what were the differences between the reconstruction plans of the Presidents v. Congress?

Question

Lincolns Reconstruction plan and andrew jackson's plan vs. Congress' Recon. Plan?

Answer 1

As early as 1862, Pres. Abraham Lincoln had appointed provisional military governors for Louisiana, Tennessee, and North Carolina. The following year, initial steps were taken to reestablish governments in newly occupied states in which at least 10 percent of the voting population had taken the prescribed oath of allegiance. Aware that the presidential plan omitted any provision for social or economic reconstruction, the Radical Republicans in Congress resented such a lenient political arrangement under solely executive jurisdiction. As a result, the stricter Wade-Davis Bill was passed in 1864 but pocket vetoed by the President.

After Lincoln's assassination (April 1865), Pres. Andrew Johnson further alienated Congress by continuing Lincoln's moderate policies. The Fourteenth Amendment, defining national citizenship so as to include blacks, passed Congress in June 1866 and was ratified, despite rejection by most Southern states (July 28, 1868). In response to Johnson's intemperate outbursts against the opposition as well as to several reactionary developments in the South (e.g., race riots and passage of the repugnant black codes severely restricting rights of blacks), the North gave a smashing victory to the Radical Republicans in the 1866 congressional election.

That victory launched the era of congressional Reconstruction (usually called Radical Reconstruction), which lasted 10 years starting with the Reconstruction Acts of 1867. Under that legislation, the 10 remaining Southern states (Tennessee had been readmitted to the Union in 1866) were divided into five military districts; and, under supervision of the U.S. Army, all were readmitted between 1868 and 1870. Each state had to accept the Fourteenth or, if readmitted after its passage, the Fifteenth Constitutional Amendment, intended to ensure civil rights of the freedmen.

Answer 2

Lincoln didn't live long enough for his reconstruction plan to be worked out beyond vague principals. In the conflict between Johnson and the Radical Republicans who dominated Congress, Johnson's ideas for returning the South to the Union were generally much less punitive. Johnson was willing to let the former rebel states return once they repealed their Secession laws, repudiated their wartime debts, and ratified the 14th Amendment. The Congress was far less willing to let the southern states return, and refused to seat members from the former confederate states. Those states sometimes provoked Congress deliberately by electing representatives who had been Confederate leaders, but Congress also refused to seat members who had proven loyalty to the Union, including, to Johnson's fury, those from his home state of Tennessee.

There were also disagreements over how broad an amnesty should be issued to the former Confederate leaders and how many of them should be charged with treason and other war-related crimes. In the end, very few were actually sentenced for their acts.

Answer 3

Who would you assess the major responsiblity for directing Reconstruction, and to whom would you lay the major reasons for its successes or failures?