Secret Political Societies in the South During the Period of Reconstruction e-bog

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. By the close of hostilities the duty of the North toward the South was clear, namely, to provide the latter with a political organization fitted to its economic needs; one that would protect property, protect life, and bring order out of chaos. Who could better do this than the intelligent whites of the South? They alone knew the problem. But could they be trusted to reorganize governments that would in sure the freedom of the negroes, and that would be loyal members of the Union? Clearly so. Every bit of non partisan evidence shows that the southerners accepted the freedom of the slaves as a natural concomitant of defeat, and, like good soldiers that they were, waited with properhumiliation the conditions of the conqueror. Mr. Lincoln saw this clearly. With characteristic wisdom and mercy he was willing to recognize new state governments in the South, as fully restored members of the Union, as soon as state organizations had been completed by southern men who would take an oath of loyalty to the new Union. Of course the freedom of the negroes must be forever se cured, but, on the other hand, suffrage was to be the same as before the war. Mr. Lincoln did not favor unlimited negro suffrage. He could not be brought to believe in forcing negro suffrage on the South, since in some states the negroes far outnumbered the whites, and the mass of these former slaves ignorant and barbarous, many less than fifty years removed from the savagery of Africa. Mr. Lincoln's successor was of the same mind, and at tempted to carry out the former's reconstruction policy. By the spring of 1866 reorganized loyal state governments had been formed in each of the southern states in con formity with the Lincoln plan, and southern Senators and Representatives were knocking upon the door of Congress for recognition and admission. Would Congress adopt the liberal policy of Mr. Lincoln? At first perhaps a majority of the Republicans wished to do so, but day by day the radical element grew stron