Chapter III

PRESIDENT JOHNSON'S PLAN OF RECONSTRUCTION AND HIS PROCEEDINGS IN REALIZATION OF IT

The Character of Mr. Johnson--The Radical Nature of Johnson's First Views on Reconstruction--The Retention of Lincoln's Cabinet by Mr. Johnson and the Modification of Johnson's Views by Mr. Seward's Arguments--Johnson's Amnesty Proclamation of May 29th, 1865--The Excepted Classes--The Effect of these Exceptions--The President's Plan--The Realization of it--The Administering of the Oath--Reconstruction in North Carolina--The Identity of Johnson's Plan with that of Lincoln--Reconstruction in Mississippi--Reconstruction in Georgia--Reconstruction in Alabama, South Carolina and Florida--Reconstruction in Virginia--Reconstruction in Louisiana, Arkansas and Tennessee--The Constitutional Conventions of 1865--The Form of the Work Done in these Conventions, and its Substance--The Erection of "State" Governments and the Election of Members of Congress--The Orders of the President Putting the Civil Government of the United States into Operation Everywhere--The President's First Annual Message.

[Sidenote: The character of Mr. Johnson.]

Mr. Johnson was a man who rose from very low estate through his own efforts. He was a man of considerable intellectual power and of great will power. He was somewhat vain of his success and somewhat piqued by the social neglect which he had suffered at the hands of the "old families." He was intensely loyal to the Union, and could regard secession and rebellion only as treason. Having suffered so much for his loyalty, he was somewhat moved by considerations of revenge. He was profoundly stirred by {32} the assassination of Lincoln, and apparently believed it to have been planned by those high in authority in the Confederacy; and he was possessed with an intense desire to re-establish the Union on an enduring foundation.

[Sidenote: The radical nature of Johnson's first views on Reconstruction.]

With such a history behind him, and such a disposition impelling him, it is not to be wondered at that his policy in regard to Reconstruction should have been more stringent than that of Mr. Lincoln. In fact it was feared, even by the more radical Republicans, such, for instance, as Mr. Wade, that he would be bloody minded in the treatment of the rebel chiefs. He had, before his accession to the Presidency, declared so often, and so vehemently, that "traitors should be arrested, tried, convicted and hanged," that most men were expecting the strict application of the criminal law to the Confederate leaders.

[Sidenote: The retention of Lincoln's Cabinet by Mr. Johnson, and the modification of Johnson's views by Mr. Seward's arguments.]

Mr. Johnson retained Lincoln's Cabinet, and among them the conciliatory and persuasive Seward, who, in about six weeks from the night of the assassination, at which time he himself was seriously wounded, returned to his work in the State Department. There is no doubt that it was the influence of Seward which modified the views and purposes of Mr. Johnson. The compliant spirit manifested at this time by the Confederate chiefs helped strongly in the same direction. By the 1st of June, Seward had won Johnson completely for his plan of a rapid and forgiving reconstruction by the Executive. Congress was not in session, and the President was not inclined to call an extra session. The late rebel chieftains were pressing for the political rehabilitation of their section, and the President now fully believed that he had the power to proceed with the problem of Reconstruction, and was inclined to do so.

{33} [Sidenote: Johnson's Amnesty Proclamation of May 29, 1865.]

On the 29th of May, he issued his proclamation of amnesty and pardon to all persons who, having engaged in rebellion, had failed to take the benefits of Mr. Lincoln's proclamations of December 8, 1863, and March 26, 1864. To all such persons Mr. Johnson offered his pardon upon their taking an oath of the following tenor: "I ---- do solemnly swear (or affirm) in the presence of Almighty God, that I will henceforth faithfully support, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Union of the States thereunder, and that I will in like manner abide by and faithfully support all laws and proclamations which have been made during the existing rebellion with reference to the emancipation of slaves. So help me God."

[Sidenote: The excepted classes.]

He, however, excepted the following classes of persons from the benefits of the offer: 1st. Those who held or had held, under the pretended Confederate Government, civil or diplomatic office or agency, or military office above the rank of colonel in the army and lieutenant in the navy, or military or naval office of any grade, if educated by the United States Government in the Military Academy at West Point or the United States Naval Academy; and all those who held, or had held, the pretended office of Governor of a "State" in insurrection against the United States;

2d. Those who had left seats in the Congress of the United States or judicial stations under the United States to aid in the rebellion against the United States, and those who had resigned or tendered resignations of their commissions in the army or navy of the United States to evade duty in resisting the rebellion;

3d. Those who had, in any way, treated persons found in the service of the United States, in any capacity, otherwise than lawfully as prisoners of war;

{34} 4th. Those who had been engaged in destroying the commerce of the United States on the high seas, or upon the lakes and rivers separating the British Provinces from the United States, or in making raids from Canada into the United States;

5th. Those who were, or had been, absent from the United States, or had left their homes within the jurisdiction of the United States, and passed beyond the military lines of the United States into the pretended Confederate States, for the purpose of aiding the rebellion;

6th. Those who, at the time they might seek to obtain the benefits of the proclamation by taking the oath, were prisoners of war, or under civil or criminal arrest, and those who had taken the oath of allegiance to the United States since December 8, 1863, and had failed to keep it;

And, finally, those who had voluntarily participated in any way in the rebellion and were the owners of taxable property to the value of more than twenty thousand dollars.

[Sidenote: The effect of these exceptions.]

These exceptions would have shut out almost all of the leading men of most of the "States" that passed secession ordinances from the benefits of the proclamation, except for the subsequent provision in the proclamation, which ordained that special application might be made to the President for pardon by any person belonging to the excepted classes, and held out the promise that such clemency would be as liberally extended as might be consistent with the facts of the case and the peace and dignity of the United States.

[Sidenote: The President's plan in a sentence.]

Briefly, the President proposed to pardon the rebel leaders, upon special personal application, as an act of high executive grace, and to amnesty every one else in a body; and upon the basis of {35} their re-established loyalty to use the old electorate of the South in reconstruction. How he succeeded we will now proceed to relate.

[Sidenote: The realization of it.]

[Sidenote: The administering of the oath.]

In the first place, the machinery for administering the cleansing oath was made very simple and accessible. Any commissioned officer, civil, military or naval, of the United States, and any officer, civil or military, of a loyal "State" qualified by the laws of the "State" to administer oaths, was declared by the President, through his Secretary of State, to be competent to administer this oath of loyalty, a copy of which should be given to the person taking it as his certificate of restored citizenship, and another copy sent to the State Department at Washington to be there deposited and kept in the archives of the Government.

[Sidenote: Reconstruction in North Carolina.]

In the second place, and by a second proclamation, issued on the same day, May 29th, the President appointed a Provisional Governor for North Carolina, and authorized and commanded him to cause the election of delegates to, and their assembly in, a constitutional convention of the "State" for the reconstruction of the "State," and its restoration to its constitutional relations to the United States. The electorate to be employed by the Provisional Governor should be those persons who were qualified to vote by the laws of North Carolina in force immediately before the 20th of May, 1861, and had taken the oath prescribed in the first proclamation.

This second proclamation also commanded the heads of the departments of the United States Government to put the laws of the United States into operation in North Carolina, the United States judges to open the United States courts and proceed to business, and the military officers in the district to aid the Provisional {36} Governor in carrying the duties assigned to him into effect, and to abstain from hindering, impeding, or discouraging, in any manner, the organization of a "State" government as authorized by the proclamation.

[Sidenote: The identity of Johnson's plan with that of Lincoln.]

It will thus be seen that Mr. Johnson's plan of Reconstruction was in substance the same as that of Mr. Lincoln. It rested upon the theory of the indestructibility of the "States," their perdurance as "States" throughout the period of rebellion, the commission of treason and rebellion by combinations of private persons, the right of the Executive to withdraw his military powers and put his civil powers in operation, whenever, in his judgment, the circumstances would warrant him in so doing, and his authority to recognize the old electorates of the "States" in which rebellion had existed as the respective constituent bodies of the "States," upon such terms and under such limitations as he might prescribe. He did not lay down any rule as to the numerical proportion which the modified electorates should bear to the old, in order to make their acts legitimate, as Mr. Lincoln did; and he did declare in his second proclamation that the North Carolina convention, when convened, or the legislature that might be thereafter assembled, should prescribe the qualification of electors, and the eligibility of persons to hold office under the constitution and laws of the "State," which Mr. Lincoln did not do in his proclamation. But there is no doubt that Mr. Lincoln would have indorsed this proposition. He could not have avoided it, while holding the theory that North Carolina was a "State" simply engaged in amending its constitution, the theory which his own proclamation apparently set up. In a word Johnson's policy and acts in reconstructing the "States" in which secession ordinances had been passed, and rebellion committed, were {37} but a continuation of those of Mr. Lincoln. If Lincoln was right so was Johnson, and _vice versa_.

[Sidenote: Reconstruction in Mississippi, Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina and Florida.]

On the 13th of June, the President issued a proclamation of like tenor and containing similar orders for putting the laws of the United States into operation, and for putting similar machinery in motion for reconstruction, in Mississippi. He appointed William L. Sharkey Provisional Governor therein. On the 17th of June, similar steps were taken for the reconstruction of Georgia, with James Johnson as the Provisional Governor; on the 21st of June for the reconstruction of Alabama, with Lewis E. Parsons as Provisional Governor; on the 30th of June for the reconstruction of South Carolina, with Benjamin F. Perry as Provisional Governor; and on the 13th of July for the reconstruction of Florida, with William Marvin as Provisional Governor.

[Sidenote: Reconstruction in Virginia.]

Already on May 9th, twenty days before the issue of his proclamation of amnesty, the President had issued an executive order putting the laws of the United States in operation in Virginia, and guaranteeing the support of the United States Government to Governor Francis H. Pierpont in all lawful measures for the extension and administration of the "State" government throughout the geographical limits of Virginia. This meant, of course, that the United States Government recognized the shadowy loyal "State" government, which had kept up at least a show of existence throughout the rebellion, as the true "State" government of Virginia, and that Virginia did not need reconstruction, but only the extension of the authority of this government throughout her territorial limits. This was, also, a simple continuation of Mr. Lincoln's policy, as we well know.

{38} [Sidenote: Reconstruction in Louisiana, Arkansas and Tennessee.]

Of course Mr. Johnson recognized the reconstruction of Louisiana, Arkansas and Tennessee as effected by Mr. Lincoln; so that by mid-summer of 1865 the reconstruction of all the "States" which had passed secession ordinances, except only Texas, had been completed, or had been put in course of completion.

[Sidenote: The constitutional conventions of 1865.]

During the summer, autumn and early winter of 1865, the Provisional Governors of Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida ordered elections for the choosing of delegates to constitutional conventions, upon the basis of the old suffrage laws of the respective "States" once answering to these names, modified by the requirements of the Presidential pardon, received after taking the oath of allegiance; and these elections were held and these conventions assembled.

[Sidenote: The form of the work done in these conventions, and its substance.]

These bodies chose to do their work in the form of amendments to the old constitutions of the "States," whose constituent powers they assumed to hold, rather than in the form of new constitutions. Before the meeting of Congress on the first Monday of December, they had all passed ordinances, either repealing the secession ordinances of their respective "States," or pronouncing them null and void; had all voted amendments to the constitutions of their respective "States" abolishing slavery; and all, except Mississippi and South Carolina, had passed ordinances repudiating the debt incurred by their respective "States" in aid of rebellion against the United States.

[Sidenote: The erection of "State" governments and the election of Members of Congress.]

Before the meeting of Congress also, elections of the members of the respective "State" legislatures and of "State" officers, and of the members of the House of Representatives in Congress, had been held by the {39} Provisional Governors, under the direction of the respective conventions. And, finally, before the assembly of Congress, these Legislatures had, with the exception of that of Florida, met, organized, and elected United States Senators, and, with the exception of those of Florida and Mississippi, had adopted the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The legislature of Florida, not having met and organized, had not at that date been able to consider the Amendment. It met on December 18th and elected United States Senators, and adopted the Thirteenth Amendment on the 28th. The legislature of Mississippi, on the other hand, rejected the Thirteenth Amendment on the 27th of November.

[Sidenote: The orders of the President putting the civil Government of the United States into operation everywhere.]

During the same period, the President had by his several proclamations and orders declared the cessation of armed resistance, the restoration of intercourse throughout the country, and the raising of the blockade and the opening of the ports, and had put the different branches of the civil Government of the United States into operation in all the "States" which had been the scene of the recent rebellion. He had not, however, restored the privilege of the writ of Habeas Corpus in these regions or in the District of Columbia, and he reserved the right to have recourse to military control therein in case of necessity. The Governors of South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi and Florida under the Confederacy had, in the spring of 1865, assumed to summon the legislatures, chosen by these "States" while members, or pretended members, of the Confederacy, to meet together for reconstruction purposes. The President had, through his military officials, ignored and prevented all such movements. No farther resistance to his plan of Reconstruction had been attempted, but he saw {40} plainly that, without the United States military power to sustain the new "State" governments, there might be.

[Sidenote: The President's first annual Message.]

This was the situation when Congress met on the first Monday of December, and received President Johnson's first annual Message. This document contained a disquisition upon the political system of the United States, as "an indissoluble union of indestructible States," with the natural conclusion that by attempting secession, the "States" impaired, but did not extinguish, their vitality, suspended, but did not destroy, their functions. It then proceeded with a narration of the facts above stated, in which the President sought to establish, upon the basis of his power to pardon and withdraw military rule, and to guarantee a republican form of government to every "State," his authority to reconstruct "State" government, or at any rate to permit the pardoned citizens to do so under his direction.

Finally, this paper contained the official notice to Congress that the President had admitted the reconstructed "States"--and that would mean all that had passed the secession ordinance, except perhaps Texas, whose convention did not assemble until March of 1866--to participate in amending the Constitution of the United States. The President concluded his narration and argumentation upon this all-important subject in these words: "The amendment to the Constitution being adopted, it will remain for the States whose powers have been so long in abeyance to resume their places in the two branches of the National Legislature, and thereby complete the work of restoration. Here it is for you, fellow citizens of the Senate, and for you, fellow citizens of the House of Representatives, to judge, each of you for yourselves, of the elections, returns and qualifications of your own members."

{41} It is entirely evident from all this that the President denied the power of the Houses of Congress, either separately or jointly, to prevent the Senators and Representatives from the reconstructed "States" from taking their seats upon any other grounds than defects in the election and return, or in the personal qualifications, of the particular persons under consideration.

{42}