RECONSTRUCTION!!!

[unionblue]

Ron, on this one I am closer to your position than on any other post we have clashed on.

BUT, when you mention 'disorganized communities' and get a little (lot?) upset over the winning side (the Radical Republicans) not recognizing the idea that the Southern States could try and keep things as they had been before the war, aren't you being a bit unrealistic?

If the Republicans were being vengeful, the Southerners were being stubborn, stubborn in the belief that anyone was going to sit still for the idea that a defeated enemy was going to dictate terms on how it would set itself up after a devistating war. The South was still trying to hang onto slavery, State's rights over the Union, only now instead of fighting for these things on the battlefield, it was trying to win them in their own state legislatures.

Now before you go completely off, let me say here and now, I can understand (especially after knowing you a few years) that the South could NOT stop fighting for what it thought was right. It simply was not in 'those people'. I also tend to think they had a right to be scared at what was coming. Reconstruction under Congress was MUCH harsher than necessary and set back true reunification of the country until the present day.

This is one of the reasons I wish Lincoln had stuck around. We might have avoided some of the harshness and more quickly reunited as a country.

YMOS,
Unionblue

You could spend years in study of reconstruction and never get the whole of it. The effects are still felt. I believe both Alabama and Arkansas had unratified constitutions forced upon them. etc..The Carolinas with 200+ justices appointed that could not read nor write...etc etc years and years and years...of plunder..of total oppression.

Whether he gets upset or not, I know that Ron has legitimate for cause to be, The Magnolia State suffered terribly. I honestly do not know if the effects of reconstruction will ever be healed there. I understand winners and losers. Yet I see Ron's point of veiw..the north's policy was two faced lie. It said one thing and did another. The south was plundered systematically. I think the south were the only one's trying to restore the union after the war. They did the hardest thing in the world for them....they submitted.

I think in the end, the north showed the true colors of their cause.

If Lincoln had lived would it made a difference? We will never know. Just my opinion but I think, like Britain's Churchill, he'd been out on his ear soon as it was politically expediant to do so.

(Message edited by mental_nomad on July 09, 2002)

Neil, it scares me when you start to agree with me. I fear you are losing your edge!

You stated: "BUT, when you mention 'disorganized communities' and get a little (lot?) upset over the winning side (the Radical Republicans) not recognizing the idea that the Southern States could try and keep things as they had been before the war, aren't you being a bit unrealistic?"

To this I reply <font size="+2">NO! I am not being unrealistic!</font>

The state governments were not disorganized communities UNTIL the radical republicans filled the ranks of duly elected officials who had been turned out of office frequently at gunpoint, with carpetbaggers, uneducated freemen, and scalawags. This form of government was left to fester and mold for nearly 10 years. In 1878, the state was ordered to write a "new" Constitution. The convention that performed that task was called the "Black-and-Tan" Constitutional Convention of 1878. In that convention, with nearly 85% of the delegates African-American, the issue of the 13th and 14th amendment to the US Consitution came up for a vote. It was soundly DEFEATED by the convention representatives. WHY? Who the hell knows.

The South did not want to try to keep slavery. That issue had been decided by the sword. It is my belief, based on some research, that the Federal government made sure that whatever was done in the states was to the detrement of the Southern man and the Southern State until such time as the North felt the south had been punished enough. at that time, the governments were restored by Federal decree, the states were allowed to "return" to the bosum of the United States.

You are right, however, in the harshness of the reconstruction effort. That is more the reason the difficulties exist(ed) between north and south today than the war. The wounds caused by the war healed quickly. The fact that the Federal government placed the rule of the defeated states under the former slave and men from the north who came down to the south to steal, rape, plunder and pillage (that has not totally stopped yet) hurt more than losing the war.

Again, I state, if the south never left the union as stated repeatedly by Lincoln for four long grueling, terrible years of war, why the hell did we (the 11 southern states) have to be readmitted to the Union? Janus himself could not have made up a better set of complications for the south!
MN - thanks for your support. And I tend to agree, regardless of how strong many see Lincoln as, he stated it, ""I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me." I believe the Congress that wanted to spank the south would have put Mr. Lincoln on the impeachment stand had he tried to stand in their way. It seems that then, just as today, the dollar spoke more powerfully than patriotism or love of union.

regards to all, I am
old reb

[unionblue]

Ron, in that point, where the North, mainly the Radical Congress wanted to 'spank' or punish the South partly out of vengeance and mostly for gain (political and monetary) I agree with you completely. It was not right, it did not benefit anyone, North or South, except the scum who plundered and robbed a helpless people.

I also feel every soldier who fought and died for the North was betrayed. Reconstruction was not what they had fought for. Mental Nomad, the North didn't show it's true colors when the South was treated so harshly. The average man just wanted to go home and pick up his life again. He thought he had done his duty by keeping the Union together. All Reconstruction did was keep it apart much longer.

Ron, I do not have my source book with me, but when I do, I would like to quote from it a few passages on how some in the South thought some things would never change and may have contributed to the problem.

Until that time,
Unionblue

Neil, that is a quote I will save you from finding. I agree, that many felt nothing would ever change. And from my viewpoint, with some of the requirements still being imposed on the States of Mississippi, Louisiana, and Alabama by the loving Federal government, we may just be right.

Slavery was the curse of the Southern man (and woman). As Longstreet is misquoted in Gettysburg as saying, "The south should have freed its slaves first then declared war." I think they should have too. And sent them all packing if they did not want to remain and work for the SAME WAGES as were being paid to the workers in Massachusetts and Connecticut. $0.03/day for children from 4-12 years of age, $0.05/day for women and children older than 12, and $0.07/day for men. Of course, to paraphrase Lincoln in his first inaugural address, "Who is going to pay for the loss of the property?" Perhaps the slave should have also had to pay massa for his cabin, his garden, his clothes, his food, etc.

Oh, what a tangled web we weave... deception can come in many forms, and arguing one side of a coin without knowing the other side is one of those deceptions.

Yes, the northern soldier was betrayed but that betrayal started with Lincoln and Seward who convinced the men of the Federal army they were fighting to protect the union when from the get-go Lincoln was fighting to abolish slavery.

Got some more arrows?

oldreb

[unionblue]

Yep, Lincoln was not trying to abolish slavery from the git-go. Limit it's spread, yes, go after it in the South where it was established, NO! And the Northern men who fought during the war were mainly fighting for law and order and the preservation of their nation. They were betrayed by scum-sucking politicians who did not have the guts to live up to the principles those men had died for.

See you soon,
Unionblue

[mobile_96]

Ron, what book is the source for your wage comments.
Do they give any figures for something like bricklayers.
Also, any figures on cost of housing, especially boarding house prices for weekly, as this is how many people obtained shelter. Of course, price will most likely include at least 1 meal/day.

[blackirish]

Reconstruction in the South was a failure. I think we can all agree on that. However, the idea that the whole of this failure can be laid at the feet of the Republican Party is a considerable reach. It is true that there were many from the North that attempted to come south and make a quick fortune and thereby take advantage of the policies of the radicals in Congress. However, to assert this was the case in the majority of the cases is another stretch and requires ignoring some basic facts.
1866 and 1867 were two of the worst years for growing cotton in the thirty years previous. The south was hit by a period of unstable weather where weeks of dry spells would be followed by heavy rains, rains that were heavy enough to cause uncontrolled flooding in many areas where the levy systems had fallen into disrepair during the war. The crops all over the south were stunted and minimal. On top of this natural disaster, the price of cotton fell due to a market going soft. Cotton fell from $1.25 a pound to $.20 a pound. These conditions would have spelled economic disaster in the pre-war economy of the south, coming during the fragile and unsure system that existed after the war; they spelled something much worse.
The labor system in the south after the war was simply in chaos. Freeing the slaves upon which this system depended had two effects. First, slaveowners lost their biggest investment. Most slaveowners had much more capital invested in slaves than they did in land, tools, outbuildings, etc. This investment was wiped out completely when the slaves were freed removing their most ready source for capital. Second, it required the implementation of some sort of system of labor between the owners and the slaves; who were operating in a totally new area that neither was familiar with. There were two basic approaches to this problem; wage labor and sharecropping.
Wage labor consisted in the owner paying the freedmen directly for their labor. There were several different methods for doing so. Sometimes the freedmen was payed weekly or monthly but more often a contract was arranged whereby the owner payed for his labor after the crop was harvested.
Sharecropping also had several different forms but generally consisted in the owners sharing the profits with the freedmen after the crop was harvested.
The freedmen favored the wage labor system and the owners favored the sharecropping system. Under the wage labor system the owner was compelled to pay for labor whether he made a profit or not, and as you can see from the above this was very seldom the case in 1866-67. This left the owner losing money on his crop and paying out still more money to his laborers. In cases where he was required to pay for his labor during the growing season it caused him to search for capital in an economy where none existed to start with.
Under the sharecropping system the laborer became partners to a certain extent with the owner. It was in his best interests to see that the crop was as bountiful as possible. It also put the laborer in a position where he was susceptible to the vagaries of the market. In cases where the owner made no profit the laborer didn't either. As he had been required to go into debt with the owner or a local store for his substinence during the year this put him in a condition where he was steadily getting further and further in the hole.
When crops failed all over the south in 1866-67 the whole fragile labor system collapsed. Freedmen who had worked all year under labor contracts or sharecropping contracts were not paid. Owners lost money and scrambled to keep their land from foreclosure with poor results.
Labor and Ownership came to see the new labor system as an abject failure, and as is often the case when the economy goes into the toilet, Government took the blame.
Labor and Ownership struggled to overcome these failures but the remembrance of these two years forever shaded the minds of both. Owners began to simply refuse any sort of agreement whereby labor was paid separate from profits. Freedmen all over the south distrusted the owners intentions and often refused to sign any sort of agreement where their pay was open-ended or tied to profits. Many who had managed to gain a small start through careful management were wiped out economically and never recovered.

blackirish

Rick,
An excellent post with thought provoking Ideas..
Normally this is where someone would put a "but" and then start trying to disassemble your statements..I won't do that...other than to say good post, I liked the ideas..I still see republican abuse yet it doesn't invalidate those few years you mention...which were crucial.

Charles, my source was the internet. When I am at work, which unfortunatley I am not allowed to do internet play anymore as they are working me in a way that would made MR. Lincoln mad, I have none of my 327 books on hand. SO, I use the internet.
I will see if I can find the going rate for a bricklayer, and for boarding house prices.

oldreb