What effects did the civil war have on women and African?
You have a question that requires a book size answer something
we do not have so let me do it this way.
Lincoln was reluctant to issue an Emancipation Proclamation but
you would have thought from what one is taught in class these days
this was his primary concern. He issued the proclamation to save
the Union making impossible for foreign Governments to intervene on
behalf of the Confederacy. Even though the English supported
(indirectly) slavery, they like other countries were officially
against the practice. By his actions, Lincoln was showing the US
was against slavery but not the Confederacy. If like the leaders of
these countries at the time, you took the time to read and study
the act you would see it does nothing and in fact, Lincoln thought
that the Afro American was not the equal of whites and his plan was
to resettle the slaves in either the Amazon or Western Texas.
Most people are not aware that there was a series of action and
even proclamations for instance Lincolns correspondence of October
14, 1862 to the military and civilian authorities of occupied
Louisiana.
"Major General Butler, Governor Shepley, & and [sic] all
having military and naval authority under the United States within
the S[t]ate of Louisiana. The bearer of this, Hon. John E.
Bouligny, a citizen of Louisiana, goes to the State seeking to have
such of the people thereof as desire to avoid the unsatisfactory
prospect before them, and to have peace again upon the old terms
under the constitution of the United States, to manifest such
desire by elections of members to the Congress of the United States
particularly, and perhaps a legislature, State officers, and United
States Senators friendly to their object. I shall be glad for you
and each of you, to aid him and all others acting for this object,
as much as possible. In all available ways, give the people a
chance to express their wishes at these elections. Follow forms of
law as far as convenient, but at all events get the expression of
the largest number of the people possible. All see how such action
will connect with, and affect the proclamation of September 22nd.
Of course, the men elected should be gentlemen of character willing
to swear support to the Constitution, as of old, and known to be
above reasonable suspicion of duplicity. (CW 5:462-3, italics
added).
NOTE: The italic show that Lincoln rather then issue an
Emancipation Proclamation or free the slaves was still willing to
allow the Southern States back into the Union. One will find this
all the way up to the 1865 visit to Camp Lookout.
At the same time Lincoln was issuing the Emancipation
Proclamation he was petitioning his cabinet to negotiate and
appropriate funds to force the Blacks else where.
In 1864, Jeff Davis and other Southerner leaders would
contemplate outlawing slavery and probably would have if the
opportunity had arisen.
In the 1770s, the South had every reason to continue the
relationship with England, one of its best customers. It was the
manufacturing North that was getting the short end of that stick.
Southerners joined the Revolutionary War out of patriotism,
idealism, and enlightened political philosophy such as motivated
Jefferson, not patriotism, philosophy and economic betterment which
inspired the North.
In 1860, the shoe was on the other foot. Southern agrarians were
at heel to the nation's bankers and industrialists. That just got
worse with the election of the Republican Lincoln, bringing back
into power the party favoring the wealthy supply side, as it still
does.
Then as now central to that, party's interest was keeping down
the cost of manufacture. Today labor is the big cost, so today they
move the plants offshore and leave US workers to their fate. Back
before the US labor movement existed the big cost was raw
materials, and the GOP was just as unprincipled toward its Southern
suppliers as it is today toward labor.
Thanks to modern graveyard science and surviving records,
researchers know that in 1760, 100 years before the War Between the
States, Charleston, South Carolina, had the largest population of
slaves and we say proudly the second largest slave population was
in New York City.
One of the main quarrels was about taxes paid on goods brought
into this country from foreign countries. This tax was called a
tariff. Southerners felt these tariffs were unfair and aimed toward
them because they imported a wider variety of goods than most
Northern people. Taxes were also placed on many Southern goods that
were shipped to foreign countries, an expense that was not always
applied to Northern goods of equal value. An awkward economic
structure allowed states and private transportation companies to do
this, which also affected Southern banks that found themselves
paying higher interest rates on loans made with banks in the North.
As industry in the North expanded, it looked towards southern
markets, rich with cash from the lucrative agricultural business,
to buy the North's manufactured goods. The situation grew worse
after several "panics", including one in 1857 that affected more
Northern banks than Southern. Southern financiers found themselves
burdened with high payments just to save Northern banks that had
suffered financial losses through poor investment. However, it was
often cheaper for the South to purchase the goods abroad. In order
to "protect" the northern industries Jackson slapped a tariff on
many of the imported goods that could be manufactured in the North.
When South Carolina passed the Ordinance of Nullification in
November 1832, refusing to collect the tariff and threatening to
withdraw from the Union, Jackson ordered federal troops to
Charleston. A secession crisis was averted when Congress revised
the Tariff of Abominations in February 1833. The Panic of 1837 and
the ensuing depression began to gnaw like a hungry animal on the
flesh of the American system. The disparity between northern and
southern economies was exacerbated. Before and after the depression
the economy of the South prospered. Southern cotton sold abroad
totaled 57% of all American exports before the war. The Panic of
1857 devastated the North and left the South virtually untouched.
The clash of a wealthy, agricultural South and a poorer, industrial
North was intensified by abolitionists who were not above using
class struggle to further their cause.
In the years before the Civil War the political power in the
Federal government, centered in Washington, D.C., was changing.
Northern and mid-western states were becoming more and more
powerful as the populations increased. Southern states lost
political power because the population did not increase as rapidly.
As one portion of the nation grew larger than another, people began
to talk of the nation as sections. This was called sectionalism.
Just as the original thirteen colonies fought for their
independence almost 100 years earlier, the Southern states felt a
growing need for freedom from the central Federal authority in
Washington. Southerners believed that state laws carried more
weight than Federal laws, and they should abide by the state
regulations first. This issue was called State's Rights and became
a very warm topic in congress.
That should answer your question as to the Emancipation
Proclamation; now the hard parts. Blacks as much of the country
have been led to believe the war was over slavery and thus with
"FREEDOM" they were free. Recent studies have show the
manufacturing North might have led Lincoln to war to free up the
slaves so they could replace a workforce that was chambering for
more pay and rights. Consider the famous story forty acres and a
mule. On March 3, 1865, just weeks before the end of the Civil War
and almost a year prior to the ratification of the 13th Amendment
the Freedmen's Bureau was created by Congress. Originally the
Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, the Freedmen's
Bureau was responsible for, among other things, "the supervision
and management of all abandoned lands . . . ..the control of all
subjects relating to refugees and freedmen from rebel States."
Also according to Section 4 of the First Freedmen's Bureau Act,
this agency "shall have authority to set apart for use of loyal
refugees and freedmen such tracts of land within the
insurrectionary states as shall have been abandoned or to which the
United States shall have acquired title by confiscation or sale, or
otherwise; and to every male citizen, whether refugee or freedman,
as aforesaid there shall be assigned not more than 40 acres of such
land."
Introduced into Congress by Thaddeus Stevens this portion of the
Freedmen's Bureau Act was defeated by Congress on February 5, 1866
"by a vote of 126 to 36." Lands which had been distributed to
freedmen were reclaimed and returned to the previous owners.
It should be noted that there is no mention of providing the
freedmen with a mule (or any other type of animal) in any portion
of this legislature. So the question remains in part unanswered.
What is the origin of the promised 40 acres and a mule?
The second possibility for the basis of the 'promise' has to do
with the efforts of the War Department to furnish accoutrements for
the thousands of freedmen who assisted General Sherman in his
triumphant march across Georgia. According to Claude F. Oubre in
his book Forty Acres and a Mule, General Tecumseh Sherman, acting
under an edict from the War Department, issued Special Field Order
No. 15. Promulgated on January 16, 1865, after Sherman had
conferred with 20 black ministers and obtained the approval of the
War Department, Special Order No. 15 provided that:
"The islands of Charleston south, the abandoned rice fields
along the rivers for thirty miles back from the sea, and the
country bordering St. Johns River, Florida, are reserved and set
apart for the settlement of [N]egroes now made free by the acts of
war and the proclamation of the President of the United
States."
The land was then divided into 40-acre tracts. Sherman then
issued orders to General Saxton to distribute the plots and
processory titles to the head of each family of the freedmen. There
were no mules included in the order, so where did the "and a mule"
come from? Shortly after Stanton left, Sherman's commissary man
came to him complaining that he had a large number of broken down
mules for which he had no means of disposal. Sherman sent the
useless animals to Saxton for distribution along with the land.
"By June, 1865 approximately 40,000 freedmen had been allocated
400,000 acres of land." However, by September, 1865 former owners
of the land reserved by Sherman "demanded the same rights afforded
returning rebels in other states."
After Lincoln's assassination, Andrew Johnson became President.
One of his first acts was to rescind Special Military Order No. 15
because of the constitutional violations that it created. Former
slave owners were then exempted from the initial general amnesty
given to them, and instead secured special pardons from President
Johnson, who broke the promise made to the freedmen when he ordered
the processory titles rescinded and the land returned to the white
plantation owners. Johnson gave little or no regard to the fate of
the former slaves
From the viewpoint of the former slaves, who believed that they
were owed this property, their eviction from land was seen as
another example of ill treatment. The illegality of the promise was
not their concern, but from that late war incident grew an urban
legend that survives into the present day.
Dismayed, like many, Saxton wrote Oliver O. Howard (Commissioner
of the Freedmen's Bureau) stating:
"The lands which have been taken possession of by this bureau
have been solemnly pledged to the freedmen. The law of Congress has
been published to them, and all agents of the bureau acting under
your order have provided lands to these freedmen . . . . I
sincerely trust that the government will never break its faith with
a single one of these colonists by driving him from the home which
he was provided. It is of vital importance that our promises made
to freedmen should be faithfully kept . . . . The freedmen were
promised the protection of the government in their possession. This
order was issued under great military necessity with the approval
of the War Department . . . . More than 40,000 freedmen have been
provided with homes under its promises. I cannot break faith with
them now by recommending the restoration of any of these lands. In
my opinion this order of General Sherman is as binding as a
statute."
Saxton's pleas were to no avail. The freedmen were ultimately
summarily removed from the land. There were however, numerous
individuals and organizations which believed the freedmen were
entitled to land. Their conviction in this belief was not easily
thwarted. Between 1865-9 countless alternatives for solving this
matter were proposed and presented to Congress as well as President
Johnson. The motivations for these proposals were as varied as the
propositions themselves. They ranged from a sincere belief that the
freedmen were entitled to land, to fear of violence, resistance to
social, economic and political equality, concern about miscegeny,
attempts to purge the country of the burden of freedmen on the
doles, economic gain and to eliminate any competition they might
present for employment.
For instance, quartermaster M.C. Megis devised a plan which
would enable the freedmen to secure land in the South. Simply put
he suggested that:
1) As a condition of receiving pardons, southerners, whose net
worth exceeded $20,000 and were not recipients of an automatic
pardon as a result of Johnson's amnesty proclamation, give to each
head of family of their former slaves from 5 to 10 acres of
land.
2) The freedmen would receive full title to the land with the
stipulation that the land could not be alienated during the life
time of the grantee."
President Johnson chose not to adopt this recommendation.
However, according to Oubre, Megis' proposal may have been the
inspiration for Thaddeus Stevens' confiscation plan (one of the
many he proposed for black reparations). Just and well thought out
I feel had it been approved Stevens' proposal may have provided a
more equal distribution of wealth. The primary points of Stevens'
'confiscation plan' according to Oubre are as follows:
1) The government would confiscate the property of all former
slaveholders who owned more than 200 acres of land.
2) The property seized would have been allocated to the freedmen
in lots of 40 acres.
3) The remaining land would be sold and the monies would be used
to remunerate loyalists whose property had been seized destroyed or
damaged as a result of the war.
4) Any remaining funds would be utilized to augment the pensions
of Union soldiers and to pay the national debt.
Yet another proposal suggested that the government transport the
freedmen west and colonize them along the route of the Union
Pacific Railroad. It was argued that to do so would prove
beneficial for the railroad as well as the freedmen. The freedmen
would have their land. The railroad would have both an accessible
labor force and someone to protect the trains from Indian attack
Additionally, adopting this particular proposal would also bode
well for the government. permitting it to keep its promise to
provide land for the freedmen. Simultaneously, according to Carl
Schurz sand John Sprage, "this plan would serve to remove some of
the "surplus" black [people] from the South."
The American Missionary Association requested, to no avail, that
President Johnson reserve the land promised to the freedmen. If
that was not a suitable option they further petitioned that the
freedmen be provided with transportation to homestead lands in the
west and provided with rations enough to sustain them until crops
could be yielded.
Concerned with the burgeoning African American population in
Virginia, Orlando Brown proposed, that some 10,000 African American
soldiers stationed in Texas, might be provided with a land bounty
in Texas if they remained there and sent for their families. A
similar proposal was made by "Sergeant S.H. Smothers, an African
American soldier from Indiana serving with the 25th Army Corps in
Texas."
But President Johnson seemed to be determined to make sure that
freedmen received no land. He mercilessly vetoed any proposal
having to do with providing land to the freedmen that reached his
desk. Finally, Congress overrode his veto and passed a bill to
extend the life of the Freedmen's Bureau. However, it contained no
provision for granting land to the freedmen, other than to provide
them access to the Southern Homestead Act at the standard rates of
purchase. May-be I can best sum it up by a quote from Grant: "The
sole object of this was is to restore the Union. Should I be
convinced it had any other object, or that the Government designs
using its soldiers to execute the wishes of the abolitionists, I
pledge to you my honor as a man and as a soldier I would resign my
commiission and carry my sword to the other side".
That and this statement about the Klan shows you the plight of
the Afro Americans (still I guess it was better then Lincolns plan
to ship them to the Amazons) There were three Klans the first
fought reconstruction and yankee brutality. The Second Communist,
Jews, Gays and scattered foreigners. The third well you know about
them.
Now the women. Women suffrage was the same for both North and
South women could not vote, hold most office and many occupations
were denied them. The women in the South suffered much more and it
continues today. The Bible belt was and is more traditional in it's
believe as to the role of women and men. The Southern woman is
credited with keeping the war going on as long as it had and it is
felt in many circles ending it. When they could no longer manage
the farms, factories and the shortages and lack of food they called
their men home. One big issue in many cases there were no men to
come home. So in the beginning Southern women either continued
normal men occupations or began them
This handles the question on women. Anything else?
God Bless You and Our Southern People.
