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reconstruction
The year of 1864 brought the first experiment with readmitting Confederate states into the Union. The first to undergo this process, termed “Reconstruction,” was Louisiana. Initially, Lincoln created a plan to bring Confederate states back into the Union. Known as his Ten Percent Plan, it mandated ten percent of the voting population in the 1860s election to declare their loyalty to the United States. Upon satisfaction of this demand, the state would reenter the United States and proceed to create a state constitution.
A population of politicians believed Lincoln’s plan was too lenient to Confederate rebels. Known as Radical Republicans, they demanded a more progressive policy that increased punishment to many Confederates and brought equality under the law to black Americans. Radical Republicans forecasted the continued discrimination of black Americans under Lincoln’s plan for Reconstruction, as it left room for state constitutions to be made by Southerners who supported the Confederacy.
By July of 1864, Radical Republicans pressured Congress to pass a stricter Reconstruction plan. The Wade-Davis Bill mandated a majority of each state population to take a loyalty oath--a much harsher requirement than Lincoln’s plan. However, Lincoln knew the country would struggle to heal itself under such such a law; thus, he vetoed the legislation. While with one choice, he dashed the requirement of equality under the law, he did press Southern state officials to begin the extension of the ballot to black soldiers who fought on the side of the Union in the war.
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Letter to Michael Hahn, March 13, 1864
In 1864, the state of Louisiana was under occupation of the Union army. Lincoln’s objective to preserve the Union was coming closer to fruition. To reassemble the country as it was before the Confederacy broke from the United States, he proposed a plan of Reconstruction. With Louisiana as the first to undergo the process of readmittance, Lincoln knew the eyes of the entire country would be watching.
An effort to hold the portrayal of federal authority at bay while still extending rights to black Americans, Lincoln wrote a letter to Michael Hahn, the newly elected governor of Louisiana. In his private letter, Lincoln urges the governor to support the enfranchisement of black veterans, leaving all other black Americans without the vote. The letter shows how Lincoln’s attitudes regarding rights for freedmen were not outward demands; instead, they encompass the tone of a polite plea. It also reflects Lincoln’s narrow extension of rights rather than complete equality for all individuals.
Lincoln’s letter fell on blind eyes, as Hahn and the Louisiana constitutional convention failed to make a place for black Louisianans in the democratic process of voting.
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Born in Germany in 1830, Hahn rose to political power as an anti-secessionist Republican in 1862. Serving as a member of Congress, he went on to hold the office of Governor to Louisiana during Reconstruction.
Northern-born lawyer who became chairman of Republican Party in Louisiana in 1863. His organization, Friends of Universal Suffrage, worked tirelessly to attain black voting rights, securing them in 1865.
A member of Congress from Pennyslvania, Stevens pushed for equality under the law for black Americans throughout his life. A leader of Radical Republicans, he chided President Lincoln's Reconstruction Plan.
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