91-549: Founded in 1902 by John Mitchell, Jr. , Mechanics Savings Bank was a bank in the Jackson Ward neighborhood of Richmond, Virginia . Mitchell, who was an African American, also owned and edited the Richmond Planet . In 1905 the bank bought a three-story brick building at No. 310 East Broad Street. The bank's Clay Street and Third building was designed by architect Carl Ruehrmund and constructed in 1910. The bank
182-646: A Reconstruction belief that the government could protect civil and political rights . In the American Civil War , eleven Southern states, all of which permitted slavery , seceded from the United States following the election of Lincoln to the presidency and formed the Confederate States of America . Though Lincoln initially declared secession "legally void" and declined to negotiate with Confederate delegates to Washington, following
273-655: A black fraternal organization, both locally and on the state level, where he led it into the 1920s. He was also president of the National Afro-American Press Association. Mitchell was the founder and president of the Mechanics Savings Bank in Richmond. It was part of the rise of black-owned businesses in the city. Among the bank's board of directors was photographer James C. Farley , who also worked with Mitchell at
364-813: A component of Reconstruction, the Interior Department ordered a meeting of representatives from all Indian tribes who had affiliated with the Confederacy. The council, the Southern Treaty Commission , was first held in Fort Smith, Arkansas in September 1865, and was attended by hundreds of Native Americans representing dozens of tribes. Over the next several years the commission negotiated treaties with tribes that resulted in additional re-locations to Indian Territory and
455-628: A devastating economic and material impact on the South, where most combat occurred. The enormous cost of the Confederate war effort took a high toll on the region's economic infrastructure. The direct costs in human capital , government expenditures, and physical destruction totaled $ 3.3 billion. By early 1865, the Confederate dollar had nearly zero value, and the Southern banking system
546-594: A low of $ 80 in 1879. By the end of the 19th century and well into the 20th century, the South was locked into a system of poverty. How much of this failure was caused by the war and by previous reliance on slavery remains the subject of debate among economists and historians. In both the North and South, modernization and industrialization were the focus of the post-war recovery, built on the growth of cities, railroads, factories, and banks and led by Radical Republicans and former Whigs. From its origins, questions existed as to
637-564: A newsboy while attending school. He then became a carriage boy for James Lyons , an aristocratic lawyer. Lyons opposed Mitchell's education, but Mitchell's mother persisted, and Mitchell attended the school taught by Rev. A. Binga Jr. In 1876, he entered the Richmond Normal High School and in 1877 he received a silver medal for being first in his class. In May 1878, he joined the first Baptist Church and became an active member throughout his life, even serving as chairman of
728-424: A note attached warning him that he would be lynched himself if he ever set foot in the county. In reply, and borrowing a line from Shakespeare , Mitchell had this to say: 'There are no terrors, Cassius, in your threats, for I am so strong in honesty that they pass by me like the idle wind, which I respect not.' Then, armed with two Smith & Wesson pistols, he boarded a train for Smithville and undeterred, walked
819-796: A policy of "malice toward none" announced in his second inaugural address, Lincoln asked voters only to support the Union in the future, regardless of the past. Lincoln pocket vetoed the Wade–Davis Bill, which was much more strict than the ten percent plan. Following Lincoln's veto, the Radicals lost support but regained strength after Lincoln's assassination in April 1865. Upon President Lincoln's assassination in April 1865, Vice President Andrew Johnson became president. Radicals considered Johnson to be an ally, but upon becoming president, he rejected
910-492: A precedent for president Abraham Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation . Congress later established a Freedmen's Bureau to provide much-needed food and shelter to the newly freed slaves. As it became clear that the war would end in a Union victory, Congress debated the process for the readmission of the seceded states. Radical and moderate Republicans disagreed over the nature of secession,
1001-437: A result, a system of sharecropping was developed, in which landowners broke up large plantations and rented small lots to the freedmen and their families. Thus, the main structure of the Southern economy changed from an elite minority of landed gentry slaveholders into a tenant farming agriculture system. Historian David W. Blight identified three visions of the social implications of Reconstruction: The Civil War had
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#17328016891391092-555: A status like new territories. Sumner argued that secession had destroyed statehood but the Constitution still extended its authority and its protection over individuals, as in existing U.S. territories . The Republicans sought to prevent Johnson's Southern politicians from "restoring the historical subordination of Negroes". Since slavery was abolished, the Three-fifths Compromise no longer applied to counting
1183-548: Is 1877, when the federal government withdrew the last troops stationed in the South as part of the Compromise of 1877. Later dates have also been suggested. Fritzhugh Brundage proposed in 2017 that Reconstruction ended in 1890, when Republicans failed to pass the Lodge Bill to secure voting rights for Black Americans in the South. Heather Cox Richardson argued that same year for a periodization from 1865 until 1920, when
1274-698: Is great danger that ... the liberating slaves of traitorous owners, will alarm our Southern Union friends, and turn them against us—perhaps ruin our fair prospect for Kentucky." After Frémont refused to rescind the emancipation order, Lincoln terminated him from active duty on November 2, 1861. Lincoln was concerned that the border states would secede from the Union if slaves were given their freedom. On May 26, 1862, Union Major General David Hunter emancipated slaves in South Carolina, Georgia , and Florida, declaring all "persons ... heretofore held as slaves ... forever free". Lincoln, embarrassed by
1365-414: The de facto creation (initially by treaty) of an unorganized Oklahoma Territory . President Lincoln signed two Confiscation Acts into law, the first on August 6, 1861, and the second on July 17, 1862, safeguarding fugitive slaves who crossed from the Confederacy across Union lines and giving them indirect emancipation if their masters continued insurrection against the United States. The laws allowed
1456-615: The Confederate States Army surrendered and the Southern states repealed secession and accepted the Thirteenth Amendment —most of which happened by December 1865. Lincoln broke with the Radicals in 1864. The Wade–Davis Bill of 1864 passed in Congress by the Radicals was designed to permanently disfranchise the Confederate element in the South. The bill asked the government to grant African American men
1547-496: The Confederate assault on the Union garrison at Fort Sumter , Lincoln declared that "an extraordinary occasion" existed in the South and raised an army to quell "combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings." Over the next four years, 237 named battles were fought between the Union and Confederate armies, resulting in the dissolution of the Confederate States in 1865. During
1638-716: The Hampton Roads Conference . In August 1862, Lincoln met with African American leaders and urged them to colonize some place in Central America . Lincoln planned to free the Southern slaves in the Emancipation Proclamation and he was concerned that freedmen would not be well treated in the United States by Whites in both the North and South. Although Lincoln gave assurances that the United States government would support and protect any colonies that were established for former slaves,
1729-732: The Ku Klux Klan , the White League , and the Red Shirts , engaged in paramilitary insurgency and terrorism to disrupt the efforts of the Reconstruction governments and terrorize Republicans. Congressional anger at President Johnson's repeated attempts to veto radical legislation led to his impeachment , but he was not removed from office. Under Johnson's successor, President Ulysses S. Grant , Radical Republicans passed additional legislation to enforce civil rights, such as
1820-680: The Ku Klux Klan Act and the Civil Rights Act of 1875 . However, continuing resistance to Reconstruction by Southern whites and its high cost contributed to its losing support in the North during the Grant administration. The 1876 presidential election was marked by widespread Black voter suppression in the South, and the result was close and contested. An Electoral Commission resulted in the Compromise of 1877 , which awarded
1911-482: The Planet . In 1904, Richmond passed a new law to enforce segregated seating areas on its trolleys. In protest, Mitchell helped organize mass meetings and a boycott by blacks of the system. As Mitchell gleefully covered in his article: "Street Car Trap", on the first day of the new system, only whites were arrested for refusing to change their seats; some could not be bothered to observe the new rules or had not realized
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#17328016891392002-614: The Reconstruction Acts of 1867 which outlined the terms in which the rebel states would be readmitted to the Union. Under these acts Republican Congress established military districts in the South and used Army personnel to administer the region until new governments loyal to the Union—that accepted the Fourteenth Amendment and the right of freedmen to vote—could be established. Congress temporarily suspended
2093-529: The United States Constitution to grant citizenship and equal civil rights to the newly freed slaves . To circumvent these legal achievements, the former Confederate states imposed poll taxes and literacy tests and engaged in terrorism to intimidate and control black people and to discourage or prevent them from voting. Throughout the war, the Union was confronted with the issue of how to administer areas it captured and how to handle
2184-473: The Wade–Davis Bill in opposition, which instead proposed that a majority of voters must pledge that they had never supported the Confederate government and disfranchised all those who had. Lincoln vetoed the Wade–Davis Bill, but it established a lasting conflict between the presidential and congressional visions of reconstruction. In addition to the legal status of the seceded states, Congress debated
2275-479: The Black community on education, the majority of Blacks had achieved literacy. Sumner soon concluded that "there was no substantial protection for the freedman except in the franchise". This was necessary, he stated, "(1) For his own protection; (2) For the protection of the white Unionist; and (3) For the peace of the country. We put the musket in his hands because it was necessary; for the same reason we must give him
2366-470: The Confederacy. During the war, a war among pro-Union and anti-Union Native Americans had raged. Congress passed a statute that gave the president the authority to suspend the appropriations of any tribe if the tribe is "in a state of actual hostility to the government of the United States ;... and, by proclamation, to declare all treaties with such tribe to be abrogated by such tribe". As
2457-514: The Democrat and the "Lily White" Republican candidate. He died at his desk in December 1929. He is buried at Evergreen Cemetery in Richmond, VA. The grave at Evergreen Cemetery is marked, and reads: "Editor, Banker, Alderman And Pioneer Of Civil Rights A Man Who Would Walk Into The Jaws Of Death To Serve His Race" The marker goes on to quote Isaiah 55:4: "Behold I have given him for a witness to
2548-902: The Emancipation Proclamation or 1865 with the end of the war". The Reconstruction Era National Historical Park proposed 1861 as a starting date, interpreting Reconstruction as beginning "as soon as the Union captured territory in the Confederacy" at Fort Monroe in Virginia and in the Sea Islands of South Carolina . According to historians Downs and Masur, "Reconstruction began when the first US soldiers arrived in slaveholding territory, and enslaved people escaped from plantations and farms, some of them fleeing into free states, and others trying to find safety with US forces." Soon afterwards, early discourse and experimentation began in earnest regarding Reconstruction policies. The Reconstruction policies provided opportunities to enslaved Gullah populations in
2639-476: The Ironclad Oath, which would effectively have allowed no former Confederates to vote. Historian Harold Hyman says that in 1866 congressmen "described the oath as the last bulwark against the return of ex-rebels to power, the barrier behind which Southern Unionists and Negroes protected themselves". Radical Republican leader Thaddeus Stevens proposed, unsuccessfully, that all former Confederates lose
2730-515: The Pierpont government separated the northwestern counties of the state and sought admission as West Virginia .) As additional territory came under Union control, reconstructed governments were established in Tennessee, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Debates over legal reconstruction focused on whether secession was legally valid, the implications of secession for the nature of the seceded states, and
2821-638: The Radical program of Reconstruction. He was on good terms with ex-Confederates in the South and ex- Copperheads in the North. He appointed his own governors and tried to close the Reconstruction process by the end of 1865. Thaddeus Stevens vehemently opposed Johnson's plans for an abrupt end to Reconstruction, insisting that Reconstruction must "revolutionize Southern institutions, habits, and manners .... The foundations of their institutions ... must be broken up and relaid, or all our blood and treasure have been spent in vain." Johnson broke decisively with
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2912-641: The Republicans in Congress when he vetoed the Civil Rights Act on March 27, 1866. While Democrats celebrated, the Republicans rallied, passed the bill again, and overrode Johnson's repeat veto. Full-scale political warfare now existed between Johnson (now allied with the Democrats) and the Radical Republicans. Since the war had ended, Congress rejected Johnson's argument that he had the war power to decide what to do. Congress decided it had
3003-712: The Sea Islands who became free overnight on November 7, 1861, after the Battle of Port Royal when all the white residents and slaveholders fled the area after the arrival of the Union. After the Battle of Port Royal, reconstruction policies were implemented under the Port Royal Experiment which were education , landownership , and labor reform. This transition to a free society was called "Rehearsal for Reconstruction." The conventional end of Reconstruction
3094-492: The South would gain additional seats in Congress. If Blacks were denied the vote and the right to hold office, then only Whites would represent them. Many, including most White Southerners, Northern Democrats , and some Northern Republicans, opposed voting rights for African-Americans. The small fraction of Republican voters opposed to Black suffrage contributed to the defeats of several suffrage measures voted on in most Northern states. Some Northern states that had referendums on
3185-1109: The South; some of them were men who had escaped to the North and gained educations, and returned to the South. They did not hold office in numbers representative of their proportion in the population, but often elected Whites to represent them. The question of women's suffrage was also debated but was rejected. Women eventually gained the right to vote with the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1920. From 1890 to 1908, Southern states passed new state constitutions and laws that disenfranchised most Blacks and tens of thousands of poor Whites with new voter registration and electoral rules. When establishing new requirements such as subjectively administered literacy tests , in some states, they used " grandfather clauses " to enable illiterate Whites to vote. The Five Civilized Tribes that had been relocated to Indian Territory (now part of Oklahoma ) held Black slaves and signed treaties supporting
3276-427: The Union (derisively called " scalawags " by White Democrats), and Northerners who had migrated to the South (derisively called " carpetbaggers ")—some of whom were returning natives, but were mostly Union veterans—organized to create constitutional conventions. They created new state constitutions to set new directions for Southern states. Congress had to consider how to restore to full status and representation within
3367-424: The Union those Southern states that had declared their independence from the United States and had withdrawn their representation. Suffrage for former Confederates was one of two main concerns. A decision needed to be made whether to allow just some or all former Confederates to vote (and to hold office). The moderates in Congress wanted virtually all of them to vote, but the Radicals resisted. They repeatedly imposed
3458-575: The Union, hostile to loyal Unionists, and enemies of the Freedmen. Radicals used as evidence outbreaks of mob violence against Black people, such as the Memphis riots of 1866 and the New Orleans massacre of 1866 . Radical Republicans demanded a prompt and strong federal response to protect freedmen and curb Southern racism. Stevens and his followers viewed secession as having left the states in
3549-596: The ability to vote of approximately 10,000 to 15,000 former Confederate officials and senior officers, while constitutional amendments gave full citizenship to all African Americans, and suffrage to the adult men. With the power to vote, freedmen began participating in politics. While many enslaved people were illiterate, educated Blacks (including fugitive slaves ) moved down from the North to aid them, and natural leaders also stepped forward. They elected White and Black men to represent them in constitutional conventions. A Republican coalition of freedmen, Southerners supportive of
3640-415: The administration of Reconstruction under presidential control, rather than that of the increasingly unsympathetic Radical Congress. On March 3, 1862, Lincoln installed a loyalist Democrat, Senator Andrew Johnson, as military governor with the rank of brigadier general in his home state of Tennessee. In May 1862, Lincoln appointed Edward Stanly military governor of the coastal region of North Carolina with
3731-521: The adversary [Radicals in Congress], and set an example the other states will follow." Charles Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens, leaders of the Radical Republicans, were initially hesitant to enfranchise the largely illiterate freedmen. Sumner preferred at first impartial requirements that would have imposed literacy restrictions on Blacks and Whites. He believed that he would not succeed in passing legislation to disenfranchise illiterate Whites who already had
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3822-460: The balance of power, giving the Republicans two-thirds majorities in both houses of Congress, and enough votes to overcome Johnson's vetoes. They moved to impeach Johnson because of his constant attempts to thwart Radical Reconstruction measures, by using the Tenure of Office Act . Johnson was acquitted by one vote, but he lost the influence to shape Reconstruction policy. In 1867, Congress passed
3913-452: The change was happening. The electric trolley system had been created in 1888. Suffering the loss of black business, but refusing to give up its Jim Crow policy, the trolley company went into receivership. In 1892 and 1894, Mitchell was elected to a seat as a Richmond city alderman from Jackson Ward. It was another facet of his widespread connections in the community. In a more ambitious move, in 1921, Mitchell ran for governor , on what
4004-432: The colonies were able to remain self-sufficient. Frederick Douglass , a prominent 19th-century American civil rights activist, criticized Lincoln by stating that he was "showing all his inconsistencies, his pride of race and blood, his contempt for Negroes and his canting hypocrisy". African Americans, according to Douglass, wanted citizenship and civil rights rather than colonies. Historians are unsure if Lincoln gave up on
4095-563: The conditions for readmission, and the desirability of social reforms as a consequence of the Confederate defeat. Lincoln favored the " ten percent plan " and vetoed the radical Wade–Davis Bill , which proposed strict conditions for readmission. Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865, just as fighting was drawing to a close . He was replaced by President Andrew Johnson . Johnson vetoed numerous Radical Republican bills, he pardoned thousands of Confederate leaders, and he allowed Southern states to pass draconian Black Codes that restricted
4186-648: The confiscation of lands for colonization from those who aided and supported the rebellion. However, these laws had limited effect as they were poorly funded by Congress and poorly enforced by Attorney General Edward Bates . In August 1861, Major General John C. Frémont , Union commander of the Western Department, declared martial law in Missouri , confiscated Confederate property, and emancipated their slaves. Lincoln immediately ordered Frémont to rescind his emancipation declaration, stating: "I think there
4277-484: The early failure to prevent violence, corruption, starvation, disease, and other problems. Some consider the Union's policy toward freed slaves as inadequate and its policy toward former slaveholders as too lenient. However, Reconstruction is credited with restoring the federal Union, limiting reprisals against the South, and establishing a legal framework for racial equality via the constitutional rights to national birthright citizenship , due process , equal protection of
4368-487: The election of Warren G. Harding to the presidency marked the end of a national sentiment in favor of using government power to promote equality. In 2024, Manisha Sinha periodized Reconstruction from 1860—when Abraham Lincoln won office as a president opposed to slavery—until 1920, when America ratified the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution affirming the right of women to vote, which Sinha called "the last Reconstruction amendment" because it drew upon
4459-412: The election to Republican Rutherford B. Hayes on the understanding that federal troops would be withdrawn from the South, effectively bringing Reconstruction to an end. Post-Civil War efforts to enforce federal civil rights protections in the South ended in 1890 with the failure of the Lodge Bill . Historians continue to disagree about the legacy of Reconstruction. Criticism of Reconstruction focuses on
4550-488: The end of formal hostilities between the North and South. However, in his landmark 1988 monograph Reconstruction , historian Eric Foner proposed 1863, starting with the Emancipation Proclamation , Port Royal Experiment , and the earnest debate of Reconstruction policies during the Civil War. By 2017, among scholars it was "widely understood" in the words of Luke Harlow, that Reconstruction started in either "1863 with
4641-587: The end of the Reconstruction era . Like Ida B. Wells , he reported lynchings. Mitchell's condemnation of the lynching of Richard Walker in Charlotte County, Virginia resulted in his receiving death threats: Mitchell himself was threatened with hanging at the hands of a Charlotte County mob angered by his reporting of the lynching, there, of Richard Walker in May 1886. Mitchell was sent a rope with
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#17328016891394732-624: The executive board of the Virginia Baptist State Sunday school convention. In 1881, he created a map for his classmates and teacher which attracted the attention of minister to Austria A. M. Riley, who gave him a medal for his efforts. He won yet another medal in an oration contest and he continued drawing maps. His maps eventually secured him an apprenticeship in the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, D.C. at
4823-502: The extinction of slavery in twenty years". On March 26, 1862, Lincoln met with Senator Charles Sumner and recommended that a special joint session of Congress be convened to discuss giving financial aid to any border states who initiated a gradual emancipation plan. In April 1862, the joint session of Congress met; however, the border states were not interested and did not make any response to Lincoln or any congressional emancipation proposal. Lincoln advocated compensated emancipation during
4914-409: The five miles from the station to the site of the hanging. Another early case Mitchell reported was the murder of a black man named Banks by a white officer named Priddy. Mitchell declared the officer guilty of murder and was summoned to the grand jury. He was indicted for making such a charge, but the case was dropped. He sought to have the body exhumed and examined, as he had heard a report that Banks
5005-531: The former Confederate states could be readmitted to the Union. Constitutional conventions held throughout the South gave Black men the right to vote. New state governments were established by a coalition of freedmen, supportive white Southerners , and Northern transplants . They were opposed by " Redeemers ," who sought to restore white supremacy and reestablish the Democratic Party 's control of Southern governments and society. Violent groups, including
5096-450: The former Confederate states? What was the citizenship status of the leaders of the Confederacy? What was the citizenship and suffrage status of freedmen? After the war ended, President Andrew Johnson gave back most of the land to the former White slave owners. By 1866, the faction of Radical Republicans led by Representative Thaddeus Stevens and Senator Charles Sumner was convinced that Johnson's Southern appointees were disloyal to
5187-442: The franchise." The support for voting rights was a compromise between moderate and Radical Republicans. The Republicans believed that the best way for men to get political experience was to be able to vote and to participate in the political system. They passed laws allowing all male freedmen to vote. In 1867, Black men voted for the first time. Over the course of Reconstruction, more than 1,500 African Americans held public office in
5278-510: The ground that a loyal Negro is more worthy than a disloyal White man." As president in 1865, Johnson wrote to the man he appointed as governor of Mississippi, recommending: "If you could extend the elective franchise to all persons of color who can read the Constitution in English and write their names, and to all persons of color who own real estate valued at least two hundred and fifty dollars, and pay taxes thereon, you would completely disarm
5369-501: The idea of African American colonization at the end of 1863 or if he actually planned to continue this policy up until 1865. Starting in March 1862, in an effort to forestall Reconstruction by the Radicals in Congress, Lincoln installed military governors in certain rebellious states under Union military control. Although the states would not be recognized by the Radicals until an undetermined time, installation of military governors kept
5460-512: The laws , and male suffrage regardless of race. The Reconstruction era has typically been dated from the end of the American Civil War in 1865 until the withdrawal of the final remaining federal troops stationed in the Southern United States in 1877, though a few other periodization schemes have also been proposed by historians. In the twentieth century, most scholars of the Reconstruction era began their review in 1865, with
5551-502: The leaders declined the offer of colonization. Many free Blacks had been opposed to colonization plans in the past because they wanted to remain in the United States. Lincoln persisted in his colonization plan in the belief that emancipation and colonization were both part of the same program. By April 1863, Lincoln was successful in sending Black colonists to Haiti as well as 453 to Chiriqui in Central America; however, none of
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#17328016891395642-500: The legal and social inequality of the races in the United States. The end of the war was accompanied by a large migration of newly freed people to the cities, where they were relegated to the lowest paying jobs, such as unskilled and service labor. Men worked as rail workers, rolling and lumber mills workers, and hotel workers. Black women were largely confined to domestic work employed as cooks, maids, and child nurses, or in hotels and laundries. The large population of slave artisans during
5733-670: The legal consequences for Confederate veterans and others who had engaged in "insurrection and rebellion" against the government and the legal rights of those freed from slavery. These debates resulted in the Reconstruction Amendments to the United States Constitution. During the Civil War, the Radical Republican leaders argued that slavery and the Slave Power had to be permanently destroyed. Moderates said this could be easily accomplished as soon as
5824-404: The legal significance of the Civil War, whether secession had actually occurred, and what measures, if any, were necessary to restore the governments of the Confederate States. For example, throughout the conflict, the United States government recognized the legitimacy of a unionist government in Virginia led by Francis Harrison Pierpont out of Wheeling . (This recognition was rendered moot when
5915-558: The legitimate method of their readmission to the Union. The first plan for legal reconstruction was introduced by Lincoln in his Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, the so-called " ten percent plan " under which a loyal unionist state government would be established when ten percent of its 1860 voters pledged an oath of allegiance to the Union, with a complete pardon for those who pledged such an oath. By 1864, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Arkansas had established fully functioning Unionist governments under this plan. However, Congress passed
6006-479: The order, rescinded Hunter's declaration and canceled the emancipation. On April 16, 1862, Lincoln signed a bill into law outlawing slavery in Washington, D.C., and freeing the estimated 3,500 slaves in the city. On June 19, 1862, he signed legislation outlawing slavery in all U.S. territories. On July 17, 1862, under the authority of the Confiscation Acts and an amended Force Bill of 1795, he authorized
6097-529: The people a leader and commander to the people." Reconstruction era The Reconstruction era was a period in United States history and Southern United States history that followed the American Civil War and was dominated by the legal, social, and political challenges of the abolition of slavery and the reintegration of the eleven former Confederate States of America into the United States. During this period, three amendments were added to
6188-402: The population of Blacks. After the 1870 Census, the South would gain numerous additional representatives in Congress, based on the full population of freedmen. One Illinois Republican expressed a common fear that if the South were allowed to simply restore its previous established powers, that the "reward of treason will be an increased representation". The election of 1866 decisively changed
6279-524: The prewar period did not translate into a large number of free artisans during Reconstruction. The dislocations had a severe negative impact on the Black population, with a large amount of sickness and death. During the war, Lincoln experimented with land reform by giving land to African-Americans in South Carolina . Having lost their enormous investment in slaves, plantation owners had minimal capital to pay freedmen workers to bring in crops. As
6370-410: The primary authority to decide how Reconstruction should proceed, because the Constitution stated the United States had to guarantee each state a republican form of government . The Radicals insisted that meant Congress decided how Reconstruction should be achieved. The issues were multiple: Who should decide, Congress or the president? How should republicanism operate in the South? What was the status of
6461-536: The rate of damage in smaller towns was much lower. Farms were in disrepair, and the prewar stock of horses, mules, and cattle was much depleted. Forty percent of Southern livestock had been killed. The South's farms were not highly mechanized, but the value of farm implements and machinery according to the 1860 Census was $ 81 million and was reduced by 40% by 1870. The transportation infrastructure lay in ruins, with little railroad or riverboat service available to move crops and animals to market. Railroad mileage
6552-479: The recommendation of John Wesley Cromwell . He started his apprenticeship with encouragement and support from a number of prominent figures, including Blanche Bruce , John A. Logan , and Frederick Douglass . In 1883 and 1884, he served as Richmond correspondent of the New York Freeman . On December 5, 1884, at the age of 21, Mitchell joined the Richmond Planet , a newly founded black newspaper and
6643-405: The recruitment of freed slaves into the U.S. Army and seizure of any Confederate property for military purposes. In an effort to keep border states in the Union, Lincoln, as early as 1861, designed gradual compensated emancipation programs paid for by government bonds. Lincoln desired Delaware , Maryland , Kentucky , and Missouri to "adopt a system of gradual emancipation which should work
6734-705: The return of his body after his execution and partial dissection by students at the Medical College of Virginia. The body had been legally seized by the College's janitor, Chris Baker. Mitchell investigated the case for the Richmond Planet and included grisly sketches by Mitchell of the events on its pages. Mitchell was gregarious and active; he became a leader of the Knights of Pythias of North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia ,
6825-541: The right to vote and that anyone who willingly gave weapons to the fight against the United States should be denied the right to vote. The bill required voters, fifty-one percent of White males, to take the Ironclad Oath swearing that they had never supported the Confederacy or been one of its soldiers. This oath also entailed having them to swear a loyalty to the Constitution and the Union before they could have state constitutional meetings. Lincoln blocked it. Pursuing
6916-412: The right to vote for five years. The compromise that was reached disenfranchised many Confederate civil and military leaders. No one knows how many temporarily lost the vote, but one estimate placed the number as high as 10,000 to 15,000. However, Radical politicians took up the task at the state level. In Tennessee alone, over 80,000 former Confederates were disenfranchised. Second, and closely related,
7007-400: The rights of freedmen. His actions outraged many Northerners and stoked fears that the Southern elite would regain its political power. Radical Republican candidates swept to power in the 1866 midterm elections, gaining large majorities in both houses of Congress . In 1867 and 1868, the Radical Republicans passed the Reconstruction Acts over Johnson's vetoes, setting out the terms by which
7098-548: The steady stream of slaves who were escaping to Union lines. In many cases, the United States Army played a vital role in establishing a free labor economy in the South, protecting freedmen's legal rights, and creating educational and religious institutions. Despite its reluctance to interfere with the institution of slavery, Congress passed the Confiscation Acts to seize Confederates' slaves, providing
7189-534: The subject limited the ability of their own small populations of Blacks to vote. Lincoln had supported a middle position: to allow some Black men to vote, especially U.S. Army veterans. Johnson also believed that such service should be rewarded with citizenship. Lincoln proposed giving the vote to "the very intelligent, and especially those who have fought gallantly in our ranks". In 1864, Governor Johnson said: "The better class of them will go to work and sustain themselves, and that class ought to be allowed to vote, on
7280-541: The vote. In the South, many poor Whites were illiterate as there was almost no public education before the war. In 1880, for example, the White illiteracy rate was about 25% in Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, South Carolina, and Georgia, and as high as 33% in North Carolina. This compares with the 9% national rate, and a Black rate of illiteracy that was over 70% in the South. By 1900, however, with emphasis within
7371-405: The war zone ensured the system would be ruined at war's end. Restoring the infrastructure—especially the railroad system—became a high priority for Reconstruction state governments. Over a quarter of Southern White men of military age—the backbone of the White workforce—died during the war, leaving their families destitute, and per capita income for White Southerners declined from $ 125 in 1857 to
7462-405: The war, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which declared that "all persons held as slaves" within the Confederate territory "are, and henceforward shall be free." The Civil War had immense social implications for the United States. Emancipation had altered the legal status of 3.5 million persons, threatened the end of the plantation economy of the South, and provoked questions regarding
7553-495: Was an American businessman, newspaper editor, African American civil rights activist, and politician in Richmond, Virginia, particularly in Richmond's Jackson Ward , which became known as the "Black Wall Street of America." As editor of the Richmond Planet , he frequently published articles in favor of racial equality. In 1904, he organized a black boycott of the city's segregated trolley system. He founded and served as president of Mechanics Savings Bank . An impressive building
7644-484: Was beaten to death. When he went to the mortuary where the body was at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, he was locked in the mortuary and had to escape and hurry back to Richmond to make an appointment in the courts the next morning. The officer was not convicted or punished. In 1896, together with local clergy including James H. Holmes , Mitchell appealed on the behalf of the widow of Solomon Marable for
7735-461: Was called a "Lily Black" ( Black-and-tan faction ) Republican Party ticket (an all African American party offshoot). His campaign was considered controversial and opposed by some Black newspapers, such as the Journal and Guide of Norfolk ; editors believed his run would split the Black vote and cost them influence with the Democratic Party candidate who won the office. Mitchell finished third behind
7826-561: Was constructed for the Bank on Clay Street and newspaper ads featured Mitchell Jr. He also served as a city alderman for two terms, and was active in fraternal and professional organizations. He ran unsuccessfully as a Republican Party candidate for governor in 1921. Mitchell was born a slave in Richmond, Virginia in 1863, shortly before the end of the American Civil War and of slavery. His mother taught him to read and later he worked as
7917-439: Was in collapse by the war's end. Where scarce Union dollars could not be obtained, residents resorted to a barter system. The Confederate States in 1861 had 297 towns and cities, with a total population of 835,000 people; of these, 162, with 681,000 people, were at some point occupied by Union forces. Eleven cities were destroyed or severely damaged by military action, including Atlanta, Charleston, Columbia, and Richmond, though
8008-468: Was located mostly in rural areas; over two-thirds of the South's rails, bridges, rail yards, repair shops, and rolling stock were in areas reached by Union armies, which systematically destroyed what they could. Even in untouched areas, the lack of maintenance and repair, the absence of new equipment, the heavy over-use, and the deliberate relocation of equipment by the Confederates from remote areas to
8099-488: Was made an editor. "It was under his tenure that the Planet gained its well-deserved reputation as a proponent of racial equality and of rights for the African-American community." He was also a teacher in the local schools. Mitchell reported fearlessly and campaigned against racist lynching , which increased in the late nineteenth century as whites worked to re-establish white supremacy and Jim Crow after
8190-560: Was the chief depository of the Knights of Pythias . At the time of its failure in 1922, the bank had deposits totaling approximately $ 500,000. In 1930, the Clay Street Building was purchased by the Southern Aid and Insurance Company . This United States bank–related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . John Mitchell, Jr. John Mitchell Jr. (July 11, 1863 – December 3, 1929)
8281-426: Was the issue of whether the 4 million freedmen were to be received as citizens: Would they be able to vote? If they were to be fully counted as citizens, some sort of representation for apportionment of seats in Congress had to be determined. Before the war, the population of slaves had been counted as three-fifths of a corresponding number of free Whites. By having 4 million freedmen counted as full citizens,
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