Testimony before the Joint Committee on Reconstruction on Atrocities in the South against Blacks

Questions for Further Study

• 1.: What was the distinction between “Presidential Reconstruction” and “Radical Reconstruction”? What do you think might have been the effects if Presidential Reconstruction had continued to be the policy of the Union?
• 2.: What do you think were President Andrew Johnson’s motives in treating the rebellious South with leniency in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War? Do you believe he was right or wrong? Explain.
• 3.: Throughout the Civil War, numerous people living in the Confederacy were loyal to the Union at heart and, in some instances, did what they could to aid the Union by, for example, providing information to Union generals. What do you think the position of these Union loyalists would have been in the months and years following the war? How vulnerable to reprisals do you think they would have been?
• 4.: Even in the twenty-first century, debates continue to rage about the legacy of the Confederacy and its role in the Civil War. Some people continue to regard the Confederacy—and the Confederate flag—as a symbol of a way of life and of an attitude toward state and regional interests versus federal interests. What is your position on this matter?
• 5.: In the years immediately following the Civil War, many African Americans felt a sense of hope, despite the dangers and abuses they suffered. The Emancipation Proclamation had freed slaves, the Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, and numerous African Americans were elected to Congress. What happened? Why did this hope collapse in later years?