Radical Republicans

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The Radical Republicans ( English Radical Republicans ) were a faction within the Republican Party of the USA , which existed from 1854 to 1877. This informal association of republican senators and members of parliament determined policy during the final phase of the Civil War and the period of reconstruction that followed . The main concerns of the Radical Republicans were the abolition of slavery , extensive civil rights for the liberated Afro-Americans, and severe punishment of the leaders and supporters of the Confederate States . The Radical Republicans opposed the policies of the conservative Democrats in particular and were in part critical of the moderate Republicans (such as US President Abraham Lincoln ). The climax of these political conflicts was the years of Andrew Johnson's presidency , when there were strong political rifts - including a narrowly unsuccessful impeachment process - between the Radical Republicans in Congress and the President.

Prehistory and Civil War

The Republican Party was founded in 1854 with the aim of eradicating slavery throughout the United States. A number of northern states had already done so, but in the southern states slavery was widespread and an integral part of cultural and political identity and the economic system (especially in the cultivation of cotton ). The democrats who dominated the southern states therefore pleaded for slavery to be retained. The Whig Party , a forerunner of the Republican Party, broke up in the first half of the 1850s in the dispute over slavery after political conflicts broke out again in the wake of the expansion of US territory (as a result of the Mexican-American War ). The political positioning within the Republican Party, however, has not been completely uniform since the party was founded: many abolitionists described themselves as Radical Republicans; their goal was the complete abolition of slavery within the USA and far-reaching rights for the slaves to be liberated. Opposite the radical wing were the moderate Republicans, who initially advocated strict territorial limits on slavery. In the long term, they also pursued the goal of abolition. However, many moderates were of the opinion that the integration of colored slaves into American society was not feasible. They therefore favored a gradual resettlement of blacks to Africa . With this moderate course one tried to appease the southern states; because in the event of a ban on slavery, politicians in the south repeatedly threatened to split off from the USA ( secession ). Former Congressman Abraham Lincoln also belonged to the moderate wing . Above all, he saw the preservation of the unity of the country as his most important goal.

The political conflicts between the southern states in favor of slavery ("slave states") and the northern states opposed to slavery ("free states") had arisen due to a number of events over the 1850s (especially the compromise of 1850 , the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Dred Scott v. Sandford judgment ) came to a head. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as president in the fall of 1860, a number of southern states left the USA in 1860/61 and merged to form the Confederate States , although Lincoln was only a moderate opponent of slavery. From 1861 there was a civil war between North and South, because the US government under Lincoln refused to recognize the breakaway states as sovereign . The main concern of the president initially remained the preservation of the unity of the United States, but from 1863 Lincoln gave the war another political goal with his emancipation proclamation : the abolition of slavery. Other moderates also joined this course. Although he implemented a central concern of the Radical Republicans with this move, they were divided on the questions of a post-war order. In particular, the question of how to deal with the political and social elites of the southern states, who were held responsible for the rebellion, turned out to be a controversial issue. President Lincoln advocated mild treatment; the people of the southern states should also be treated with indulgence. Above all, he wanted to prevent further cultural and political division. Lincoln did not want to evoke a sense of humiliation by the north, especially in the south. Radical Republicans spoke out in favor of harsh punishment for the southern states. They also demanded clear commitments to the national government in Washington from the population. The partial sovereignty enjoyed by the US states should be denied to the south for the time being. Instead, they wanted to treat these states as occupied territories.

From 1864 it became clear that the north would win the war and the country would remain united. Lincoln assessed his clear election victory in the fall of 1864 as a mandate to implement his reconstruction plans. At the celebrations for his swearing-in for a second term in March 1865, he again strongly advocated the mild treatment of the south ("with resentment against anyone"). Meanwhile, the war ended a few weeks later with the Confederation surrendering. Slavery was finally abolished as early as January 1865 with the 13th Amendment to the Constitution . All Republicans and a number of Democrats from the north had approved the amendment. By December of that year, a sufficient number of states had also ratified the addition .

Reconstruction

With the end of the war and the ban on slavery, however, by no means all political conflicts were resolved. The post-war order ( reconstruction ) was a point of contention between and within the parties. The Republican MPs were divided into the moderate and radical camps, and the Democrats were in favor of a mild resumption of the South anyway. With the exception of the formal ban on slavery, the old social structures in the south should remain. Moderate Republicans advocated concessions to blacks by granting them some natural rights (such as paid work). The Radical Republicans, on the other hand, wanted Afro-Americans to be granted the right to vote and citizenship. The Republicans only had a majority in Congress through both party wings. In the last days of his life, Lincoln was quite open to the proposal that blacks be allowed to vote. However, the president died on April 15, 1865 as a result of an assassination attempt by the fanatical southern sympathizer John Wilkes Booth the previous evening. The new president was Andrew Johnson , who ran as Lincoln's runner -up candidate in the 1864 election (as part of the National Union Party ). With the appointment of Democrat Johnson to the vice presidency, Lincoln wanted to make clear his intention to treat the South with leniency.

Like Lincoln, the new president advocated leniency towards the former confederation. However, through his political activities in the years to come, he not only turned the radical republicans against him, the moderates who were initially willing to compromise turned away from him. The first tension between the President and the Radical Republicans arose when he appointed a number of military governors in the occupied southern states, some of whom came from the former southern elite and some of them had close ties to the leaders of the rebellion. In addition, he gave the southern states no conditions for the preparation of new ( republican ) state constitutions. By appointing democratic military governors from the southern elite, the president also limited the right to vote to those who had a vote before the civil war. The introduction of black codes , which were very similar to the earlier slave codes , prevented many African Americans from participating in elections and thus denied political influence. The Radical Republicans in particular sharply criticized this policy, while Johnson saw himself in Lincoln's tradition by indulging the South.

With the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 , a law to protect those rights of African Americans, it came to a new rift. This law was the result of a compromise between moderate and radical Republicans who together made up a majority in Congress. After President Johnson vetoed it on March 27, 1866 , a rift broke out between the White House and the then moderate Republicans. Many of them switched to the Radical Republican line, believing that the Reconstruction with Johnson would not succeed. A few weeks later, a coalition of both blocs was able to override the presidential veto against the Civil Rights Act with the necessary two-thirds majority, which means that the bill came into force even without the approval of the president.

Another reaction to Johnson's course was the enforcement of the 14th Amendment , which declared blacks citizens of the United States, which constitutionally guaranteed formal equality before the law (even if practical equality was far from being achieved). Johnson spoke out vehemently against the addition, which he viewed as an act of revenge by Congress against the South.

The Radical Republicans emerged stronger from the 1866 congressional elections. Throughout 1867 they were able to largely revise the presidential forbearance "reconstruction" policy by overriding a number of presidential vetoes. Johnson's military governors in the southern states were also replaced by the Congress majority. As early as the summer and autumn of 1867, radical Republicans in Congress in particular came to the conclusion that the solution to the ongoing conflict with the President lay in the impeachment of Johnson. Many Radical Republicans said that "the reconstruction could fail because of resistance from a stubborn president." In the spring of 1868, about six months before the next presidential election, many radical Republicans saw the chance of impeachment after Johnson wanted to dismiss his Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, without the approval of the Senate, contrary to the provisions of the Tenure of Office Act . There had been considerable differences of opinion between the President and the Minister of War over the past few months about the reconstruction. In the end, the impeachment failed because of one vote in the Senate because seven moderate Republicans opposed the party line. They were also politically at odds with Johnson, but saw his proposed impeachment as politically motivated. Since the constitution does not provide for impeachment for political reasons, but provides for serious crimes to be committed as a prerequisite for impeachment, these senators refused to vote for Johnson's premature removal. With the upcoming presidential election, Johnson’s days as president were numbered anyway, as the Democrats wanted to campaign with a less controversial personality.

Completion of the reconstruction

In the fall of 1868, Civil War General Ulysses S. Grant was elected as a Republican candidate for president. He prevailed against Horatio Seymour , who ran for the Democrats instead of Johnson's. The previously largely apolitical grant identified itself with the Radical Republicans and, unlike its predecessor, no longer blocked Congress. Although the southern states gradually regained their full rights as partially sovereign states from 1868 onwards, Radical Republicans and President Grant prevented a withdrawal of the occupying forces of the north from the former Confederate States. A number of measures to protect African Americans in the south were also taken under Grant, against bitter opposition from the political elites in the south. The withdrawal of troops had been a major concern of the Democrats, as had a number of moderate Republicans. The occupation was only lifted from 1877 onwards as part of a compromise that resulted from the controversial outcome of the 1876 ​​presidential election .

Leaders of the Radical Republicans

Radical Republican leaders included:

literature

  • Eric Foner : Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2002 ISBN 978-0060937164
  • David O. Stewart : Impeached. The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln's Legacy. Simon & Schuster.
  • Hans L. Trefousse: Radical Republicans. Knopf Doubleday, New York 2014, ISBN 978-0-8041-5392-8 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Andrew Johnson: Domestic Affairs , American President, Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia (English).
  2. ↑ PBS.org Political Party Timeline
  3. ↑ Vera Nünning: Andrew Johnson (1865–1869). The dispute over the reconstruction. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 194-204, here: p. 198; David O. Stewart: Impeached. The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln's Legacy. Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, New York NY 2010, pp. 36-39; Annette Gordon-Reed: Andrew Johnson (= American Presidents Series. ). Times Books / Henry Holt, New York City NY 2011, pp. 88-91.
  4. ↑ a b Vera Nünning: Andrew Johnson (1865–1869). The dispute over the reconstruction. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 194–204, here: pp. 199–200.
  5. ↑ David O. Stewart: Impeached. The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln's Legacy. Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, New York NY 2010, p. 60.
  6. ↑ Vera Nünning: Andrew Johnson (1865–1869). The dispute over the reconstruction. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 194–204, here: p. 200.
  7. ↑ Vera Nünning: Andrew Johnson (1865–1869). The dispute over the reconstruction. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 194–204, here: p. 201.
  8. ↑ Vera Nünning: Andrew Johnson (1865–1869). The dispute over the reconstruction. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 194–204, here: p. 202.
  9. ↑ Vera Nünning: Andrew Johnson (1865–1869). The dispute over the reconstruction. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 194–204, here: p. 203.