Radical Reconstruction

Tova Wax
Mrs. Oakes
History/Newton
9/9/2013

Radical Reconstruction

I. Black Codes Anger Congress A. Rights and Restrictions 1. Black codes granted some rights. a. African Americans could marry legally b. African Americans could own some kind of property 2. Black Codes forbade freedmen from things like: a. The right to vote b. The right to own guns c. The right to serve on juries 3. The could work as servants or farm laborers, sometimes they had to sign contracts for a years' work and those without contracts could be arrested and sentenced to plantation work. B. Congress Reacts 1. In 1866 angry whites burned homes, churches and schools in a black section of Memphis, Tennessee. 2. More than 40 African Americans were killed.

II. Rise of the Radicals A. Republican Control 1. Moderate Republicans and Radicals disagreed on many issues, but they shared a strong political motive. 2. Congress passed the Civil Right's Act in April 1866. B. Fourteenth Amendment 1. In 1857, the court ruled that African Americans were not citizens. 2. Republicans proposed the 14th Amendment. 3. In the 1950's, the Fourteenth Amendment became a powerful took in the struggle of citizenship rights. III. Radicals in Power A. Election of 1866 1. In July, white mobs in New Orleans killed 34 African Americans. B. The Radical Program 1. Congress passed the first Reconstruction Act in March 1867. 2. To rejoin the Union, former Confederate states had to write a new Constitution and ratify the Fourteenth Amendment. 3. The Reconstruction Act required that Southerners allow African Americans to vote. 4. Former Confederate officials were barred from voting when reconstructed states held elections to set up new governments.

5. Many white southerners stayed away from the polls in protest. 6. Freedmen exercised their right to vote. 7. Republicans gained control of all of the new Southern state governments.

IV. Impeachment and a New President A. Trial 1. On February 24, 1868, the House of Representatives voted to impeach Johnson. 2. During Johnson's trial, it became clear that he was not guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. 3. In the end, the vote to convict Johnson was 35 to 19, one vote shy of the two thirds needed to convict him.

B. Fifteenth Amendment 1. in 1869 Congress proposed the Fifteenth Amendment. 2. It forbade any state to deny any citizen the right to vote because of “race, color or previous condition of servitude”. 3. Republicans knew that if African Americans could vote in the South, they would help Republicans win elections there. 4. The Fifteenth Amendment was ratified in 1870.