So, we have talked about Reconstruction in many articles in Hill1News. Reconstruction was Abraham Lincolns plan for restoring the South economically and socially after the ravages of the Civil War. For African Americans, it meant walking into Colonel Beauregard’s “Rebel Yell Saloon” with a white woman and ordering a tall dark rum “Playa, Playa” with a straw… Colonel Beauregard: “Boy, Ima tell you something right now… ain’t nothing in this world gonna stop me…!!” Me: OMG!! Anywho… Reconstruction was also supposed to be the answer to changing the attitudes that southern whites had about African Americans and the Northerns who had whooped it really good and changed their entire way of life.
Mister Ugly…
On April 9, 1865, General Robert E. “Can I At Least Keep This One” Lee, signed the surrender of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses Grant at Appomattox Court House in Appomattox, County, Virginia. So, while there was no formal surrender of the Confederate States of America (CSA) to the United States, the CSA wasn’t “EVEN” trying to get no more of that heart skipping, dome splitting, Momma!! Mamma!! Help Me!!… azz stumping and whooping the USA was dishing out with both feet. Hold on for a sec… Ima have to put it where I can get to it in case of an emergency… okay… so yeah… that was one side of the coin. The other side of the coin was… we are going to take it out on the blacks. When the fall of Petersburg, Virginia, became inevitable, Jefferson Davis, president of the CSA and his cabinet fled Richmond on April 2, 1865. Richmond was taken the next day on April 3, 1865… with all that azz whooping and dome splitting going on… I guess they didn’t have time to surrender… Racist: “Boy you keep pushing…” Anyway, Davis was later apprehended near Danville, Viriginia and charged with treason. Although he was imprisoned for a time, he was never tried and died on December 6, 1889, in New Orleans, Louisiana. Twelve days after the fall of Richmond, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated at Ford’s Theater in Washington, D.C. on April 15, 1865. It was estimated that over twenty-five million people participated in Lincolns memorial in Washington D.C. and around the country. That’s saying something because in 1865, there were only thirty million people living in the United States. Andrew Johnson, Lincoln’s vice president, would take his place and it was left up to him to fulfill Lincoln’s dream of Reconstruction.
A Snake In Snakes Clothing..
Now the first thing I want to do before we continue talking about Reconstruction, is to apologize. In my series, “By the Numbers,” I gave Andrew Johnson a “7.” Andrew Johnson was a full-time skank of the 6th degree and really deserved a “3” or 4″”. As I go deeper into researching the Reconstruction, I find that Johnson put up more roadblocks than the police at a go-go concert in Fort Dupont… Fort Dupont is a park in Washington DC where they hold concerts for us darkies… to keep us from coming downtown and messing with the folks who had never seen one before. They used to call it “Summer in The Parks,” and it was instituted in the late sixties during the height of the Civil Rights movement. They probably call it something else now, but the reason is the same, to keep somebody from coming downtown. Yeah, I know it’s ugly, but don’t hate the player… hate the game. Anywho, Johnson was chosen to be vice president by Lincoln to appease the border states. The border states were those states that didn’t secede but where slavery was still legal. They were Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri. Now Johnson wasn’t from the border states, he was from Tennessee. Tennessee seceded from the Union, but Johnson held on to his seat in the Senate. He was the only senator that didn’t resign after their confederate state left the Union. Folks from Tennessee viewed him as a traitor and a dead man walking, especially after Lincoln appointed him as military governor to Tennessee after the Union army made them hillbillies put their shat down and apologize. Racist: “Nigra… you gonna have to come outside… Me: “I plan on coming out tomorrow to get some more ammunition…” Anyway, he was a natural fit for Lincoln as a vice president, a senator from a slave state, but loyal to the Union.
In The Bible?
In May of 1865, President Johnson put on the hood to let you know how he really felt. He announced his vision of Reconstruction. So, Johnson was an adherent of states’ rights. He thought that the federal government did not have the right to order the voting requirements for states or interfere in local state matters. At the extreme end of that kind of thinking, Mississippi could just say, “(Cuss word!!) the nigras’!! It’s now illegal to be black in Mississippi!!” So yeah, that shat could get problematic… and it did. Under Johnson, General Sherman’s Special Field Order #15 was rescinded. That was the order that gave black folks forty acres of tillable land. As far as the mules were concerned, that wasn’t in the plan. A few black farmers were given some old army mules, but not everyone received one. It didn’t matter though because Johnson told them to “Give it up!!” The land went back to its former landowners. In the end, the only price that Southerns paid for running their mouth about what they were gonna do if Lincoln had to come down there… was of course a first class text book azz whooping with boot stumping and dome splitting… Racist: “Naw we ain’t gonna wait… we gonna take the tree and the rope in the house with us!!” Me: “Now where did I put that dynamite…? Oh here it is…” Anyway, there was that price and also, they had to abide by the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery, swear allegiance to the United States and pay off the war debt. Other than that, they were free to do as they wanted. Because Johnson gave them free rein to do the ugly, they started making laws to oppress black folks. These laws at that time were known as the black codes. They later evolved into Jim Crow. So, there was a fundamental difference between the black codes and Jim Crow. While both were repressive laws aimed at curtailing our civil rights, the Black Codes were also meant to ensure that we would be an available labor force. They needed our help in rebuilding the south. For instance, in Mississippi, they required you to have written evidence of employment for the coming year each January and if you left before the end of the contract, you would have to give them back all the money you had already worked for. South Carolina took it to the next level… black folks could only be a farmer or servant there unless you paid them $100 every year you stayed in the state. That tax was really hard on blacks with trades, like brick mason and blacksmiths, or professionals like teachers and so forth. Now they wanted a nigra to be charged with vagrancy… they salivated in the mouth at that. Being charged with that crime could mean forced plantation labor or else! There were some who did break their contracts but paid a heavy price. In those cases, they were beaten, or arrested. Some had their children taken away, because if you don’t have a job, how are you gonna support your children… yes indeed, they were some evil mfers! As for your children, well they were put into apprenticeship programs for white plantations owners. Massa: “Okay, son we gonna teach you how to pick cotton properly and how to obey yo’ superior in yo’ heart… that’s in the bible…”
Day Dreaming…
All this shat was going on just after the Civil War… Reconstruction was just getting started. In Congress they were starting to notice the shenanigans going on down south and required states to ratify the 14th Amendment, which granted “equal protection” of the Constitution to black people and enact universal male suffrage. Suffrage is the right to vote. They had to ratify it before they could rejoin the Union. That was in 1867. In 1870 they hit the racist with another one… the 15th Amendment, which guaranteed that a citizen’s right to vote would not be denied “on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. Between 1870 and 1877, there were hundreds of blacks employed at the state and federal level. Scores more were elected officials. Racist: Yes, I’m Willam Reilly Dongivafaque to see Senator Marcus about the nigras…” Receptionist: “The senator will see you sir… come with me…” Racist: OMG!! JEFFERSON?!! Senator: “That’s right!! Sit down Billy… now what’s this about the nigras?” We were in the big league. But we don’t have Johnson to thank for that. He vetoed the Civil Right Act of 1866, which made us all citizens and protected equally under the law. Northern republicans were pissed to the 5th degree! They vowed to get that undercover (cuss word)! In the history of the United States, there have only been three presidents which have been impeached. Andrew Johnson was the first. The other two were Bill Clinton and Donald Trump. So, they tried to get rid of Johnson when he tried to fire Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton. Johnson wanted Stanton gone because he opposed his lenient treatment of the Southerners. To keep Johnson from firing him, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act in 1867. It prevented the president from firing people Congress had approved. Johnson said ” faque that!!,” and sent some people over to clear his office out. Stanton had to barricade himself in his office to prevent them from forcibly removing him. That’s when Congress drew up articles of impeachment. Unfortunately, the Senate did not have enough votes to convict Johnson, and he finished out his term. Stanton resigned and went back to his old profession as an attorney. In December 1869 he was nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court by President Ulysses S. Grant. The senate confirmed Stanton to the high court, but he died four days later at the age of 55.
Racist: Naw nigra!! Naw!!
Me: Oh Massa!! Massa please don’t shoot me in my azz again!!
Racist: Naw nigra!! Yo’ mouth!! (Bang!! Bang!!)
Me: Massa!! Massa!! I promise!! No more back sass!! I’ll be a good one!! Please don’t shoot me in my azz again!!
Racist: Bang!! Bang!! TAKE THAT NIGRA!!
Racist 2: HEY!! HEY!! WAKE UP!! WAKE UP!! YOU ALMOST SHOT ME!!
Racist: It was so real… I had that nigra tied up like a Christmas bow… have they dug up the tree yet?
Racist 2: Yep, we ready to go…
A Hard Head Makes A Soft…
So, in 1867 a new faction of Republicans took control of the Congress. They were known as the “Radical Republicans” They were tired of Johnson and his racist policies, and they were tired of the south reneging on their promise to treat African Americans as equals under the law. Congress passed the Reconstruction Act of 1867, which temporarily divided the South into five military districts and outlined how governments based on universal (male) suffrage were to be organized. Oh yeah… Johnson vetoed that also, but his veto was overridden. Anywho, that’s how we made all those gain during reconstruction. They had United States troops down there backing us up … and we showed our… every bit of it. It was the most progressive large-scale experiment in interracial democracy any nation had ever seen after the abolishment of slavery. Southern blacks gained enormous strides. We were elected to posts in state legislatures and even had blacks elected to congress. The first state funded public school systems were a result of Reconstruction. Tax laws were changed to be more equitable, laws against discrimination in public transport and accommodations were passed. We were walking around with white women, and some were even talking about marrying them… okay they weren’t that free… a nigra could still get a hymn sung over him… “amazing grace… how sweet the sound…” Anywho… it was a revolution in the south like few before or since. By the way, I’m just going to touch on this and let you come to your own conclusions… To me there is a nexus between the radical republicans of 1867 and the radical leftist in the mind of Donald Trump… and so I’m going to leave that right there.
Racist: “OPEN THAT DOOR RIGHT NOW NIGRA!! YOU DONE TYPED YOUR LAST LETTER ABOUT GAWD FEARING WHITE MEN. IF WE HAVE TO BUST DOWN THAT DOOR… IMA MAKE YOU TAP DANCE AND SANG DIXIE… IN JAPANESE… THEN WE GONNA DROP IT LIKE ITS HOT!! NOW OPEN UP THAT DOOR NIGRA… IM NOT GONNA SAY IT AGAIN!! … OKAY BOYS!! BREAK IT DOWN!!”
Me: Yes bartender… I’ll have another Black Russian… thank you… can you turn on the TV please…?
News Announcer: Rachell… what can you tell us?
Rachell: Yes Henry… Well, I’ve talked to some of the witnesses, and they say they’ve never seen anything like it… They say the fireball was at least 100 ft high… Mr. Cooper who lives across the street says he thought he heard someone breaking down a door… but he said he was too blinded by the flash to be certain… I’ll have more Mike, once the rescue team comes out of the crater… This is Rachell… at D.A.Y.U.M… reporting… back to you…
Bartender: Omg…!! Is this your first time hearing about it? I felt the building shake just before you walked in…
Me: Yep… first time hearing about that… Do you mind if I plug my laptop in…? I have a story to finish…
For What It’s Worth…
So yeah… that’s that… Now where was I? Oh yeah… After 1867 and with the advancement of blacks in all walks of life, racist answered the progress of blacks with violence. Groups like the Ku, Klux Klan, the Red Hats… I mean Red Shirts and the White League, targeted local Republican leaders, white and Black, and other African Americans who challenged white authority. Things went south… no pun intended when in 1874 the Dixie Democrats won the U.S House of Representatives. It was the first time since the Civil War. That came about because an economic depression caused the South to slip into poverty. They blamed it on us. Southerners overwhelmingly replaced their Republican representatives with Dixie Democrats who vowed to get the nigras under control and put the whites back in power. They never were out of power, but just sold those poor folks a story they could believe in. In reality it took almost 80 years for the south to recover. Some areas recovered faster than others but as a whole, historians believe it wasn’t until after WWII that the South had fully recovered economically from the effects of the Civil War. Anyway, having control of the House it put Dixie Democrats right where they wanted to be. In order to get their support, Rutherford B. Hayes also known as “Dagger,” reached a compromise with the Democrats in exchange for certification of his election as president. He gave them complete control of the South in a back-room deal called the Compromise of 1877 better known as the Great Betrayal. He removed the rest of the US troops who were protecting our civil rights in the south and turned their duties over to the local and state governments. He ended up with the presidency and we ended up with ninety years of Jim Crow. Well, that’s it. We have only touched the edges of the Reconstruction. There were so many great accomplishments by African American during this time as there were defeats. If you have time, I highly suggest you read more about this most important era in African American history.
News Announcer: We are going to break into our regularly broadcast show for some breaking news… Rachell, we hear you have learned something new!!! What can you tell us!!?
Rachell: “Yes Henry… It’s been an hour, but the rescue crew has finally climbed out of the crater, and they rescued a man they found at the bottom. There is no word on his identity yet, but he is alive and talking… sources on the scene of the rescue have spoken to me on condition of anonymity, because they haven’t been authorized to speak… have told me the man is only half conscious but keeps repeating the same two words… “Naw Nigra…” No one seems to know what that mean but I’m sure we will find out in the days to come… back to you Henry…”
News Announcer: Thank you Rachell… now back to our regularly scheduled program… you’re watching D.A.Y.U.M TV…
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