The Controversial Role Of Reconstruction In The United States

Reconstruction, the period from 1863 to 1877, was a tempestuous and controversial time for the United States of America. President Lincoln sought to reunify the North and South, and urged moderate policies that would help to heal the wounds from the Civil War. Andrew Johnson advocated harsh penalties, including hanging, for Confederates, but softened his stance following Lincoln’s assassination. The Radical Republican Congress favored a more punitive Reconstruction policy and citizenship for the freedmen. This desire led to the passing of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which granted citizenship to anyone born in the United States. The Reconstruction was marked by struggles between moderate views of Lincoln and Johnson and Congress’ radical views on treatment of both Confederates and ex-slaves; the Fourteenth Amendment, meant to address the citizenship of slaves freed by the Thirteenth Amendment, ultimately did not have the positive impact that Congress had hoped that it would. During the time before his death, Lincoln espoused a moderate policy toward the reunification of the United States. Foner and Mahoney (2003) describes how Lincoln prioritized the preservation of the Union over any other issue of the Civil War, and that only when slaves began to cross Union lines and were needed in the war effort did freeing the slaves become a stated goal of the North. Lincoln tried to balance the desires of the many disparate groups in both the North and South with his policies. He resisted the Radical Republican’s attempt to grant full citizenship for the slaves, concerned that it would be too divisive for the South, and would prevent reconciliation between the two segments of the warring nation (Rourk. Et al. p. 502). Lincoln also opposed voting rights for freed slaves for the same reason. Lincoln’s lenient and forgiving Reconstruction policies were designed to make the nation whole again, by offering terms to the South that would not be too divisive or revolutionary. President Johnson took the oath of office hours after Lincoln had died. Johnson, a former slave owner, cared less about the rights of the freed slaves than he did his hatred of southern aristocrats or planters, who, in 1862, confiscated his slaves for his loyalty to the Union as a southern senator. Johnson’s plans for Reconstruction were similar to Lincoln’s in the sense that the rights of freed slaves were not addressed. All southerners needed to do was accept the 13th Amendment, …show more content…
They first passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866. The Library of Congress (2015) states that Congress was fearful that this might be overturned, and thus worked on drafting an Amendment to the Constitution that would guarantee rights for the slaves and for subsequent generations by including a definition of citizenship that included anyone born on United States soil. Congress also worked to eliminate the Black Codes that were passed in the South; these codes were designed to maintain Caucasian supremacy over the freed slaves politically and economically. The Fourteenth Amendment guaranteed citizenship and put provisions in place to take away a states represented power in Washington if they prevented blacks from voting. While the Republicans felt they had done a sufficient job for ex slaves, many freedmen felt that a true solution involved the granting of land to them (Rourk. Et al. p.