A Just and Lasting Peace: A Documentary History of Reconstruction (22 page)

(March 8, 1866)

Journalist John Richard Dennett's (1838–1874) eyewitness account of political and racial attitudes in Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1866 suggests how “unreconstructed” many Southerners remained and how national questions—such as Johnson's veto of the Freedmen's Bureau Bill—preoccupied them. Dennett, a Harvard graduate and special correspondent for a newly launched magazine,
The Nation
, covered much the same landscape as Schurz and reached much the same discouraging conclusions. The recently defeated Confederates considered the North their “wanton oppressor.”

The headquarters of the Freedmen's Bureau for Mississippi is at Vicksburg. It is chiefly busied with a general supervision of the affairs of the colored people, and occupies itself with details only when its interference is necessary. The examination and approval of contracts is not a part of its work, and the relations between employer and employed are controlled, in the first instance at least, by the civil authorities. Through its subordinate officials, its influence is extended to every part of the State, and, as might be expected, it is not a popular institution. Every sub-assistant commissioner, the Assistant Commissioner informs me, needs military force within call to sustain him. The freedmen are working very well, and are receiving good treatment; their labor being in great demand, it commands very good prices, and the planter finds it to his interest to use his laborers well. It is not from the oppressive acts of individuals, therefore, that the Negroes suffer most injustice, but from the spirit in which the civil authorities enforce the laws. Under the provisions of the vagrant law, for example, a white man as well as a Negro might be arrested; but in practice it is found that while honest and industrious Negroes are often arrested and punished, there is no arrest of notoriously idle and worthless white men. For this state of things the spirit of public opinion is responsible; and because this state of things exists the Bureau is a necessity. The hostility to schools for the Negroes is very general, and often very bitter and dangerous. In the middle of February a Dr. Lacy, an old man who had started a school in Okolona, was four times shot at as he walked in the street for no other reason than that he was a teacher of Negroes.

Such cases, whenever they occur, are reported by the officers of the Bureau to the military commander, General T. J. Woods. The case of Dr. Lacy has been reported. As yet nothing has been done in reference to it. In the town of Fayette the people will not permit schools to be maintained, and in Grenada they will not permit them to be opened.

In the face of such opposition, 5,240 children have been gathered into schools, and are receiving instruction from about 70 teachers, who are paid in small part by their pupils, but mainly by the Northern charitable associations. In the monthly reports returned by these teachers they are required, I notice, to give the number of pupils in their charge whose blood is mixed, and the number of those whose blood is purely African. Taking the returns of twelve schools which happened to be first set down in the consolidated report, I find it stated that, in the opinion of the teachers, the children of African blood number 287, and those of mixed blood number 777. A majority of the scholars live in the towns and cities.

In the office of the Assistant Commissioner, Colonel Thomas, I met several gentlemen attached to the Bureau, and resident in different parts of the State. They spoke of the condition of the Negroes as being generally prosperous, but there is much hostility, they say, on the part of the native white population to Northern men. The large landowners are anxious for immigration, but it is not so with the mass of the people. It is for their property rather than for their lives that the new-comers fear; but in respect to their lives they are by no means at ease. It would be easy to multiply instances, one gentleman told me; he would give me two. Not long since Colonel S–––, of Hinds County, a Southerner, and a gentleman from the North were in treaty about going into cotton-planting together, and probably would have done so. But Colonel S––—, after a little while, saw with regret that it would be necessary to break off the arrangements. He informed his prospective partner that he had reliable intelligence that more than a hundred men in the neighboring county of Holmes had bound themselves to prevent the settlement of Northern men among them, and had also determined that no discharged Negro soldier should be suffered to find employment in that section of country. My informant said it was beyond a doubt that Colonel S—–– acted in perfect good faith.

Another case was that of Mr. A—––, of Boston. He moved into Mississippi after the war, with the intention of becoming a planter, and at first was very much pleased with his prospects—so much pleased that when a little while ago he made a visit to Massachusetts, he wrote a letter to the Boston
Post
and praised his new neighbors highly. Soon he came back, and it was not long before he began to think himself mistaken. By-and-bye he became convinced that the people were too much opposed to Northern men for him to stay among them with safety. So he paid a considerable sum of money to the owner of the lands which he had intended to cultivate, was released from his bargain, and has left Mississippi.

On the last night of my stay in a Southern city I attended a political meeting, which had been called to endorse the President's recent veto message. It was held in the court-house, and was composed of about two hundred persons, who were by no means enthusiastic. Resolutions were passed, and many speeches were made, in all of which the President was lavishly praised, and the Senate and House of Representatives spoken of with great disrespect. “The war being over,” said one speaker, “we were looking for peace, but it seems that the rebellion has only changed hands; that treason has reached the halls of the Congress of the United States. But there is a man at the head who is able to cope with it. President Johnson has put down the rebellion at the South, and he is now prepared to put down the rebellion at the North.”

Another speaker warned the Southern people to remember that there was a party at the North, the Radical party, who would never be content till the last silver spoon was taken from them and their lands divided; but there was also in the North a Democratic party which needed the active cooperation of the Southern people, and only needed that to hurl the Radicals from power.

The evening was not very far advanced when Colonel Joseph E. Davis, a brother of Jefferson Davis, was seen upon the floor and a committee was appointed to lead him to the platform. A speech from him was demanded, and he complied, speaking three or four minutes, when, as I think, at the suggestion of the chairman of the meeting he brought his remarks to an abrupt conclusion. The Vicksburg
Journal
says:

 

He fully endorsed the action of President Johnson in vetoing that accursed measure to enlarge the powers of the Freedmen's Bureau. The bill, if passed, would have caused a revolution equal to, if not more dreadful than, the one through which we have just passed. We have a branch of the Freedmen's Bureau in our midst headed by officers of the most infamous character; who hold the offices for a given purpose; who gladly record the abuses and murders of Negroes, and forward such information, rather than assist our people without homes and means in obtaining the necessaries of life. You have these officers among you. I charge you to look out for them. Mr. Davis's feeble health would not admit of any extended remarks.

 

I might give many passages from the various speakers, but they would be wearisome. I give but one.

Mr. McKee, formerly a general in the Federal army, stepped forward and said that he approved of the veto message of the President and endorsed it fully. “But in that hall on that night he had heard language used by some of the speakers that made his blood run cold.”

Though it seemed to me not very successful as a political gathering, the meeting revealed very plainly the feeling which prevails in all the Southern country. The speakers represented the South as being cruelly injured, insulted, and oppressed, and the North as her wanton oppressor.

R
ADICAL
R
ECONSTRUCTION

Under the leadership of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, in 1866 Congress asserted itself, taking control of Reconstruction by passing a series of acts designed to protect the freedpeople and to establish federal authority in the former Confederate states. In February 1866, Congress attempted to extend the existence of the Freedmen's Bureau (initially limited to one year after the conclusion of hostilities) indefinitely and to expand the agency's jurisdiction over cases tried in the former Confederate states that denied equal protection of the laws to African-Americans. Though Johnson vetoed the bill, a similar piece of legislation passed despite the president's veto in July.

In another bill, aimed directly at the Black Codes passed by the Southern states, Congress sought to enforce the equal rights of the freedpeople by federal legislation, defining as citizens all persons (with the exception of Indians not taxed) born in the United States and empowering the federal courts to protect citizens when any state or territory violated their civil rights. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 passed on April 9 over Johnson's veto. The president believed that the bill violated the prerogatives of the states, privileged blacks over whites, and undermined what he considered executive authority generally and his restoration program in particular. According to historian Hans L. Trefousse, the Civil Rights Act of 1866 “was the first major legislation ever to be passed over an executive veto, and it exacerbated the growing rift between the President and Congress.”
30

The 1866 Civil Rights Act raised essential constitutional questions, concerns that led the Joint Committee on Reconstruction to draft what became the landmark Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, passed by Congress on June 13, 1866 (but not ratified until July 9, 1868). Its intent was to protect the basic rights of black Southerners. This amendment defined national citizenship and guaranteed certain civil rights to all citizens, including the right to due process and equal protection under the law. In a clear and powerful assertion of Congressional authority, the amendment empowered the legislative branch to enforce federal civil rights legislation by reducing congressional representation of states that abridged the suffrage of male voters. The amendment also disfranchised certain former Confederates and outlawed Confederate debt. Passing this amendment signified a bold move by Congress, one that President Johnson, as well as his Southern and conservative supporters, strongly rejected. These objections had little consequence when, after the fall 1866 elections, Radicals gained control of the Thirty-ninth Congress.

Radical supremacy in Congress set the scene for new, more stringent measures to regulate the former Rebel states. Thereafter ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment would become a prerequisite for the ex–Confederate states to reenter the Union. The legislation that the Radical-controlled Congress passed over President Johnson's repeated vetoes confirmed the supremacy of Congress over the executive branch and revolutionized the South. Led by old hard-line abolitionist politician-reformers Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania, Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, and Benjamin F. Wade of Ohio, Congressional Radicals privileged slavery's overthrow and the protection of black civil rights over other political questions of the day. According to Eric Foner, these men and their supporters believed “the Civil War constituted a ‘golden moment,' an opportunity for far-reaching change,” and that the postwar United States would become a nation “whose citizens enjoyed equality of civil and political rights, secured by a powerful and beneficial national state.”
31
Free labor backed by a strong national state became the Radicals' new economic ideal. They hoped that the South would come to share the North's competitive capitalism. The Radicals envisioned the freedpeople sharing the same opportunities for economic success as white Southerners.

During Presidential Reconstruction, moderate Republicans had focused on reunifying the nation and thus initially supported President Johnson. They hoped to amend the process to ensure greater Southern “loyalty” and guarantee a modicum of civil rights to the freedmen without infringing on states' rights. However, Johnson's intransigence, his antagonism toward blacks, his sympathy toward white Southerners, plus his vetoes of the Freedmen's Bureau Bill and the 1866 Civil Rights Act, drove moderates into the Radical camp. The Republicans had gained confidence and power in their landslide victories in the fall 1866 elections. In January 1867, Congress passed a bill enfranchising Washington, D.C., blacks, again over Johnson's veto, and Congress considered even more decisive political measures, including disfranchisement and martial law in the South and even Johnson's impeachment.
32

In March 1867, following the refusal of the Southern states organized by Johnson to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress passed the first of a series of four Reconstruction Acts. Historians consider these acts the cornerstone of Radical Reconstruction, ushering in the new, Radical phase of thoroughly reconstructing the defeated Confederate states. Not surprisingly, Johnson vetoed each in succession. The Reconstruction Acts reflected the Radicals' determination to impose strict conditions on those states. White Southerners believed that the acts rendered their states conquered provinces.

The first act (March 2, 1867) divided the ten unreconstructed states (Tennessee, after ratifying the Fourteenth Amendment, had been readmitted to the Union in 1866) into five military districts and called for elections under universal manhood suffrage for constitutional conventions to frame basic laws. Congress required each state to ratify new constitutions that included black suffrage and the Fourteenth Amendment as preconditions for readmission to the Union. The act disfranchised some persons, prohibiting from voting those who had violated pre–Civil War loyalty oaths, had committed crimes, or who were disqualified from office by the Fourteenth Amendment.
33
Significantly, the act enfranchised African-American male voters in the former Rebel states, inaugurating their participation in politics. After the states had adopted these constitutions and ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, they could apply for readmission to the Union.

On March 23, when Southern state legislators failed to implement this process, Congress passed a second (supplemental) Reconstruction Act, authorizing the commanding generals of the military districts to supervise the election process, spelling out the oaths to be administered to registrars and voters, and providing for the ratification of the state constitutions by a majority of the states' registered voters. A third Reconstruction Act (July 19, 1867) subjected Johnson's state provisional governments to the military commanders, arming them with broad powers to remove state officials and to assess voter eligibility. Finally, the fourth Reconstruction Act (March 11, 1868) mandated that the ratification of the new Southern state constitutions required a majority of the actual number of voters, not a majority of those persons registered to vote in the ratification process.

Historian Hugh Davis underscores the importance of the new Southern state constitutions mandated by the Reconstruction Acts. Under close federal government scrutiny, the legislators totally revamped and modernized their basic laws. “These constitutions were quite innovative,” Davis explains, “in that they laid the foundations of the Southern public school system, provided protection for all citizens' civil rights, funded railroad construction, and established the basis for a new system of free labor.” Despite their best efforts, however, Republicans struggled to gain legitimacy for their party among white Southerners, “because it was imposed by a Northern Congress and relied largely on the support of the freedpeople.”
34

Foner correctly interprets the Reconstruction Acts, especially the implementation of black suffrage, as Congress' response to “the obstinacy of Johnson and the white South, and the determination of Radicals, blacks, and eventually Southern Unionists not to accept a Reconstruction program that stopped short of this demand.” That said, he characterizes the Radical project as a “somewhat incongruous mixture of idealism and political expediency.” At each step, moderate acts tempered radical elements. While the acts subjected the Southern states to temporary military rule to ensure order, they provided a means for them to gain readmission to the Union. The legislation “looked to a new political order for the South, but failed to place Southern Unionists in immediate control. It made no economic provisions for the freedmen. Even the commitment to black suffrage applied only to the defeated Confederacy, not the nation as a whole.”
35

Two events, the impeachment of Andrew Johnson in May 1868 and the election of Ulysses S. Grant in November of that year, signaled the end of Presidential Reconstruction. Johnson's stormy relationship with Congress harkened back to December 1865, when Congress refused to seat members elected by the Southern state provisional governments, and then worsened over disagreements over the Freedmen's Bureau and Civil Rights Bills. The president's vocal opposition to the Reconstruction Acts set him on a collision course with Congress, a situation exacerbated by Johnson's determination to reassign Radical-friendly commanding generals in the South and to remove Secretary of War Stanton from his cabinet, in direct violation of the Command of the Army Act and the Tenure of Office Act. As early as December 1867 some representatives sought to impeach Johnson, a move that finally came to pass on February 21, 1868, when the House of Representatives passed Pennsylvanian John Covode's resolution to impeach him for eleven articles of high crimes and misdemeanors. Johnson's trial lasted from March 29 until May 26, 1868, when the Senate acquitted him by one vote. Though he held office for the rest of his term, Johnson remained politically impotent.

During Presidential and Radical Reconstruction, Ulysses S. Grant, who became a hero as the commanding general of the Union armies, served as general-in-chief of the U.S. Army. Following his report on a Southern tour in December 1865, the general gradually came to support the Radical Republicans, though he served as Johnson's interim secretary of war (August 12, 1867, to January 14, 1868) following the president's ousting of Stanton from office.

The popular Grant captured the Republican presidential nomination in 1868, and defeated Democrat Horatio Seymour by 134 electoral votes. Despite scandals that marred his presidency, involving both members of his cabinet and close associates, Grant was reelected president in 1872, defeating Liberal Republican–Democratic candidate Horace Greeley by 220 electoral votes. As president, Grant witnessed ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment (adopted by Congress in 1869 and ratified by the states in 1870), guaranteeing that citizens' right to vote “shall not be abridged by the United States or any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” Under Grant the ten Southern states still under provisional governments regained their proper position in the Union. Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina, and South Carolina met Congress' requirement in 1868. The remaining former Confederate states—Georgia, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia—rejoined the Union in 1870.

As president, Grant also took steps to protect the freedpeople and Unionists from white paramilitary or vigilante groups such as the Ku Klux Klan. The Klan, established in May 1866 as a social club in Tennessee, marked an aggressive challenge to the newly empowered blacks and to the federal government's Reconstruction efforts. The terrorist organization quickly spread across the South, attacking and terrorizing blacks and white Republicans. Using violence as a political tool, the Klan sought to undo Reconstruction by undermining the Republican Party, destabilizing the Reconstruction governments, and reestablishing white supremacy through the forced subordination of people of color and their Union supporters.

Three Enforcement Acts (May 31, 1870; February 28, 1871; and April 20, 1871) imposed federal protection and supervision of voting in the South, outlawed terrorist conspiracies, and authorized the president to suspend the writ of habeas corpus in areas where lawlessness ruled. This legislation worked to some degree in preventing voter intimidation, fraud, and bribery, and in protecting the right under federal law of all citizens, black and white, to vote. Nonetheless, Klan violence became so severe that in 1871 Grant suspended the writ of habeas corpus in several South Carolina counties.