Unconditional Surrender Truman
Harry S Truman
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« on: March 04, 2015, 05:04:12 PM » |
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To white Southerners, the election of Salmon P. Chase was seen as the first volley of Southern liberation, a signal that the time had come to redeem the South from the "Black Republican" rule that had existed since the 1850s. With a Democrat in the White House, they believed, nothing would prevent them from quietly ignoring the 14th and 15th Amendments, and the new Democratic state governments in Mississippi, Arkansas, and Texas quickly passed laws disenfranchising blacks and restoring the old pre-war order.
They had greatly misjudged their man. Salmon P. Chase was no Radical Republican, but he had little sympathy for those who wanted to undo the work of Reconstruction. When requests that the offending states repeal the laws disenfranchising black Southerners yielded no effect, Chase had his Attorney General file suit against them in the Supreme Court, with the result that the so-called "black codes" were struck down.
Reform of the civil service program proceeded slowly, impeded by resistance on both sides of the aisle and Chase's own personality, which prevented full cooperation between Congress and the president. When the Republicans retook Congress in the 1870 Midterms, anti-corruption efforts effectively stopped. Nevertheless, Chase was able to curb some of the largest excesses of the spoils system, and the appointment of Theodore Roosevelt [Sr.] as head of the Customs Office did much to further the cause of reform. Meanwhile, tensions have begun to rise between the United States and Mexico, whose new government wishes to reclaim the land purchased by the U.S. during the Taylor Administration.
In the Election of 1872, Chase faces a convention challenge from Mississippi Senator John M. Stone, a virulent racist who wants revenge for Chase's "betrayal" of the South on civil rights. Republicans, meanwhile, are approaching their first election without an incumbent in the White House, a circumstance that has led to a plethora of possible candidates. These include Senator Roscoe Conkling of New York, a Radical Republican chin-deep in corruption; Senator Benjamin Bristow of Kentucky, who backs firmer efforts to squash the growing KKK and a more concerted effort to reform the Civil Service program; Governor Rutherford B. Hayes, who has criticized the federal government for violating its treaties with the Indian tribes to the West and who supports several blossoming reform movements, including Prohibition; and Speaker of the House James G. Blaine, who wants to foster the nation's growing industries with a renewed tariff. Finally, the Constitutional Unionists seemed poised to nominate former Senator Andrew Johnson, the only candidate for the nomination, though as in 1868 movements have sprung up to fuse with one of the two major parties.
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