A History of the American People Part 11

However, Lincoln was dead, and the task of reconstruction fell on his successor, Andrew Johnson. Johnson agreed wholly with Lincoln's view that the South, consistent with the rights of the freed slaves, should be treated with leniency. But he was in a much less strong position to enforce such views. He had not been twice elected on a Northern Republican platform, fought and won a Civil War against the rebels, and held the nation together during five terrifying years. Moreover, he was a Southerner-and, until 1861, a lifelong Democrat. The fact that he had defied the whole might of the Southern establishment in 1861 by being the only Southern senator to remain in Washington when the South seceded was too easily brushed aside. So, too, was his profound belief in democracy. Johnson stood for the underdog. He had nothing in common with the old planter aristocracy who had willed the war and led the South to destruction. In many respects he was a forerunner of the Southern populists who were soon to make their entry on to the American scene.

He was born in Raleigh, North Carolina. His background was modest, not to say poor. He seems to have been entirely self-educated. At thirteen he was apprenticed to a tailor but ran away from his cruel master and came to Greeneville, Tennessee, where he plied his trade and eventually became its mayor. He was a typical Jacksonian Democrat, strongly in favor of cheap land for the poor-his pa.s.sionate belief in the Homestead Act was a major factor in his breach with the Southern leadership in 1860-1. He was state representative and senator and governor, representative and senator in Congress, and finally (in Lincoln's first term) military governor of Tennessee from 1862. He was a brilliant speaker, but crude in some ways, with a vile temper. And he drank. At Lincoln's Second Inaugural, following his own swearing-in, Johnson, who had been consuming whiskey, insisted on making a long, rambling speech, boasting of his plebeian origins and reminding the a.s.sembled dignitaries from the Supreme Court and the diplomatic corps, 'with all your fine feathers and gewgaws,' that they were but 'creatures of the people.' Lincoln was disgusted and told the parade marshal, 'Do not let Johnson sneak outside.' Johnson began his term with a violent denunciation of all rebels as 'traitors' who 'ought to be hanged.' Then he proceeded to change tack and carry out what he believed were Lincoln's wishes and policies. There were three possible const.i.tutional positions to be taken up about the South. The extreme position, urged on the White House and Congress by Senator Charles Sumner, the firebrand who had been caned in the Senate, and by Thaddeus Stevens (1792-1868), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, was that secession had, in effect, destroyed the Southern states, which now had no const.i.tutional existence, and it was entirely in the power of Congress to decide when and how they were to be reconst.i.tuted. Both men were, first and foremost, good haters, and they hated the South and wanted to punish it to the maximum of their power. And their power, in both Houses of Congress, was enormous. Second, there was the bulk of the Republican majority who took a somewhat more moderate position: the rebellion had not destroyed the Southern states but it had caused them to forfeit their const.i.tutional rights, and it was up to Congress to determine when those rights should be restored, under the article of the Const.i.tution guaranteeing all states a republican form of government. Finally there was the Lincoln-Johnson clemency position: this held that rebellion had not affected the states at all, beyond incapacitating those taking part in it from performing their const.i.tutional duties, and that this disbarment could be removed by executive pardon-as soon as this was done, normal government of the states, by the states, could follow.

Initially, Johnson was in a strong position to make this third position prevail. Not only was it manifestly Lincoln's wish, but he was called on to act alone, since it was against the practice of the United States political system for a Congress elected in the autumn of 1864 to be summoned before December 1865, unless by special presidential summons. He had, then, a free hand, but whether it was wise to exercise it without the closest possible consultation with Congressional leaders is doubtful. On May 29, 1865 Johnson issued a new proclamation, extending Lincoln's clemency by excluding from the loyalty oath-taking anyone in the South with property worth less than $20,000. This was consistent with his general view that the South had been misled by its plantocracy and that it must be rebuilt by the ordinary people. In the early summer, he appointed provisional governors for each rebel state, with instructions to restore normalcy as soon as practicable, provided each state government abolished slavery by its own law, repudiated the Confederation's debts, and ratified the Thirteenth Amendment. This was quickly done. Every state found enough conservatives, Whigs, or Unionists, to carry through the program. Every state amended its const.i.tution to abolish slavery. Most repudiated the Confederate debt. All but Mississippi and Texas ratified the Thirteenth Amendment. When all, including these two sluggards, had elected state officials, Johnson felt able to declare the rebellion legally over, in a proclamation dated April 6, 1866.

The new state governments behaved, in all the circ.u.mstances, with energy and sense. But there was one exception. They made it plain that blacks would not be treated as equal citizens-would, in fact, be graded as peons, as in some Latin American countries. They had freedom under the state const.i.tutions, and provisions were made for them to sue and be sued, and to bear testimony in suits where a black was a party. But intermarriage with whites was banned by law, and a long series of special offenses were made applicable only to blacks. A list of laws governing vagrancy was designed to force blacks into semi-servile work, often with their old masters. Other provisions in effect limited blacks to agricultural labor. These Black Codes varied from state to state and some were more severe than others; but all had the consequence of relegating blacks to second-cla.s.s citizenship. Plantation owners were anxious to get blacks to work as peons. Local black leaders encouraged them to sell their labor for what it would fetch, and so make freedom work. This feeling was encouraged by a new kind of federal inst.i.tution, called the Freedmen's Bureau, set up under the aegis of the military, which spent a great deal of bureaucratic time, and immense sums of money, on protecting, helping, and even feeding the blacks. It was America's first taste of the welfare state, even before it was established by its European progenitor, Bismarck's Germany. The Bureau adumbrated the countless US federal agencies which were to engage in social engineering for the population as a whole, from the time of F. D. Roosevelt until this day. It functioned after a fashion, but it did not encourage blacks to fend for themselves, and one of the objects of the Black Codes was to supply the incentives to work which were missing.

All this caused fury among the Northern abolitionist cla.s.ses and their representatives in Congress. They were genuinely angry that the Southern blacks were not getting a square deal at last, and more synthetically so that the Southern whites were not being sufficiently punished. Most Northerners had no idea how much the South had suffered already; otherwise they might have been more merciful. Congress had already pa.s.sed a vengeful Reconstruction Bill in 1864, but Lincoln had refused to sign it. When Congress finally rea.s.sembled in December 1865, it was apparent that this spirit of revenge was dominant, with Sumner and Stevens whipping it up, a.s.sisted by most of the Republican majority. It was clear that the President had the backing only of the small minority of Democrats. The majority promptly excluded all senators and representatives from the South, however elected, appointed a joint committee to 'investigate conditions' in the 'insurrectionary states,' and pa.s.sed a law extending the mandate of the Freedman's Bureau. Johnson promptly vetoed this last measure, lost his temper, and denounced leading Republican members of Congress, by name, as traitors. When Congress retaliated by pa.s.sing a Civil Rights Bill, intended to destroy much of the Black Codes, especially their vagrancy laws, Johnson vetoed that too. Congress immediately pa.s.sed it again by a two-thirds majority, the first time in American history that a presidential veto had been overriden on a measure of importance. Thus the breach between the White House and Congress was complete. As Johnson had never been elected anyway, and had no personal mandate, his moral authority, especially in the North, was weak, and Congress attempted to make itself the real ruler of the country, rather as it was to do again in the 1970s, after the Watergate scandal.

The consequence was an unmitigated disaster for the South, in which the blacks ultimately became even greater victims than the whites. By June 1866, the Joint Committee reported on the South. It said that the Johnson state governments were illegal and that Congress alone had the power to reconstruct what it called the 'rebel communities.' It said that the South was 'in anarchy,' controlled by 'unrepentant and unpardoned rebels, glorying in the crime which they had committed.' It tabled the Fourteenth Amendment, already described, and insisted that no state government be accorded recognition, or its senators and representatives admitted to Congress, until it had ratified it. All this became the issue in the autumn 1866 mid-term elections. Johnson campaigned against it, but the vulgarity and abusive language of his speeches alienated many, and he succeeded in presenting himself as more extreme, in his horrible way, than his opponents. So the radical Republicans won, and secured a two-thirds majority in both Houses, thus giving themselves the power to override any veto on their legislation which Johnson might impose. The radicals were thus in power, in a sense, and could do as they wished by law. In view of this, the governments of the Southern states would have been prudent to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment. But, as usual, they responded to Northern extremism by extremism of their own, and all but one, Tennessee, refused.

To break this impa.s.se, the dominant northern Radicals now attacked, with the only weapon at their disposal, the law. In effect, they began a second Reconstruction. Their object was partly altruistic-to give justice to the blacks of the South by insuring they got the vote-and partly self-serving, by insuring that blacks cast their new votes in favor of Republicans, thus making their party dominant in the South too. As it happened, most Republicans in the North did not want the blacks to get the vote. Propositions to confer it in the North were rejected, 1865-7, in Connecticut, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Kansas, all strong Republican states. But the Republican majority insisted nonetheless on forcing black voters on the South. In March July 1867 it pushed through Congress, overriding Johnson's veto, a series of Reconstruction Acts, placing what they called the 'Rebel States' under military government, imposing rigid oaths which excluded many whites from electoral rolls while insuring all blacks were registered, and imposing a number of conditions in addition to ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, before any 'Rebel State' could be readmitted to full membership of the Union. It also made a frontal a.s.sault on the powers of the executive branch, in particular removing its power to summon or not to summon Congress, to dismiss officials (the Tenure of Office Act) and to give orders, as commander-in-chief, to the army. Fearing obstruction by the Supreme Court, it pa.s.sed a further Act abolishing its jurisdiction in cases involving the Reconstruction Acts. Much of this legislation was plainly unconst.i.tutional, but Congress planned to make it efficacious before the Court could invalidate it.

This program, characteristic of the tradition of American fundamentalist idealism at its most extreme and impractical, had some unfortunate consequences. In Washington itself it led to a degree of bitterness and political savagery which was unprecedented in the history of the republic. In the debates of the 1840s and 1850s, Calhoun, Webster, Clay, and their colleagues, however much they might disagree even on fundamentals, had conducted their arguments within a framework of civilized discourse and with respect for the Const.i.tution, albeit they interpreted it in different ways. And, in those days, Congress as a whole had treated the other branches of government with courtesy, until the Rebellion, by refusing to accept the electoral verdict of 1860, ruined all. Now the Republican extremists were following in the footsteps of the secessionists, and making a harmonious and balanced government, as designed by the Founding Fathers, impossible.

The political hatred which poisoned Washington life in 1866-7 exceeded anything felt during the Civil War, and it culminated in a venomous attempt to impeach the President himself. Johnson regarded the Tenure of Office Act as unconst.i.tutional, and decided to ignore it by sacking Stanton, the War Secretary. Stanton had always been an unbalanced figure, politically, whom Lincoln had brought in to run the War Department simply because of his undoubted energy, drive, and competence. But with the peace Stanton became increasingly extreme in using military power to bully the South. He also, like the President, had an ungovernable temper and lost it often. Johnson saw him as the Trojan Horse of the Radical Republicans within his own Cabinet, and kicked him out with relish. The Republican majority retaliated by impeaching him, under Article I, Sections 1, 2, and 5, of the Const.i.tution. Article II, Section 4, defines as impeachment offenses 'Treason, Bribery or other High Crimes and Misdemeanors.' This last phrase is vague. One school of thought argues it cannot include offenses which are not indictable under state or federal law. Others argue that such non-indictable offenses are precisely what an impeachment is for-political crimes against the Const.i.tution which no ordinary statute can easily define.

The procedure for impeachment is that the House presents and pa.s.ses an impeachment resolution and the Senate convicts, or not, by a two-thirds vote. Since 1789, the House has successfully impeached fifteen officials, and the Senate has removed seven of them, all federal judges.141 Johnson was the first, and so far only, president to be impeached, and the experience was not edifying. Johnson was subjected during the proceedings to torrents of personal abuse, including an accusation that he was planning to use the War Department as a platform for a personal coup d'etat, and much other nonsense. An eleven-part impeachment resolution pa.s.sed the House on February 24, 1868. There was then a three-month trial in the Senate, at the end of which he was acquitted (May 26, 1868) by 35 to 18 votes, the two-thirds majority not having been obtained. No constructive purpose was served by this vendetta, and the only political consequence was the discrediting of those who conducted it.

The consequences for the South were equally destructive. The Acts of March 1867 led to a new Reconstruction along Republican, anti-white lines. Registration was followed by votes calling conventions, and these by the election of conventions, the drafting of const.i.tutions, and their approval by popular vote. But those who took part in this process were blacks, guided by Northern army officers, a few Northerners, and some renegade whites. This new electorate was organized by pressure groups called Union Leagues, which built up a Republican Party of the South. In fact, the state const.i.tutional conventions were almost identical with Republican nominating conventions. The new party and the imposed state were one. It was as though the North, with its military power, had imposed one-party dictatorships on all the Southern states. The vast majority of whites boycotted or bitterly opposed these undemocratic procedures. But for the time being there was nothing they could do. Only in Mississippi did they succeed in rejecting the new const.i.tution.

By the summer of 1868 all Southern states except three (Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia) had gone through this second, Congressional-imposed Reconstruction, and by an Omnibus Act seven of them were restored to Congressional partic.i.p.ation (Alabama had already pa.s.sed the test). As a result of the disenfranchis.e.m.e.nt of a large percentage of Southern white voters, and the addition of black ones, organized as Republicans, the ruling party carried the elections of 1868. General Grant, who had been nominated unanimously by the Republican Convention as candidate, won the electoral college by 214 votes to 80 for the Democrat, Governor Horatio Seymour of New York (1810-86). Without the second Reconstruction, it is likely Grant would have lost, and some of the Republicans, such as Sumner and Stevens, admitted that Congress had recognized the eight Southern states in 1868 primarily to secure their electoral votes. Thus America, after abolishing the organic sin of slavery, witnessed the birth of an organic corruption in its executive and Congress.

These transactions at least had the merit of enabling Congress to bully the South into ratifying the Fifteenth Amendment, which stated that the right of American citizens to vote should not be denied or abridged 'on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude.' On the other hand, in evading its implications, Southerners could later cite, as moral justification, the fact that they had ratified it only under duress-especially true in Georgia, for instance, which had to be placed yet again under military occupation and Reconstructed for the third The consequences for the South were equally destructive. The Acts of March 1867 led to a new Reconstruction along Republican, anti-white lines. Registration was followed by votes calling conventions, and these by the election of conventions, the drafting of const.i.tutions, and their approval by popular vote. But those who took part in this process were blacks, guided by Northern army officers, a few Northerners, and some renegade whites. This new electorate was organized by pressure groups called Union Leagues, which built up a Republican Party of the South. In fact, the state const.i.tutional conventions were almost identical with Republican nominating conventions. The new party and the imposed state were one. It was as though the North, with its military power, had imposed one-party dictatorships on all the Southern states. The vast majority of whites boycotted or bitterly opposed these undemocratic procedures. But for the time being there was nothing they could do. Only in Mississippi did they succeed in rejecting the new const.i.tution.

By the summer of 1868 all Southern states except three (Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia) had gone through this second, Congressional-imposed Reconstruction, and by an Omnibus Act seven of them were restored to Congressional partic.i.p.ation (Alabama had already pa.s.sed the test). As a result of the disenfranchis.e.m.e.nt of a large percentage of Southern white voters, and the addition of black ones, organized as Republicans, the ruling party carried the elections of 1868. General Grant, who had been nominated unanimously by the Republican Convention as candidate, won the electoral college by 214 votes to 80 for the Democrat, Governor Horatio Seymour of New York (1810-86). Without the second Reconstruction, it is likely Grant would have lost, and some of the Republicans, such as Sumner and Stevens, admitted that Congress had recognized the eight Southern states in 1868 primarily to secure their electoral votes. Thus America, after abolishing the organic sin of slavery, witnessed the birth of an organic corruption in its executive and Congress.

These transactions at least had the merit of enabling Congress to bully the South into ratifying the Fifteenth Amendment, which stated that the right of American citizens to vote should not be denied or abridged 'on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude.' On the other hand, in evading its implications, Southerners could later cite, as moral justification, the fact that they had ratified it only under duress-especially true in Georgia, for instance, which had to be placed yet again under military occupation and Reconstructed for the third time. Moreover, the Republican-imposed governments in the Southern states, as might have been expected, proved hopelessly inefficient and degradingly corrupt from the start. The blacks formed the majority of the voters, and in theory occupied most of the key offices. But the real power was in the hands of Northern 'carpetbaggers' and a few Southern white renegades termed 'scalawags.' Many of the black officeholders were illiterate. Most of the whites were scoundrels, though there were also, oddly enough, a few men of outstanding integrity, who did their best to provide honest government. There were middle-cla.s.s idealists, often teachers, lawyers or newspapermen who, as recent research now acknowledges, were impelled by high motives. But they were submerged in a sea of corruption. State bonds were issued to aid railroads which were never built. Salaries of officeholders were doubled and trebled. New state jobs were created for relatives and friends. In South Carolina, where the prescriptions had been particularly savage, and carpetbaggers, scalawags, and blacks had unfettered power, both members of the legislature and state officials simply plunged their hands into the public treasury. No legislation could be pa.s.sed without bribes, and no verdicts in the courts obtained without money being pa.s.sed to the judges. Republicans accused of blatant corruption were blatantly acquitted by the courts or, in the unlikely event of being convicted, immediately pardoned by the governor.

The South, its whites virtually united in hatred of their governments, hit back by force. The years 1866-71 saw the birth of the Ku Klux Klan, a secret society of vigilantes, who wore white robes to conceal their ident.i.ties, and who rode by night to do justice. They were dressed to terrify the black community, and did so; and where terror failed they used the whip and the noose. And they murdered carpetbaggers too. They also organized race-riots and racial lynchings. They were particularly active at election-time in the autumn, so that each contest was marked by violence and often by murder. Before the Civil War, Southern whites had despised the blacks and occasionally feared them; now they learned to hate them, and the hate was reciprocated. A different kind of society came into being, based on racial hatred. The Republican governors used state power in defense of blacks, scalawags, and carpetbaggers, and when state power proved inadequate, appealed to Congress and the White House. So Congress conducted inquiries and held hearings, and occasionally the White House sent troops. But the blacks and their white allies proved incapable of defending themselves, either by political cunning or by force. So gradually numbers all, was a democracy, even in the South. Congressional Reconstruction gradually crumbled. The Democrats slowly climbed back into power. Tennessee fell to them in 1869, West Virginia, Missouri, and North Carolina in 1870, Georgia in 1871, Alabama, Texas, and Arkansas in 1874, Mississippi in 1875. Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina were held in the Republican camp only by military force. But the moment the troops were withdrawn, in 1877, the Republican governments collapsed and the whites took over again.

In short, within a decade of its establishment, Congressional Reconstruction had been destroyed. New const.i.tutions were enacted, debts repudiated, the administrations purged, cut down, and reformed, and taxation reduced to prewar levels. Then the new white regimes set about legislating the blacks into a lowly place in the scheme of things, while the rest of the country, having had quite enough of the South, and its blacks too, turned its attention to other things. Thus the great Civil War, the central event of American history, having removed the evil of slavery, gave birth to a new South in which whites were first cla.s.s citizens and blacks citizens in name only. And a great silence descended for many decades. America as a whole did not care; it was already engaged in the most astonishing economic expansion in human history, which was to last, with one or two brief interruptions-and a world war-until the end of the 1920s.