Reconstruction
Government in the South
Under the
terms of the Reconstruction Act of 1867, Republican governments came to
power throughout the South, offering blacks, for the first time in American
history, a genuine share of political power. These governments established
the region's first public school systems, enacted civil rights laws, and
sought to promote the region's economic development.
The coming
of black suffrage under the Reconstruction Act of 1867 produced a wave
of political mobilization among African Americans in the South.
In Union
Leagues and impromptu gatherings, blacks organized to demand equality
before the law and economic opportunity.
Blacks were
joined by white newcomers from the North - called "carpetbaggers"
by their political opponents. And the Republican party in some states
attracted a considerable number of white Southerners, to whom Democrats
applied the name "scalawag" - mostly Unionist small farmers
but including some prominent plantation owners.
By 1870,
the former Confederate states had been readmitted to the Union under new
constitutions that marked a striking departure in Southern government.
For the first time in the region's history, state-funded public school
systems were established, as well as orphan asylums and other facilities.
The new governments
passed the region's first civil rights laws, reformed the South's antiquated
tax system, and embarked on ambitious and expensive programs of economic
development, hoping that railroad and factory development would produce
a prosperity shared by both races.
Composed
of slave ministers, artisans, and Civil War veterans, and blacks who had
been free before the Civil War, a black political leadership emerged that
pressed aggressively for an end to the South's racial caste system.
African Americans
served in virtually every governmental capacity during Reconstruction,
from member of Congress to state and local officials. Their presence in
positions of political power symbolized the political revolution wrought
by Reconstruction.
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