According to Foner, the American Civil War laid the foundation for modern America, guaranteed the Union’s predominance, destroyed slavery in America and shifted power from the North to the South (551). However, the greatest challenge that faced the United States after the Civil War was the task of reconstructing America to ensure that liberated slaves retained their freedom (Foner 551). This essay will argue that ‘Reconstruction’ is the best word to characterise national priorities after the Civil War by exploring several reasons behind this term’s accuracy. There will be an analysis of the other terms historians have attempted to apply to this period and a discussion on the limitations behind using labels to describe historical periods.
Reconstruction came to prioritise national priorities during this era because Andrew Johnson, Lincoln’s successor, immediately issued a series of proclamations in between 1865-7 that restored political and property rights to all white southerners that swore an oath of allegiance (Foner 569). Johnson immediately appointed provisional governors loyal to the new government in the South (Foner 569). Reconstruction came to prioritise national priorities because Johnson experienced opposition to his plans in the form of the Black Codes that granted blacks certain rights, such as ownership of property, but restricted their rights to serve on juries and testify against whites (Foner 570). Johnson became preoccupied by opposition to his plans from Radical Republicans, like Massachusetts senator Charles Summer, who wanted to guarantee blacks had the right to vote, further preoccupying national priorities (Foner 572). Johnson was heavily focused on introducing the Fourteenth Amendment in 1866, which guaranteed all citizens the right to be equal, and the Reconstruction Act distracted national priorities until 1877 once it was implemented in 1867, which created governments in the South that provided all blacks with the right to vote (Foner 574). Congress later ratified the Fifteenth Amendment that guaranteed all citizens the right to vote in 1870 (Foner 575). Reconstruction governments in the South introduced public schools for black and white children during the 1870s (Foner 580). Therefore, Reconstruction was the most important national priority during this time. Hodes recalls how a lady who lived throughout the Reconstruction period, Eunice Richardson, wrote about how the economic impact of Reconstruction also dominated life in the South due to the cotton industry suffering as a result of the war, forcing many workers to return to the countryside (167)
Historians like Foner have attempted to destablise traditional historical narratives by referring to this period as Radical Reconstruction, arguing that it was never truly completed due to opposition from the South, arguing that a Second Reconstruction was needed to complete the goal of full equality for African Americans (570). Nonetheless, the limitations behind trying to apply labels to these historical periods are that they are largely influenced by subjective views that distort historical realities. Instead, they draw on alternative outcomes of history if their ideas had been implemented and distract objective reality from subjective debate amongst historians.
In conclusion, there is no doubt that ‘Reconstruction’ was the best word used to describe impeding national priorities during the period 1865-77. Reconstruction distracted President Johnson from focusing on other priorities due to the amount of pardons that he had to issue as soon as he became president, alongside the opposition that he had to overcome in the South in the form of the Black Codes. Despite this, historians like Foner use different terms like ‘Radical Reconstruction’ to provide their own historical narratives on these periods of history.
Works cited
Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty! An American History. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007. Print.
Hodes, Martha. The Sea Captain’s Wife: A True Story of Love, Race, and War in the Nineteenth Century. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007. Print.
