a drastic social and economic transformation in the South. However with Southern