Years later, the impeachment of Andrew Johnson exemplified the power of the Radical Republicans in Congress. At the same time in the South, a Republican alliance of freedmen, Unionists, and their allies assembled to gain control of local and state governments. This alliance of “Radicals” quickly began rewriting state constitutions, and made considerable progress in establishing civil and political equality. They promoted a fairer system of legal justice, and instituted basic social services such as public education and care for the orphaned and the aged.
Those who were against this equality did everything in their power to thwart the Radical’s efforts. Sinking cotton prices, and wide-spread corruption undermined the strength and integrity of these governments. National disgust at the spectacle, however, bolstered the white opposition in the South. The 1870 passage of the Fifteenth Amendment, prohibiting disfranchisement because of race, added fuel to the fire of white supremacists and Democrats.
By 1870, the South had a new group of individuals which had control over most of the land, The Ku Klux Klan. Members of the KKK were not the courageous supporters of white rights portrayed in …show more content…
Federal troops were sent to protect the tormented state and local governments. Unfortunately for Southern Radicals, The KKK Act was incredibly weak and short-lived. With the reelection of Ulysses S. Grant, the ideals of the Radical Republicans in Congress retreated. It had seemed that a national consensus was developing that African-American suffrage had been a mistake and that the Southern states should now fend for themselves. When the Panic of 1873 drew the nation’s attention away from the predicament of the freedmen, Democrats seized the opportunity to put forth their program of Southern “Redemption”, which consisted of low taxes, control of the black labor force, and