Following the conclusion of the Civil War, there were many steps that needed to be taken to reunify the Southern states who had fought against Union forces during the war effort. But why was a plan for reconstruction of the South needed? At the conclusion of the war, the South had been decimated by Union war efforts. Rail lines, factories, and whole communities were destroyed from the violence of war. Of the male population in the South, 20% was dead. The labor market created under the institution of slavery was to be forbidden, and the South needed to be put back together economically. Ultimately, Reconstruction-era reforms were necessary to reestablish state governments that were loyal to the Union, as well as to formally abolish slavery.
To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member.
Create your account
President Lincoln's plan for Reconstruction was both a collection of policies and part of a larger comprehensive plan for the reunification of the North and South. President Lincoln favored a smooth and moderate transitional plan that would allow former Confederate states to begin the process of re-admittance once a small percentage of the 1860's electorate had sworn an oath of loyalty to the Union. At the conclusion of the process, President Lincoln provided for full pardons for former Confederate soldiers and promised to protect their property rights. Lincoln's plan outlined that the abolition of slavery would be required in each state's constitution, and that delegates would be voted on by the electorate to form these newly loyal states.
Lincoln's Plan for Reconstruction and Emancipation
Abraham Lincoln's reconstruction plan hinged upon the abolition of slavery as a requirement for the ultimate reunification of the state to the Union. Lincoln's now famous Emancipation Proclamation, issued on January 1, 1863, was the first step in the process. The Proclamation declared that ''all persons held as slaves . . . henceforward shall be free.'' While the Emancipation Proclamation did capture the public's interest and the hearts and minds of a population attentive to the principles of abolition, it did not end slavery.
Lincoln's Plan for Reconstruction and the Role of Military Governors
Military governors were installed in Louisiana, Tennessee, and North Carolina by President Lincoln when each state was conquered. Lincoln also went on to recognize the newly formed government of Virginia around the same time period. Lincoln wanted to pursue a path forward following the conclusion of the war and he believed that the military governors would help to hold the line. Lincoln communicated to military governors his apprehension of carpetbagger politicians from the North taking roles in the government of Southern states. In a letter from 1862 to the military governor of Louisiana, General George F. Shepley, President Lincoln wrote that carpetbaggers would be viewed as ''disgusting and outrageous . . . to send a parcel of Northern men here as representatives.'' President Lincoln used his military governors to help shape the policies that would ultimately become a part of his Ten Percent Plan.
Lincoln's Plan for Reconstruction and Loyalty Oaths
The moniker for the Ten Percent Plan came from Lincoln's idea that in order for a state to start the process of reunification, it first must have 10 percent of the voting population of 1860 to agree to sign an oath of loyalty to the Union. Lincoln believed that the 10 percent standard should be based upon eligible voters according to the rolls of the most recent presidential election, which was earlier in 1860. Only once 10 percent of the voters had signed the oath would a state be allowed to begin the process of reconstruction and organize a state constitutional convention.
Lincoln's Plan for Reconstruction and State Constitutions
President Lincoln further required states to have a subsequent election where they would elect delegates to pen their new state constitutions. Establishing new state constitutions, once adopted, would reestablish them as states in the Union. While President Lincoln did require the abolition of slavery for the ultimate reunification of seceded states, he provided leniency for Southern states to debate how to implement this requirement. Many Radical Republicans were not pleased with the lenient approach of Lincoln and feared that this could potentially lead to ineffective enforcement of abolition and the potential for the Confederacy to be resurrected in the future.
The Freedmen's Bureau
At the conclusion of the war in 1865, President Lincoln and members of Congress debated what steps would need to be taken to ensure that freedmen could become members of society. The Freedmen's Bureau was touted by Lincoln as a possible solution to a difficult problem, especially in the South. The Bureau would be tasked with providing food, shelter, access to medical assistance, employment aid, and education for Black citizens and poverty-stricken white citizens alike. Ultimately, the establishment of the Freedmen's Bureau represented the largest federal aid relief and welfare plan of the period. The Freedmen's Bureau was established on March 3, 1865, through action in Congress. Helping freedmen find work was a primary goal of the Freedmen's Bureau, and local offices were ultimately set up to assist with this process.
To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member.
Create your account
While Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan was initially viewed as popular by Northern newspapers and many Republicans. However, as the war efforts continued, the plan began to receive criticism. The Radical Republicans put up a hard fight against Lincoln's moderate tone to the Southern states.
Criticism of Lincoln's Plan for Reconstruction
 |
Radical Republicans had their own ideas about Reconstruction-era policies that would allow the former rebel states to rejoin the Union. The Radical Republicans' Wade-Davis Bill attempted to place stringent requirements for states to rejoin the Union. Despite being passed by Congress on July 2, 1864, the bill was quietly vetoed by Lincoln using a pocket veto at a congressional recess.
To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member.
Create your account
President Abraham Lincoln was only able to see the end of the Civil War before his assassination at the hands of Confederate sympathizer and actor John Wilkes Booth on April 15, 1865, in Washington, D.C. While much of President Lincoln's legacy and accomplishments are highly esteemed, his Ten Percent Plan did not last once his successor, President Andrew Johnson, took control of the office of the presidency following Lincoln's death.
After Lincoln's Approach to Reconstruction
President Andrew Johnson immediately moved to work toward a period of Presidential Reconstruction and took elements from Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan to achieve his goal. President Johnson expanded on some of the more unpopular provisions of Lincoln's plan and enraged Radical Republicans who had already expressed their dismay at the moderate approach to pardons. Political equality for Black citizens was at the cornerstone of Radical Republican efforts surrounding Reconstruction. The ensuing battle between Presidential Reconstruction and Radical Reconstruction would not be settled until the election of 1866 when Radical Republicans gained massive majorities in both the House and the Senate. The election of 1866 ushered in a new period of the Reconstruction-era, as Radical Republicans had the ability to overcome a presidential veto and shape the future of the Reconstruction-era.
To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member.
Create your account
President Abraham Lincoln wished to end the Civil War quickly, and his proposal under the Ten Percent Plan provided a moderate approach to the upcoming reunification of the North and South as the end of the war approached. Reconstruction was needed in the South following the war effort, but Northern Radical Republicans favored a much more stringent approach to reunification. Radical Republicans believed that political equality for Black citizens was an important part of this process, and they also criticized Lincoln's meager requirement of 10 percent of voters swearing an oath of allegiance as too moderate and unsustainable. The Wade-Davis Bill represented their response to Lincoln's moderate plan, which favored a majority of a state's population swearing loyalty to the Union rather than just 10 percent, but it did not go as far as requiring voting rights for freedmen.
The Freedmen's Bureau was established to help former slaves find work, housing, food, and to provide access to medical services. Lincoln did not, however, redistribute farmland to former slaves under his proposals, and he left much of the implementation process up to the states and new state governments. Ultimately, Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth only five days after the South surrendered in the war effort, and Lincoln was succeeded in his presidency by Andrew Johnson. Radical Republicans went on to win sweeping victories in an upcoming election leading to the period of Radical Reconstruction that would dominate the period.
To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member.
Create your account
Video Transcript
Reconstructing the South
 |
Even before the surrender of Confederate forces under General Robert E. Lee on April 9, 1865 ending the American Civil War, President Lincoln had begun making plans for the physical, economic, social and political rehabilitation of a region that had been devastated by four years of war. There were a number of deep wounds that needed to be treated.
First of all, there was property damage on a massive scale as Southern rail lines, factories and bridges and farmland lay in ruins. Many towns and cities had to be rebuilt. Thousands of veterans and civilians were wounded and in need of medical care. Many more were homeless. How could all of this damage be fixed? And how could it all be paid for? The destruction had crushed the Southern economy, as well as the workforce - about 20% of the Southern adult male population was dead, many more were disabled and slavery had been abolished. Many plantation owners lost their farms, and even those people who kept their land now lacked the only source of labor they'd ever known.
Ending slavery didn't just transform the workforce. It transformed Southern society and created a new set of problems Lincoln knew had to be addressed. America's four million freed slaves set about reuniting their families, building community institutions and generally trying to leave the legacy of bondage behind. Yet they lacked land, jobs and education. Where would they go, and how would they rebuild their lives? Moreover, antebellum Southern society had been built on a deeply racist divide. Freeing the slaves was not going to give them equality or unite Southern blacks and whites. Lifestyles and attitudes 200 years in the making couldn't just be erased overnight on either side of the racial divide.
There was also political damage. The Union had been preserved, but the end of the war raised several challenging political questions. How were the Southern states going to become part of the Union again? What did the Union need to do to make sure civil war wouldn't return? How would former slaves have their rights guaranteed?
 |
The process of trying to rebuild the South's economy, society and infrastructure was called Reconstruction, and it dominated political debate for more than a decade. President Lincoln hoped to reunify the nation as quickly and painlessly as possible. He realized that it wasn't just the South that needed to be rebuilt; many Northerners were angry and viewed Southerners as their bitter enemy, a defeated rival that should be punished. For their part, Southerners blamed the North for starting the war and resented the suggestion that their society needed to be reconstructed at all. They had left the Union in the first place because they didn't think the North (or anyone else) should be able to impose its will upon them. Yet, the goal of Reconstruction was to do just that.
Competing Plans for Reconstruction
The Civil War officially ended in April 1865. But as early as 1863, Lincoln began drafting a plan to bring the South back into the Union quickly (as he put it) 'with malice toward none and charity for all.' Lincoln's plan for Reconstruction became known as the Ten Percent Plan, which he hoped would be fair and attainable for Southern states. The plan required that former Confederates take an oath pledging allegiance to the Union and accepting the end of slavery. When just 10% of the voting population had taken this oath, they could set up a new state government. Once the new government had outlawed slavery, the state could then be readmitted to the Union. Lincoln also hoped to expand suffrage. He insisted that new state governments allow African Americans the right to vote, as long as they met the same requirements as everyone else in terms of property ownership, literacy and military service for the Union.
Within the Republican Party there was bitter disagreement over Reconstruction. Like Lincoln, most moderates favored expanding some rights for blacks, while not being overly ambitious about social reforms. Conservative Republicans believed that few, if any, conditions should be imposed on Southern states other than accepting the abolition of slavery, for re-admittance to the Union. The Radical Republicans, on the other hand, favored many more requirements to rejoin the Union. The Radicals believed that any plan to readmit Confederate states must account for land redistribution, full suffrage for black men and other policies to adequately punish the South.
 |
The Radical Republicans were outraged at Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan for its leniency and the president's seeming complacency. They were angry that he had not insisted on more civil rights and protections for former slaves. Radicals in Congress passed their own plan for reconstruction in the Wade-Davis Bill. Under this plan, the president would appoint a governor for each state once a majority of its voting citizens swore that they had always been loyal to the Union. Only then could the state organize a constitutional convention. The new state constitutions had to abolish slavery, take away political rights from Confederate leaders and cancel war debts. The Wade-Davis Bill left political rights for blacks up to each state, but it would be nearly impossible for any Southern state to get half of the men to swear they had never been disloyal without franchising African Americans. Congress passed the bill in 1864, but Lincoln swiftly vetoed it.
On January 16, 1865, General William T. Sherman issued Special Field Orders No. 15 during his march to the sea. It redistributed abandoned or confiscated plantation land to former slaves, and the recipients were often lucky enough to also obtain an unneeded mule from the army. However, after Lincoln's death a few months later, President Johnson restored all property back to its original owners. Ever since, the concept of '40 acres and a mule' has come to represent failed promises.
In March of 1865 - just a month before the end of the war - the president urged Congress to pass a bill creating the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, commonly called the Freedmen's Bureau. Radicals in Congress were happy to comply. Created as part of the War Department, the goal of the Freedmen's Bureau was to help ease the transition from slave to free man successfully. Immediately after the war, they helped former slaves survive in the short term, so they could build free lives in the long term. This often meant clothing, food, shelter or medical care. The Freedmen's Bureau also helped former slaves find work and provided assistance in negotiating labor contracts. Since Southern states had made it illegal to educate a slave, most freedmen were illiterate. The Bureau built schools throughout the South to provide an education to thousands of African Americans of every age. Many of the schools were run by Christian missionary organizations and former abolitionists.
 |
Lincoln had hoped to promote a spirit of compromise and bring the nation back together quickly. Unfortunately, he died before seeing most of his plans come to fruition. President Lincoln was shot on April 14, 1865 by John Wilkes Booth. It was the first assassination of a president, and it profoundly altered the direction of federal policy toward the South under President Andrew Johnson.
Lesson Summary
The process of rebuilding the South after the Civil War was a period called Reconstruction. Physical damage to people and places needed to be repaired. Former slaves needed help building free lives and securing their rights. Enemies needed to be reconciled, and a broken Union needed political repair. President Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan was intended to quickly readmit Southern states back into the Union without malice. As long as 10% of a state's voters swore an oath of allegiance to the United States, they could form a new government. When their state constitution abolished slavery, they could join the Union. Lincoln was a moderate. Conservative Republicans thought abolition alone was enough. But the Radical Republicans thought Lincoln was way too lenient. They wanted to see more social reform. They passed the Wade-Davis Bill, but Lincoln vetoed it. The Freedmen's Bureau was created to help former slaves create new lives as free individuals.
Lesson Objectives
After watching this lesson, you should be able to:
- Understand the issues that needed to be addressed after the Civil War
- Define Reconstruction and contrast Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan from Radical Republicans' Wade-Davis Bill
- Explain the purpose of the Freedmen's Bureau
To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member.
Create your account
