Lincoln's Plan of Reconstruction

by Charles H. McCarthy

The Emancipation Proclamation did not affect, as is well known, the status of slaves in the loyal border States or in the excepted parts of Virginia and Louisiana. The State of Tennessee, too, as we have seen, was not named in the edict of freedom; that was published by the President simply as a measure of military necessity, and was not regarded by him or by others as operative to prevent, when war had ceased, a revival of servitude in the insurgent States, for negroes could easily be imported from those loyal commonwealths still tolerating that institution. It was uncertain, too, how the proclamation would affect the status of slaves in those districts not yet overrun by the Union armies. In the border States, in Tennessee and in the excepted parts of Louisiana and Virginia there were probably 2,000,000 men in bondage. In order, then, to abolish universally as well as permanently to prohibit involuntary servitude an amendment of the Constitution was proposed in the familiar language of the sixth section of the ordinance of 1787. Though it passed the Senate, April 8, 1864, it failed at that time to receive in the House the requisite two thirds vote. It has been seen how upon the recommendation of Mr. Lincoln it was reconsidered and passed by the Representatives at a succeeding session, January 31, 1865, and submitted to the States for their action. It was adopted by his own State, Illinois, on the following day. By the close of February sixteen others had followed its example, and before the President’s death twenty in all had ratified the Amendment. To Mr. Lincoln, who had long held anti-slavery opinions, this expression of public sentiment was extremely grateful; indeed, less than two months before his assassination he declared his satisfaction at the popular verdict, and his confidence that the States would consummate what Congress had so nobly begun. The Thirteenth Amendment, however, was not announced as part of the organic law until after the Presidential plan of reconstruction had been ignored by the Thirty-ninth Congress. This subject, therefore, need not be further discussed in these pages.

The extraordinary amount of work actually completed by the national Legislature can be comprehended only by considering the degree of perfection to which the committee system has been carried under congressional government. Measures that conduct the reader over vast stretches of the records of Congress occupy but a day or two in the calendar. The discussions described in the two preceding chapters did not, as might be supposed, engage the entire attention of Federal legislators. It was desirable, if, indeed, it was not essential, that the sentiments of the lawmaking body of the nation be authoritatively declared on the question of admitting members to Congress from those States reconstituted under the Executive plan; definitive action in the matter of the electoral votes which they presented was also awaited with not a little interest. Scarcely inferior in importance and more instructive than these measures was the passage of an act, approved March 3, 1865, which created in the War Department a “Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands.” As the system of relief then inaugurated was destined to become an important agency in the work of reconstruction a brief account of its origin and institution may not be deemed superfluous.

A former chapter has related how great numbers of “contrabands,” by assembling early in the war at Fortress Monroe and Newport News, taxed the ingenuity of even General Butler to provide for their maintenance; it also noticed an attempt under Mr. E. L. Pierce to improve the condition of abandoned slaves in South Carolina, and the friendly interest of Secretary Chase in that experiment. But the hundreds of fugitives within Federal lines in May, 1861, had grown to be millions by the beginning of 1865. Of this army of homeless freedmen the policy of enlisting colored troops provided directly for nearly 200,000 able-bodied males. The women, the children and the large class unsuitable for military service left a multitude still unprovided for. Some relief, it is true, was afforded by the Treasury Department, which undertook to establish on abandoned and confiscated lands colonies of self-supporting negroes, but the ignorance and rapacity of many persons entrusted with the supervision of this work led to its general failure. Here and there, indeed, more satisfactory results were obtained, though these isolated successes seldom reached the point of actual encouragement. The South Carolina experiment may, therefore, be properly regarded as the germ of the Freedmen’s Bureau.

The progress of these communities had been watched anxiously by the abolition and the kindred associations which sprang up to continue the work that anti-slavery men had begun. On this subject a committee representing the Freedmen’s Aid Societies of Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Cincinnati addressed, December 1, 1863, an able memorial to the President. Without expressing a favorable opinion of the plan suggested by the petitioners, Mr. Lincoln referred the question, as one of great magnitude and importance, to the consideration of Congress. The Freedmen’s Aid Societies, however, had been anticipated by Representative Eliot, of Massachusetts, who had offered, January 12, 1863, a bill to establish a Bureau of Emancipation, which was referred to a select committee; but other business, regarded as more urgent, prevented them from reporting at that time a measure which had been prepared. At the succeeding session the proposition was offered again. After numerous efforts to secure favorable action, efforts extending over a period of two years, Congress took the subject into consideration. The House proposed one, the Senate a different measure; a committee of conference suggested something unlike either, though embodying important features of both. This, like every proposition affecting the negro, encountered considerable opposition. The creation of such a bureau, said its adversaries, conceded the very point that pro-slavery men had always maintained; namely, that the negro was incapable of taking care of himself. The extent of its powers, its duration and the cost of its maintenance were successively made grounds of opposition by those hostile to its establishment. Nor did its enemies fail to point out the great temptation to abuse which was offered by the system.

The act established in the War Department, to continue during the rebellion and for one year thereafter, a bureau to which should be committed the management of all confiscated or abandoned lands, and the control of all subjects relating to refugees and freedmen from any district within the territory embraced in the operations of the army, under such regulations as might be adopted by the head of the bureau and approved by the President.

The conduct of the bureau was entrusted to a commissioner appointed by the President with the concurrence of the Senate. In the exercise of his functions he was to be assisted by such clerks as the Secretary of War might assign him; their number, of course, was limited by law. For his compensation the head of the new bureau was to receive a sum fixed at $3,000 per annum. To aid in executing the provisions of the act the President was authorized to select, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, one assistant commissioner for each of the States declared to be in insurrection, not, however, to exceed ten in number, each to receive an annual salary of $2,500.

The Secretary of War, besides assigning clerks of the several grades mentioned in the law, was authorized to issue, under regulations which he might himself prescribe, such provisions, clothing and fuel as might be deemed needful for the immediate and temporary shelter and supply of destitute and suffering refugees and freedmen as well as their wives and children. Any military officer could be detailed to duty under the act, but without increase of pay or allowances.

It was further provided that the commissioner, “under the direction of the President, shall have authority to set apart, for the 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 forty acres of such land, and the person to whom it was so assigned shall be protected in the use and enjoyment of the land for the term of three years at an annual rent not exceeding six per centum upon the value of said land, as it was appraised by the State authorities in the year 1860, for the purpose of taxation, and in case no such appraisal can be found, then the rental shall be based upon the estimated value of the land in said year, to be ascertained in such manner as the commissioner may by regulation prescribe. At the end of said term, or at any time during said term, the occupants of any parcels so assigned may purchase the land, and receive such title thereto as the United States can convey, upon paying therefor the value of the land, as ascertained and fixed for the purpose of determining the annual rent aforesaid.”[^[425]]

It was made the duty of the assistant commissioners to submit a quarterly report of their proceedings to the commissioner, who in turn was required to report annually to the President before the commencement of each regular session of Congress. Special reports might from time to time be requested of either the head of the bureau or his subordinates.

The bureau thus established was organized principally by officers of the regular army under direction of General Oliver O. Howard, who had been selected by President Johnson as commissioner. It soon grew to vast proportions. At first it was economically managed and beneficent in its influence; subsequently, however, it degenerated into an abuse. Interesting and instructive as would be an inquiry into its operations, the history of this politico-philanthropic experiment does not fall within the limits of this work.