President Lincoln's Reconstruction Policy

Lincoln claimed he had the authority to determine the conditions for the South’s readmission to the union. He didn’t want to punish the South, he just wanted to end the war and restore the nation quickly and painlessly. Lincoln’s plan, the Ten-Percent Plan, required that ten percent of the voters who had in the 1860 election swear an oath to the union, and accept the emancipation of slaves through the thirteenth amendment. Those ten percent would then reorganize their state government, and apply for readmission to the union. Congress’ plan differed, as the Radical Republicans in Congress viewed the southern states as conquered territory.

Lincoln saw reconstruction as a time of healing for the South while radical Republicans saw it as a time to punish the South and teach them a lesson. Lincoln thought that the country should maintain a unity with its states. He also believed in having a strong governed country. After the Civil War, the radical Republicans controlled congress and if Lincoln had lived he would have been able to control their actions. The Radical Republicans whipped up public anger and demanded that president Johnson allow reprisals against former rebels.

This statement holding true, the South was not further comforted by these words. The president’s popularity among the more technologically advanced and populous Northern states caused increased friction between the two sides of the country. The next reason stems from Lincoln’s interferences with slavery during his presidency. From before the time he was even elected, Lincoln was seen as a danger to their rights and unpopular in the South, but the North’s large population outruled the South’s attempts to block him from office. The Compromise of 1850, in which the states are given power to vote on whether or not they became a slaveholding state, affected Lincoln’s time in

A few days after the civil War ended, President Lincoln was assassinated and never had the chance to implement his Reconstruction plan.   The Reconstruction Era occurred in the period of 1865 to 1877 under the reign of President Andrew Johnson who was the predecessor of President Lincoln.  Congress was not scheduled to convene until December 1865, which gave Johnson eight months to pursue his own Reconstruction policies. Under his Reconstruction policies, the former Confederate states were required to join back into the Union and heal the wounds of the nation.

The Wade-Davis bill set the bar higher for the registered voters in a Southern state to swear allegiance and gave and protected African Americans liberties it would have been a better plan for ending the

In the beginning of the war, his motivation was founded in the “belief that the south had no right to secede” and to counteract the south’s decision they declared war. Although the purpose for the war had changed from solely correcting the south’s decision to fighting for equality and abolishing slavery, Lincoln “remained steadfastly true throughout the war to his basic objective[s]” of reuniting the Union as a whole and keeping the United States together as a united force. On January 1, 1863 Lincoln enacted the Emancipation Proclamation which set free all slaves held by force in the rebellious states. This spiked participation in the Union army which was an imperative part of the success of the north. Lincoln enacted this policy knowing it would increase the Union’s chances of winning the war to assist him in reaching his consistent goal of reuniting and rehabilitating the Union including the seceding southern states.

The proclamation would forgive the Confederates for seceding from the Union, if they swear their allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and to the Union as well. Lincoln’s Ten Percent Plan would recognize the state if ten percent of the voting population who were former Confederates became loyal, thus granting them the ability to organize a new state constitution and government (Oakes, 482). He wanted to bring forth unity he states “…with malice toward none; with charity for all” to achieve “a just and lasting peace”(Abraham Lincoln Second Inaugural Address 1865). Lincoln’s priority’s did not include black civil rights, but he still believed that they should receive fair treatment. Although the Emancipation Proclamation abolished the legality of slavery it brought forth discrimination and segregation during the reconstruction era.

At the beginning of the war, General Whitfield Scott had a three-step plan for first blocking off the Southern seaports, then gaining control of the Mississippi River, and lastly capturing Richmond, Virginia the Confederate capital forcing them to surrender to the Union. The first step of blocking the ports was to prevent the South from exporting crops to England in exchange for weapons and military supplies. The second step, gaining control of the Mississippi River, was an attempt to divide the Confederacy in half making it harder to aid troops in Richmond. The final part of Scott’s plan was to capture Richmond, essentially forcing the Confederacy to surrender with nothing left. Lincoln wanted to adopt the plan, however, his cabinet didn’t.

Soon after the war was over, President Abraham Lincoln introduced his reconstruction plan to reunite the nation, and have it function the way it used to. On December 1863, President Lincoln issued his Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction; it offered “full pardon” and the restoration of property to white Southerners. However, the prerequisites to receive full pardon include swearing an oath of allegiance to the United States and its laws; the only people excluded from the offer were Prominent Confederate military and civil leaders. On December 8, 1865, President Lincoln announced the terms of another reconstructive plan, known as “Lincoln’s Ten-Percent

He favored a moderate policy that would conjoin the South with the Union without any punishment for treason. Many resisted Lincoln’s plan, saying it was not harsh enough while others did not know if Lincoln was being too lenient. The Radical Republicans and moderate Republicans were caught in a conflict. One important event of the Reconstruction Period was the Wade-Davis Bill. This was formed by the Radical Republicans and moderate Republicans.

But, when these officials were elected to Congress, they passed the “black codes” and thus the relations between the president and legislators became worst (Schriefer, Sivell and Arch R1). These so called “Black Codes” were “a series of laws to deprive blacks of their constitutional rights” that they were enacted mainly by Deep South legislatures. Black Codes differ from a state to another but they were stricter in the Deep South as they were sometimes irrationally austere. (Hazen 30) Furthermore, with the emergence of organizations such as the Red Shirts and the White League with the rise of the Conservative White Democrats’ power, efforts to prevent Black Americans from voting were escalating (Watts 247), even if the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S constitution that gave the Blacks the right to vote had been ratified in 1870.

One of reasons the confederacy failed was because the U.S. Congress, with Lincoln’s support, proposed the 13th amendment which would abolish slavery in America. Although the confederate peace delegation was unwilling to accept a future without slavery, the radical and moderate Republicans designed a way to takeover the reconstruction program. The Radical Republicans wanted full citizenship rights for African Americans and wanted to implement harsh reconstruction policies toward the south. The radical republican views made up the majority of the Congress and helped to pass the 14th amendment which guaranteed equality under the law for all citizens, and protected freedmen from presidential vetoes, southern state legislatures, and federal court decisions. In 1869, Congress passed the fifteenth amendment stating that no citizen can be denied the right to vote because of “race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

The Reconstruction period lasted from 1865 to 1877. The thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth amendment were created during the twelve years of rebuilding the country. All of the amendments were made to protect former slaves and their rights but on paper they did not have any rights. The reconstruction period had its successes and failures.

Another example of Mr. Lincoln’s unnecessary leniency is when he pocket vetoed the Wade-Davis bill. This bill made it harder for readmission into the union, and required that 50% of white males in the state’s population take a loyalty oath. This proposal could have been extremely successful in ensuring that the South would know their place and would understand the full effect that they had on our nation when they seceded, yet we would never know. I am extremely disappointed that Lincoln chose to veto it simply because it was too harsh. The President of the United States holds the highest source of power, yet instead of being benevolent, he is

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.