Reconstruction

Reconstruction, name applied to the reorganization of state governments in the South after the Civil War, the constitutional processes of their readmission to the Union, and the social adjustments made necessary by altered economic conditions, especially the emancipation and enfranchisement of blacks. The name also refers to the period of social, military, and political history in which, after Lincoln's assassination, power passed from the conservative group in the Republican party, inclined toward leniency and the rapid reinstatement of the seceded states, to the radical Republicans, who favored military rule and the suppression of civil rights in the conquered states. Reconstruction is considered to have terminated with the presidential election of 1876, despite the doubtful victory of Hayes over the Democratic candidate Tilden. Histories of the Reconstruction include Paul Buck's Road to Reunion and Claude Bowers's The Tragic Era, while events and social conditions in the South during this period are depicted in many novels, e.g. De Forest's Kate Beaumont (1872), Albion Tourgée's A Fool's Errand (1879) and Bricks Without Straw (1880), G.W. Cable's John March, Southerner (1894), Thomas Nelson Page's Red Rock (1898), Joel Chandler Harris's Gabriel Tolliver (1902), and Thomas Dixon's The Leopard's Spots (1902), The Clansman (1905), and The Traitor (1907).