After the fall of Atlanta, Hood’s army mustered thirty thousand troops to oppose Sherman’s eighty thousand plus men, so Hood decided to march north toward Nashville and the Union’s railroad and supply centers at that location. Hood’s attack came to naught, except for the complete destruction of his army, thereby allowing Sherman a free hand for the rest of his campaign. For the rest of his operation, Sherman’s army faced little to no organized southern opposition. Sherman marched from Atlanta to Savannah, Georgia, and burned and destroyed everything along the way.[143] By the time Sherman reached the Atlantic Coast at Savannah his reputation as a destroyer of life and property was well secured. Sherman’s aim was to completely demolish the economy of the South and thereby end the war as soon as possible. “War is hell,” he would famously say, and few in Georgia would argue the point. After Savannah was reached, Sherman turned north to ravage South Carolina and trap Lee between his army and Grant’s.
Even after the fall of Richmond, the burning of Atlanta, the devastation of Georgia, and the annihilation of their every army, the southern political leaders tried to fight on. They thought by reaching Texas the rebellion might survive under their continued encouragement. Lee saw no way out. As the Union army was pursuing his army from Richmond, he stopped at Appomattox Court House and requested an audience with General US Grant. It was there Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia on April 9, 1865. Other ragged, starving Confederate armies surrendered soon thereafter, and the political leaders of the South fell into captivity before they got very far (some dressed as women). Lee showed himself to be the consummate American when he ordered his army home. He could have told his army to fight on in guerrilla style in the hills and mountains of the land, but he did not, even though many counseled him to do so. Lee decided it should be totally over. An extended guerrilla war, deepening the burning hatred of each side, might destroy what was left of the nation. Certainly, the North’s response to such southern actions could have been repressive in the extreme.
Lincoln was prepared to admit the South back into the Union without punishment. During the war the Union’s war aims expanded as the number of dead alone demanded more than just saving the Union. The Union agenda soon included abolishing slavery as a key war aim. President Lincoln was shot dead by John Wilkes Booth on April 15, 1865, just a few days after Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House. His death removed the main obstacle to the Radical Republican agenda of punishing the South for its rebellion. At this point, a surprising split developed between the new president, Andrew Johnson, and Congress. President Andrew Johnson was a Democratic senator from Tennessee when that state seceded from the Union; however, Johnson stayed on in the Senate, as he was pro-Union. The other southern senators resigned as their states joined the rebellion. Lincoln chose Johnson as a running mate to widen the appeal of the Lincoln ticket to pro-Union Democrats. The Radical Republicans had decided the ideology fomenting the war was to be crushed out of the South. President Johnson tried to put Lincoln’s ideas into action, but this entailed opposing the Radical Republicans in Congress who believed they alone possessed the legal right to structure and run the Reconstruction of the South. Johnson, as Lincoln before him, thought Southern Reconstruction flowed from the executive branch as part of the war powers. Incensed by Johnson’s opposition, the House of Representatives impeached him, and failed by only one vote to remove him from office. Nonetheless, the Radicals marginalized President Johnson by enacting their program of southern “reform” over his objections.
Reconstruction of the South
1865 to 1877
Funny Name, Bad Results? What’d you mean you can’t tell?
The war of shot and shell had ended, but the war of words and legislation, ideas and ideologies, continued. The period of Reconstruction was a legislative and cultural war that went on for twelve years, or more, and cleaved profound divides into the “restored” Union. This is one of the most controversial periods in US history, as some view the era as one of great social experimentation with significant successes, and others think it was an outright occupation of American territory and the denial of Constitutional rights to ex-Confederates. If a better peace is the purpose of war (remember Scipio at Carthage?), then the North certainly failed to achieve the objective. Certain events, such as the destruction of the agriculturally rich Shenandoah Valley, Sherman’s devastating march to the sea, the Union blockade starving women and children in the South, and other northern war activities, although no doubt shortening the war, caused southerners to believe the North treated them as savages. Southerners thought they fought against oppression, but the Union treated them all like slave holders. The hatred engendered by the war failed to dissolve. Reconstruction fell far short of helping the traumatized nation recover, as once again the South bowed to overwhelming northern force.
The Radical Republicans under their leaders Representative Thaddeus Stevens and Senator Charles Sumner, considered the South conquered territory and totally under federal control. In addition, they thought Congress controlled Reconstruction issues, not the president. Issues such as who should be allowed to vote (ex-Confederates, blacks, etc.), how the rebel states should be allowed back into the Union, how the residents should be taxed, whether blacks should be allowed to hold public office, and many others were decided along ideological lines drawn hard between the radicals and the moderates in Congress. In the election of 1866, Radical Republicans gained enough congressional seats to override presidential vetoes; thus, the South was controlled by Radical Republicans in Congress, the Carpetbaggers,[144] Freedmen (free blacks), and US Army. Congress decided that readmission to the Union required a state’s voters to swear allegiance to the US Constitution and ratify recent Constitutional amendments, among several other actions. Northern states, logically concerned about the old southern leadership resuming its role and putting former slaves into economic bondage in place of legal bondage, began searching for ways to keep the Negros free and the old south suppressed. Former southern slave owners must not be allowed to resume their pre-war society. Congress, under Republican radical leadership, passed civil rights acts guaranteeing blacks the right to vote and preventing actions to restrict that right. Congress also passed numerous government service laws requiring southern states to provide education and care for orphans and the insane among other social endeavors long available only in the North.[145]
Southerners thought the Union was destroying their culture and taking away their constitutional rights. Even after their loss, southerners were proud of their “cause” and still believed they were right to leave the Union. Union actions proved to most southerners that oppression was the ultimate northern goal. Some southerners fought back violently in the form of mystic groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, but most just wanted to get back to work and restore their economy. Union troops stationed in the South were an occupying army for more than a decade as southern states gradually regained admission to the Union. The last state to regain statehood was Georgia in 1870.
An economic downturn called the Panic of 1873 caused the Republican Party to lose seats in the House and Senate reducing the Radical Republican’s strength. Political events in 1876 finally ended Reconstruction. In the presidential election of 1876 a dispute arose over who won, Rutherford Hayes (R) or Samuel Tilden (D). Tilden, the Democrat, won the popular vote, but because of a third party candidate neither Hays nor Tilden gained enough electoral votes to win the presidency; however, the Democrat needed only one electoral vote to take the presidency. This deadlock threw the election into the Congress. What happened is a mystery; however, most say a deal ended the deadlock, and Republican Rutherford B. Hays became president after winning all the disputed electoral votes. The deal seemed to be that Union troops would leave the South. The Union troops marched out in 1877. Soon thereafter the white southern culture rebounded, finding ways to limit black voting by restrictions not openly based on race. The methods successfully ended black suffrage in the South for about 100 years.
As President Grant assumed his second term scandals and corruption were rife. Newspapers found immense corruption in the Federal government and the Reconstruction governments in the South causing Republicans to lose political power. With western farmers asking for cheap money (greenbacks—paper money not backed by gold or silver) and no tariffs, and the eastern businesses battling for tight money (money backed by gold or silver) and high tariffs, the Republicans lost voters in the west. As the South came back into the Union all the previously Confederate states voted universally for Democrats; thus, Republicans started losing governorships, senatorial seats, and soon would lose the House of Representatives altogether. As the blacks came under increasing pressure in the South, Republicans balked at responding fearing the loss of even more political power. When the Republican Party restrained its Congressional actions the states stepped in and started handling previously federal issues as local matters. The South refused to obey Federal laws on voting, and eventually the Supreme Court struck down the Reconstruction civil rights laws Republicans had pushed through during Reconstruction.
The Civil War era had ended at last, or so it seemed in 1877. However, it had not. In the 1960s, under the leadership of Martin Luther King and others, blacks in the South again attempted to gain the civil and voting rights enjoyed by white citizens of the United States. The civil rights movement once again caused the North to attack the South, only this time legislatively through its majorities in Congress. Northern institutions began to pound southern culture using the federal courts and federal law enforcement. Northern newspapers and TV reporters characterized southerners as Neolithic in customs and culture; therefore, the South fully deserved harsh punitive measures for their treatment of blacks. This propaganda was like that used by the abolitionists in 1860 to stir emotions in the North against the South. It worked in 1860, and it worked in 1960. Eventually, large numbers of laws passed giving additional protection to minorities. The power of the courts would grow immensely during this legislative, legal, and media onslaught against southerners.
In 1960, Southern States subtlety and openly discriminated against blacks. During the WWI era, President Woodrow Wilson’s Administration ignored discriminatory laws passed in the South. Over time these Jim Crow laws became more separatist in nature. The US Supreme Court upheld this societal and legal separatism declaring “separate but equal” was Constitutional. In fact, the facilities were unequal. Many white southerners disliked these laws; however, nothing changed until black activists began to demonstrate, risking arrest for defying discriminatory statutes. Once the nation became aware of the plight of the southern blacks millions rallied to their cause. In Congress, especially the US Senate, the South held powerful committee chairmanships and were the senior members of the ruling Democratic party in 1965. The southern Congressmen voted as a block, so the remaining northern Democrats could not gain a majority on discrimination issues. Only by joining with the Republican Party could northern Democrats overcome the southerners voting power. Over the objections and obstructions of southern Congressmen, Congress pushed through civil rights legislation to protect minorities. The president, Texas southerner and liberal Lyndon B. Johnson, signed these bills into law. It was perhaps Johnson’s greatest achievement.
The press, especially the electronic media (TV, radio), played a major role in bringing the nation’s attention to the quandary of the blacks. The press, however, went overboard in condemning southern culture and laws. Not every southern white in 1960 supported discrimination; however, the northern press painted the South with a broad brush making it sound as if every white southerner was racist by birth.
What occurred as a result of this pressure was a change in the law for the better, but it also resulted in a tremendous growth of power in the federal governments—especially the Federal Courts, and the US Supreme Court. By using racial discrimination as its platform federal courts expanded their power to rule exponentially. For example, courts forced busing on local jurisdictions causing local governments to expend large amounts of money by order of the court. In effect, the courts were telling legislatures how to spend money when the US Constitution, and all state constitutions, clearly set forth only the House of Representatives, or its state equivalent, has the power and legal right to spend money. The courts took on the role of unelected legislators not subject to any oversight by the people. When the US Supreme Court held state legislatures must be based on population alone, it was a direct blow at the peoples’ right to choose how they were governed. The courts interfered with law enforcement, schools, local employment, and other facets of local governance and private life. Courts added to the powers of the federal government and truncated the powers of state governments immensely as a direct result of the crusade against racism. Many commentators opined race was a ruse to increase central government power, including the power of the federal courts; and, in fact, much less intervention was necessary to solve the legal and cultural problems of racism.
Aftermath—the Impacts of the Civil War
The greatest impact of the Civil War was the saving of the Union. The second greatest impact was the considerable growth in power of the federal government. The power of the presidency grew enormously, as did the powers of Congress. By extension, the power of the states significantly decreased. Today, few think anything about federal government involvement in local schools, local government, prescription drugs, medical care, vehicle safety, and on and on. Before the Civil War this would have been an outrage. Today, the federal government directly takes huge amounts of people’s salaried earnings—considerably more than the local government takes; however, before the Civil War the federal government did not tax individuals directly, and it controlled far less money than the states. After the Civil War everything changed. Another enormous change was in the economy. The Civil War expanded the industrial economy of the North and helped to make the United States a world power of industrial production.
Let Us Learn
What can the Civil War have to say to us? How about moderation and understanding are all important in human relations, and impatience leads to trouble. The South went off half cocked and destroyed themselves. The Union sought to pressure people harshly, and almost destroyed themselves. Keep cool, be ready to bargain, know the other side, understand what they hold dear, and realize that half a loaf is better than none.
Another important historical lesson involves learning where things are going, and adjusting to the direction. After 1862, and the loss at Antietam, the South needed to get real and just settle with the Union. At that point Lincoln might have accepted a deal freeing the slaves and in return give the South monetary help to rebuild their shattered economy. This deal would leave the South unoccupied, its economy still half-way intact, and could reduce the punishment the Radicals were ready to bestow. Learn to cut your losses. If things are going bad, get out. Take the hit and keep the ability to control your destiny to some extent. With the war going against them, but still not real badly, the South kept fighting. Don’t do that. Life is not a football game where there is always next season. Life often hands us situation in which there really is no tomorrow. The best time for the South to approach the Union for a settlement was after a significant Southern victory like Chancellorsville (April 30, 1863). With a proper calculation of where the war was going th
e South could have chosen a good moment to approach Lincoln, thus bettering its chances of getting a decent deal. However, even if the deal was unconditional surrender the South should have taken it early on. Cut your losses, take what you can salvage, and build up for the next project. That is how to survive and prosper.
Books and Resources:
Great Books on the American Civil War (There are hundreds of books on the Civil War; a few are great, and a few of the great ones are listed below).
Bruce Catton: his writings include many wonderful books on the Civil War (Mr. Lincoln’s Army, Glory Road, A Stillness at Appomattox, The Coming Fury, The Terrible Swift Sword, Never Call Retreat, Grant Moves South, Grant Takes Command, and others).
James M. McPherson: The Battle Cry of Freedom (my favorite one-volume work on the Civil War), Ordeal by Fire: the Civil War and Reconstruction. I highly recommend The Battle Cry of Freedom.
Shelby Foote: The American Civil War, a Narrative History. Excellent set of books.
A Battlefield Atlas of the Civil War, Symonds, the Nautical and Aviation Publishing Company, 1994.
The American Civil War (West Point Military History Series), Editor T. Griess, Square One Publishing, 2002. The West Point publications are always superb.
The Stakes of Power 1845-1877, Nichols, and Berwanger, Hill and Wang, 1982
The Super Summary of World History Page 27