By The Numbers – Reconstruction

Last week we explored Abraham Lincoln and his legacy regarding racism in the White House. So far we have talked about 16 presidents. James Buchanan was the last president to own slaves and he served from 1857-1861. He was the one who had all female slaves… and the one we don’t want to talk about in civilized conversation because it might involve “locker room talk.” Anyway, were are going to go into the Reconstruction Era just after the Civil War, when they were “reconstructing” the South and “constructing” the framework for African American civil rights. As a reminder, the administrations will be judged using the following criteria based on how well they handled race relations;
10 – You can sit next to the table and watch while we play a couple of hands of bid whisk.
9 – You are able to use the word “Bro” in front of us.”
8 – You can bring something to the barbecue and we’ll put it on the table with the other food.
7 – We will wave at you if we see you on the street.
6 – We won’t side-eye or sass if you bring a watermelon to our family dinner.
5 – You can leave with a little bit of your dignity after saying “My Nigga.”
4 – If we hear you calling for help, we will call the police after we have charged our phone.
3 – We will count to three before we let the dogs out if you come to our house.
2 – We won’t pee on your statue during daylight
hours.
1 – Faque Off!!
So in “By The Numbers” – Reconstruction, we will be starting with President Andrew Johnson, the 17th President of the United States.

Andrew Johnson – 7
Elected 1865 – 1869
We will wave at you if we see you on the street.

So Johnson became president after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. He was chosen as Lincoln’s vice president because Lincoln needed a politician on the ticket who could help win support from the border states that had remained in the union and were slave states that didn’t join the Confederacy such as Maryland, Kentucky, Delaware, and Missouri. Johnson was born in 1808 in Raliegh, North Carolina, ran away at an early age, and eventually ended up in Tennessee, where he opened a tailor shop and got married. He started dabbling in politics around this time and found out he was a pretty good stump speaker. He was known as a champion of the poor and against the wealthy plantation owners. In 1840 he was sent to the US House of Representatives and served there well into the 1850s. So during the time before the Civil War when the southern states were talking about sedition, treachery, treason, and secession, Johnson although being a representative of Tennessee did not support Tennessee’s treasonous secession talk. So in the North, he was hailed as a hero, while in most of the South and most of Tennessee, they wanted to see a pair strung up in the trees. In 1862 Lincoln made him military governor of Tennessee. He moved quickly to squash civilian rebel influences and gathered the local politicians to demand an oath of obedience and rat out the #@@! who was talking about stringing him up by his private parts… Johnson: Just tell me who it was… I ain’t gonna do nutting…” Okay, he didn’t ask about the stringing up part… Anywho, he also shut down all the newspapers which sympathized with the Confederates. Now much of Tennessee was still in Confederate hands, especially eastern Tennessee, which is where the state’s capitol is, Nashville. Union militia soldiers were constantly being attacked and harassed by General Nathan Bedford Forrest in and around Nashville and generally throughout eastern Tennessee. After the war, Forrest would go on to be the first Grand Azzhole… I mean the first Grand Dragon of the Klu Klux Klan, which was founded in Pulaski, Tenessee. Anyway, the Union would get tired of that stuff and start sending in regular Union troops. In a battle at Murfreesboro, Tennessee in 1863, the Union army stumped that racist shat all the way out of them and made them cry. Later that year, most of eastern Tennessee was under Union control and was acting like they had finally asked somebody… When Lincoln ran for his second term, he asked Johnson to be his running mate. Now it was two policies Johnson had that I didn’t like before he was asked to be Lincoln’s running mate and that’s why I gave him that rating. First, when Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation freeing all enslaved people in the Confederate states, Johnson asked that Tennessee be exempt… That’s right… every other slave in the Confederacy was free if they could escape to Union territory… everyone except those in Tennessee. If they escaped, they would be sent right back. Lincoln granted him the exemption. Second, Johnson didn’t want African Americans fighting and that we should be relegated to menial tasks. Although later in the war he reluctantly supported having African American fighting troops. As a matter of fact, he was able to muster 20,000 black troops out of Tennessee alone. I don’t want to tell him the real reason he was able to get that many black troops out of one of the most racist places on Earth at the time… I’ll just let history give him the credit. Anyway, after Lincoln’s death, Johnson went on to fulfill Lincoln’s Reconstruction efforts to build the South back up and promote African American civil rights. History also paints Johnson as one of the most “unfortunate” presidents. He was like the Jimmy Carter of his time. Opposing him were the Radical Republicans, brilliantly led and ruthless in their tactics. Johnson was no match for them. They were like our present-day Squad, Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. After the completion of his term in 1869, Johnson made his way back to Tennessee. On July 30, 1875, he passed away due to complications arising from a stroke. As per his request, he was laid to rest with his body draped in an American flag and a copy of the U.S. Constitution put beneath his head.

What’d You Do That For?

Corporal: Enslavia.. get yo tired azz up and get ready for court!!
Enslavia: That’s Miss I’Amdeeaz… to you!!

Ulysses S. Grant – 9
Elected 1869 – 1877
You are able to use the word “Bro” in front of us.”

Ulysses S. Grant was my man when it came to how he conducted the Civil War. His strategy was simple. Follow them everywhere they go and fight them. Before Grant, it was “fight and retreat”… win or lose. Grant figured out it was going to be a battle of attrition. The policy was barbaric and it was ugly. He could afford to lose unspeakable numbers of men in battle. The South could not. They would run out of men far before Grant would. Lee knew Grant’s game right after the second “Battle of the Wilderness,” in Virginia. The first battle wasn’t called the Wilderness, it was known as the Battle of Mine Runs. In that battle, the Confederate army whipped the Union army like they stole something from their mamma who was coming out of the church holding the pastor’s hand!! The Union Army hauled azz back across the Potomac after that. Confederates: “And Don’t You Come Back Heh Or You Gonna Get Some Mo Of Dat!!” Yesiree, they got them good that first time. To tell you the truth, they gotta them pretty good the second time around too. In that battle, there were close to 18,000 casualties. The Union lost around seven thousand men more than the Confederates. Only this time they didn’t retreat! They licked their wounds and then headed to attack Richmond! That was Grant’s plan, follow them everywhere they go, and keep attacking. The rest is history. Grant won the Civil War and was elected president in 1869. Besides signing the 15th Amendment into law, which gave black men the right to vote, sorry ladies… you wouldn’t get that right until 1920 when the 19th Amendment was ratified… anywho besides signing the 15th Amendment, Grant also enacted the Ku Klux Klan Act after just a year in office… you know something? As I was writing this article and many more before it about the Ku Klux Klan, I always spelled it and pronounced it as “Klu” Klux Klan. This is the first time I noticed my spell checker telling me to correct it. So if you see that in my other articles, know that I am aware of it, but I’m not going back to change it… screw them. Anyway, so yeah, he enacted the KKK Act. The KKK has been through three eras. We are in the 3rd era now. The second era was cut short when their Grand Dragon, D.C Stephenson kidnapped, raped, and murdered a woman. They put his alcoholic ass under the jail and put a mountain on top of it. At the time they were 2 or 3 million strong. After that, they dropped to under a thousand members. There were about half a million members in the first era during Grant’s time. Now Grant’s real incentive for reining them in was that Nathan Bedford Forrest was a threat. He could call together upwards of 40,000 KKK members anytime he got ready. Grant couldn’t have a private army of racists running through the country. Under the Klan Act, federal troops, rather than state militias, were used to enforce the law, and Klansmen were prosecuted in federal court, where juries were sometimes predominantly black. Hundreds of Klan members were fined or imprisoned. Oh, wait… you didn’t know that… black folks were sitting on federal juries under Grant and were locking up Klansmen and throwing away the dagnabit keys? Yep. The Ku Klux Klan Act is still on the books today! The last time it was used was in 2020 against several Trump associates. Anyway, Grant had special Klan judges to hear the cases, so that there wouldn’t be any of that nasty stuff going on like the nigra committed suicide by hanging himself from a tree and then setting himself on fire… or where they really get ugly with it and say… what nigra? So I didn’t give Grant a 10, because like all of his contemporaries, he wasn’t that keen on black troops. Yes, he used them when militarily necessary, but he preferred not to. He also recommended not having them stationed in the South where in my opinion they were needed and where the racism was hot as shat. Still, he is a solid nine. Grant’s other legacies live on also. He established the Department of Justice and get this… the next time you look at a weather forecast… it was Grant who established the National Weather Service! After he left the White House, he didn’t do so well. Failed business ventures put him in the poor house. For a time he resisted writing his memoirs and finally gave in to be able to leave his family something to live off after he passed. The memoirs fetched $450,000. That’s the equivalent of $10.5 million in today’s money. He died from throat cancer at the of age 63 on July 23, 1885. His memoir was published by a dear and close friend named Mark Twain.

You Gonna Learn Today…

Corporal: “Didn’t I tell you to… GET UP I’AMDEEAZ!!!!”
Enslavia: “ONLY IF YOU CALL ME BY MY FULL NAME!! ENSLAVIA N. YOUNO I’AMDEEAZ!!!”
Corporal “OK… ENSLAVIA N. YOUNO I’AMDEEAZ… GET UP!!!”
Enslavia: “That’s better… I’ll need to contact my attorney… Icant Helmisef… Can you call him at this number and tell him to meet me at the courthouse?”
Corporal: “Sure… ( goes to the phone in the office.) Hello? This is the Corporal at the station… I’m calling for Enslavia N. Youno I’Amdeeaz…”
Psychiatric Hosp Inc: What?? You are a what? Who are you calling for??
Corporal: Icant Helmisef.
Psychiatric Hosp Inc: Okay I see… We’ll be right over…
Corporal: Okay! they’re on their way! Now get dressed!!

Rutherford B. Hayes – 1
Elected 1877 – 1881
Faque Off!! No… Really…!!

Rutherford B. Hayes has done more harm to the African American community than any other president in American history. With the stroke of a pen, almost ten generations of African Americans were doomed to a life of racist Jim Crow. It was Rutherford B. Hayes that removed the remaining Union troops from the South, ending Reconstruction and returning home rule to the former Confederate states. He handed them our asses on a silver platter just so he could be president.
Racist: (Holding noose…)You know the troops are gone now boy… and reconstruction is gone now… and we back in power again… So what was that last week you were yelling at me about me kissing yo black… what did you say? Yo black ass…? Kiss yo black ass.. is that what you said nigra?
Blackman: (Starts crying…) Uh.. suh I was under a lot of pressure… you know how it is…
Racist: Naw nigra…
It was getting ready to go down…
The Compromise of 1877 also known as the “Great Betrayal,” was a deal struck during the 1876 presidential election. The contenders for president were Rutherford B. Hayes (R) and Samuel J. Tilden. So before we get into why the Republicans sent us buck-naked out into the hot desert with a bottle of saltwater, we need to do a little back story. So 1876 was the centennial of our country’s founding and because of that, the fervor for political participation was at a heightened level. Everybody had their own opinion about who was best to lead the way into the next hundred years. Now Grant’s administration was up to its neck in corruption. His personal secretary had been implicated in the “Great Whiskey Scandal,” where the distillers straight up refused to pay federal taxes. His Secretary of War, William Belknap was charged with malfeasance. He was taking kickbacks and they impeached him. One month after impeaching Belknap, they accused the Republican House Speaker of accepting railroad bribes. Rather than condemning him, Grant supported him, giving rise to a new term for corruption… Grantism. So Grant’s administration was like Nixon’s on steroids, they weren’t leaving one red penny on the table and people were like… “If any one of them bumps into you, you better check to see if you still have your wallet.” To combat the impression that the country was being run by a bunch of crooks, they eventually chose Hayes as their presidential candidate. He wasn’t their first choice. Now on the surface… as a matter of fact for all intents and purposes, Hayes had all the makings of being another solid 9. He was born in Delaware which during the war was a slave state, but having a law degree from Harvard, he was representing fugitive slaves in court. He was a general in the Union Army and was severely injured “IN BATTLE!” That means he wasn’t sitting in the rear sending his men up a hill into cannon fire, surrounded by rebels behind stone walls plucking them off at their leisure. He was out there shooting too! He went on to become Governor of Ohio where his reputation was spotless. Yep… good old Rudy…
Opposing him on the Democratic side was Samuel J. (Suwannee River) Tilden. Tilden won in a landslide on the second ballot at their convention. Tilden had been governor of New York. He was chosen because he was the polar opposite of the Grant administration’s sketchy image. He had brought down the notorious racketeer, “Boss” William M. Tweed. Now Tweed wasn’t a gangster in the sense that he was out there rolling up on folks. He was a political gangster. He was the leader of Tammany Hall, the Democratic political machine that ran late 19th century New York politics. That’s not to say that folks weren’t ending up in the Hudson wearing cement shoes, but he was really known for embezzlement and graft. The dude made millions! Oh yeah, graft just means he used his position to steal. Anyway, Tilden brought Tweed down and a few others like him. So you got these two men running against each other and the lines were drawn.

Enslavia Up In There…

Corporal: Well your man is on the way.. when he gets here we will be heading to court.
Enslavia: You going to court like that?
Corporal: Like what?
Enslavia: Uniform all wrinkled and stuff… dirt on your shoes… looking like who did it…
Corporal: Well I…
Enslavia: Tell you what, why don’t you take off your uniform and let me clean and press it… when you get to court you will be looking like new money!
Corporal: I don’t think that’s a good ide…
Enslavia: Okay… “Private…”
Corporal: Fine! Make it fast and no funny stuff! ( Corporal takes off his uniform and hands it to Enslavia..) a few minutes later there is a knock on the door…
Corporal: Yes…
Man: That’s him boys… grab him!!
Corporal: What in the hell!! Let me go!! What are you doing!!
Man: Come peacefully and we won’t have to sedate you!!!
Corporal: I will not!! Why are you doing this????
Man: You called our hospital and told the nurse you were an ass and couldn’t help yourself, didn’t you?
Corporal: ENSLAVIA!!!! She tricked me!! I was supposed to be calling her lawyer and she gave me your number with some bogus names!!
Man: Then why is she wearing a police uniform?
Corporal: She’s lying!! She’s not a police officer!! She’s crazy as a bat!! If you don’t believe me ask her to show you the wallet in the pants pocket!!
Man: Miss.. we are going to have to see your ID….
Enslavia: I will not!! ( She runs for the door and they grab her!!) Let me go!! Let me go!!
Man: SEDATE HER!! SEDATE HER!!
Corporal: She’s gonna pay for this!!
Man: Well first we are going to have to take her in for observation… I mean we just sedated her…
Corporal: Okay… I’ll tell the judge what happened and I’ll be by later to pick her up. Give me your card.
Man: Here you are… Boys strap her down and put her in the ambulance…
(Ten minutes later..)
Enslavia: I feel groggy… Where am I? I’m so thirsty… Can I have a glass of water?
Man: Here.. take a little bit .. don’t gulp it down… there you go… it worked just like you said…
Enslavia: Thanks, Arthur… but next time just handcuff me…
So that’s what Enslavia and Arthur were planning in jail…

That Ain’t Right

The campaign between the two men was brutal. They were throwing everything against the wall to see what would stick. They accused Hayes of being in bed with Tweed and said they saw him on the corner slinging Yayo like he was a gunfighter at the OK Corral and said they saw Tilden riding in a slave boat on the Mississippi named Faque Dem with Aunt Jemima sitting on his lap… okay.. they didn’t take it to that level, but it was pretty bad. So before we move on, there is another thing we have to cover because it had a direct effect on how Rutherford won. After the Civil War and with the passage of the 15th Amendment giving black men the right to vote, the North didn’t want any shenanigans going on. You know, like maybe fifty black folks turned in a ballot and they only count two of them. So down South, the North had canvassing boards. The board’s job was to count the votes and certify them. These boards were mostly made up of Republicans and consisted of three men. Usually, two of them were Republicans. It was this dynamic that would ensure Hayes came out on top… usually… but as you will see later the South played a card that the North didn’t count on. So polling day came and lo and behold Tilden was winning! He was winning in electoral votes and popular vote! There were only three states left, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Florida. The only way Hayes could win is if he took all three.  Now remember the canvassing boards? Well, wink, wink, wink… and the next thing you know Hayes had won. The South was madder than John Hinckley on an acid trip… They started talking big SH*T!!! Hayes and Tilden didn’t want to touch that mess… well Tilden didn’t want to touch that mess. Later on, after being threatened by… I mean talking to his supporters and sponsors, Hayes had a change of heart and threw himself wholeheartedly into the scheme. So remember when I told you the South had a hold card? Well, they told the Republicans, if Hayes even went on the same street as the White House, there was going to be another Civil War!! The Republicans knew they were serious as a heart attack. The North had long ago lost its appetite for war and the plight of the newly freed African Americans was no longer at the top of the national agenda. In a smoke-filled cigar room in the Capitol, the two sides hammered out an agreement. Hayes would become president and once into office would sign the Compromise of 1877, removing all the remaining federal troops in the South and return home rule. It was the end of Reconstruction and the beginning of Jim Crow. Jim Crow would be the law of the land for almost 90 years. It ended after Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlawing discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. After Hayes’s acceptance speech, he went home. That year there were no inaugural balls or parties. The country had little to celebrate with the signing of the “Great Betrayal”.

Enslavia: Arthur can you wake me up in the morning at eight? And see if you can get me some new clothes. This uniform is squeezing me in places polite people don’t want to talk about. I got something I need to finish…

Next: “By The Numbers – Jim Crow”

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