A PERIOD OF RADICAL RECONSTRUCTION

With many Democrats and even moderate Republicans swept out of office in the 1866 congressional elections, Radical Republicans immediately put their plans for Reconstruction into action. The 1867 Reconstruction Act actually placed the Southern states under military rule, with the South being divided into five regions and a military general in control of each region. Former Confederate states were ordered to hold new constitutional conventions to form state constitutions that allowed qualified blacks to vote and provided them equal rights. The legislation barred former supporters of the Confederacy from voting and required that the Fourteenth Amendment be passed in all former Confederate states. To guarantee the assistance of the United States Army in these efforts, Congress also passed the Army Act, which reduced the control of the president over the army. To ensure that Secretary of War Edwin Stanton (an ally of the Radical Republicans) would not be dismissed, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which stated that the president could not dismiss any Cabinet member without the approval of the Senate.