Abraham Lincoln’s vs Andrew Johnson’s Reconstruction Plan Lincoln shared the uncommon belief that the confederate states could still be part of the union and that the cause of the rebellion was only a few within the states which lead him to begin the reconstruction in December of 1863. This resulted in plans with lenient guidelines and although they were challenged by Wade-Davis Bill, Lincoln still rejected his ideas and kept his policies in place. Lincoln also allowed land to be given the newly freed slave or homeless white by distributing the land that had been confiscated from former land owners however this fell through once Johnson took office. After Lincoln’s death when Johnson was elected many things started to turn away from giving blacks equal rights and resulted in many things such a black codes which kept newly freed slaves from having the same rights as whites. When Lincoln first acted after the civil war, he offered policies that would allow the confederate slaves to become part of the union again and would allow a pardon for those states.
The Civil War has ended and now we need to reunite the states. The Johnson plan was the best plan because of various reasons. One of the reasons is because they had to ratify the 13 amendments. The thirteenth amendment was to slavery. Abolishing slavery is good because that means everyone has freedom, and freedom is what all African-Americans want.
Johnson, a former senator from Tennessee who had remained loyal to the Union during the war, was a firm supporter of states’ rights and believed the federal government had no say in issues such as voting requirements at the state level. Under his Presidential Reconstruction, which began in May 1865, the former Confederate states were required to uphold the abolition of slavery (made official by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution), swear loyalty to the Union and pay off their war debt. Beyond those limitations, the states and their ruling class (traditionally dominated by white planters) were given a relatively free hand in rebuilding their own governments.
Lincoln is still portrayed similarly in some aspects, such as his willingness to pardon the Confederates in order to create loyal governments. He also tolerated variations on Reconstruction. It is also important to note that Lincoln was not looking for a social revolution in which African Americans would be given full voting rights. However, Lincoln differed from Johnson in that Lincoln was broad-minded, willing to change his mind and cooperate with others, and would have let his ideas progress positively during Reconstruction, whereas Johnson was obstinate, racist, and unable to hear criticisms. Congress eventually became tired of Johnson’s refusal to cooperate and implemented their own plans for Reconstruction, which included passing the Civil Rights Act of 1866 (all were equal before the law), the Fourteenth Amendment (equality was now in the Constitution), and the Reconstruction Acts of 1867 and 1868 (the South had new governments, and for the first time in American history, black males could vote).
In the spring of 1865, the Civil War came to a close with the North victorious, but that was not an end to the country’s problems. The question that was now at hand and on everyone’s mind was how to rebuild the broken and shattered nation. Lincoln during the Civil War had introduced the Ten Percent plan in which states that were in rebellion against the federal government could rejoin the union if ten percent of the state’s population took an oath of allegiance to the U.S and agreed to the emancipation of slaves.
Congress took control over the southern states, congress denied The Confederate states their Congressional seats. They made equal rights for African Americans and granted them protection under the law. Presidential Reconstruction Plan: President Johnson gave a plan of Reconstruction that gave the south the choice of the transition to make slaves freemen and women. It also offered that African American had no role in the politics of the south.
The Presidential reconstruction was led by Andrew Johnson. Johnson had planned to go easy on the south and let each southern state decide their own plans for reentering the Union. Also, Johnson did not believe that African-Americans could manage their own lives and he let southern states pass black codes which restricted the African-American’s rights. With that being said he also did not believe African-Americans should have the right to vote, Johnson’s reconstruction plan allowed southern states to take away all rights for African-Americans.
After the Civil War, the United States tried to mend the relationship between the Union and Confederacy through the institution of reconstruction under Johnson. President Johnson established minimal requirements that created much controversy between the Congressmen supporting that supported the Union during the war. Ultimately, Johnson acted in protecting poor whites since there was now an abundant supply of cheap labor with slavery no longer being enacted. Slowly with the reintegration of the South, there were state laws created to repress African Americans since they were now the population that was in the majority in comparison to whites. The population grew due to freed African Americans in the South, whites saw that the racially-structured
President Andrew Johnson had tried to veto the Civil RIghts Act of 1865 but it was overturned and the act became a Law. President Johnson’s attitude toward this led to the growth of the Radical Republican Movement and it also increased intervention in the South, more help to former slaves and also to Johnson’s impeachment. The Black Code, Freedman’s Bureau, and the Bill of 1865 are all prime examples of how the African American’s have freedom. In 1865, the Civil War ended offering more freedoms to all African American
Reconstruction was a policy made to grant all southern states that succeeded, access back in the union as quickly as possible. Radical Republicans knew the Reconstruction plan would fail with Andrew Johnson in office. The Freedmen’s Bureau Bill and the Civil Rights Bill both were created to protect the rights of newly freed African Americans and Andrew Johnson vetoed the bills. Johnson was a democrat, so he believed that white men were superior to african american men. He stated at a speech, “This is a country for white men and as long as I am President, it shall be a Government for white men.”
After the Andrew Johnson’s resistance to reconstruction included bring Confederate states into the Union and letting the African American men vote. Under his held ideals of “white suffrage”. It pitted him in opposition against Congress; thus, his stubborn stance against Reconstruction is the real reason that lead to his impeachment hearing under the Tenure of Office Act of 1867, which is a federal law that passed by congress to restrict the power of the President remove people from office without the approval of the Senate, when he removed Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton from his office. Reconstruction was the period following the Civil War, when the states of the Confederacy where the government controlled bringing them back into the union and gave rights to African Americans in the process. White suffrage simply meant: only white males could vote.
Following this, the Civil War took on a new dimension. The Union winning would fundamentally transform the South, where the “peculiar institution” of slavery was a crucial aspect of the economy, politics, and society. Just prior to the end of the war, in April 1865, Lincoln shocked many by suggesting limited suffrage for African Americans in the South, allowing them to vote, at least to some degree. The assassination of Lincoln was soon after, and his successor, Andrew Johnson, oversaw the beginning of Reconstruction. Beginning in May of 1865, Johnson’s Reconstruction policies required former Confederate states to uphold the abolition of slavery, pay off war debt and swear loyalty to the Union.
However in 1865 the constitution finally outlawed slavery in the us.(13th amendment) The constitution stated that governments were prohibited from depriving a person 's life, liberty and property. Although slavery was abolished many African Americans were still deprived of their rights and were treated just as poorly as before. The reconstruction was not only a failure but was treated as a joke to all african americans. This idea is shown through laws against African Americans and the unfair way they were treated.
The southern whites who worked around the Presidents moderate plan of Reconstruction did so in a manner that would be frowned upon today. The Southern whites had been guaranteed charity from Lincoln. “With his [Lincoln’s] enormous prestige as commander of the victorious North and as victor in the 1864 election, he was able to promise freedom to the Negro, charity to the southern white, security to the North” (page 3). An example of how Congress worked around Johnson’s disliked program of Reconstruction was passing through bills for him to sign. Johnson vetoed them and as a result Congress over ruled him and passed them anyway.
The Reconstruction did not happen all at one time. It went through phases, starting out in 1863 with President Lincoln’s Ten-Percent Plan,which kicked off the Presidential Reconstruction phase (Schultz, 2013). This plan stated that if just ten percent of a state’s population would take an oath to support the newly freed slaves, that state would be allowed back into the Union with no repercussions. The Presidential Reconstruction continues until 1867 and included events such as the appointment of Andrew Johnson as president, after the assassination of President Lincoln.
