Term | Definition |
Reconstruction | the process of rebuilding the Southern economy and society, as well as readmitting the Southern states back into the Union |
Ten Percent Plan: Part 1 | offered Southerner’s amnesty, or official pardon, for all the illegal acts supporting the rebellion; Southerners had to swear an oath of loyalty to the US and agree that slavery was illegal |
Ten Percent Plan: Part 2 | When 10% of voters in a state made these pledges, they could form a new government |
Freedman's Bureau | federal agency that set up schools and hospitals for African Americans; provided clothing, food, and fuel throughout the South |
John Wilkes Booth | assassinated Lincoln while he watched a play at Ford’s Theater in Washington D.C. |
Andrew Johnson | Tennessean who was Lincoln's Vice-President & became President following Lincoln's assassination |
black codes | laws passed by Southern states that limited the freedom of former slaves |
Civil Rights Act of 1866 | stated all persons born in the US (except Native Americans) were citizens & entitled to equal rights regardless of their race |
impeachment | when Congress charges the president of abusing the power of the office; it is part of checks and balances between the legislative and executive branches |
Radical Republicans | believed Congress should oversee the policies that would remake the South; demanded full and equal citizenship for African Americans |
Ku Klux Klan | angered that African American men were allowed to vote, they used violence to intimidate black voters in order to keep former slaves powerless |
vigilante justice | KKK members accused former slaves of supposed crimes, with sentences carried out on the spot that included beatings, burning of homes, and lynching |
Carpetbaggers | term used by Southerners for the white Northerners who moved to the South and served as Republican leaders during Reconstruction; many were members of the Freedmen's Bureau who wanted to reshape Southern society |
Scalawags | term that former Confederates used for the white Southerners who opposed secession and supported Republican efforts during Reconstruction |
Compromise of 1877 | following a disputed presidential election, Congressional leaders struck a deal with the South to accept the election of Rutherford B. Hayes in return for the ending of the federal government's Reconstruction efforts |
Tennessee Constitution of 1870 | the third state constitution for TN and the one that is still in use today; gave African Americans and former Confederate soldiers the right to vote in state elections |
poll tax | effectively eliminated the ability of African Americans to vote in TN, even though the TN Constitution of 1870 had protected their right to do so |
veto | when the president refuses to allow a bill passed by Congress to become a law; part of a president's ability to check the power of Congress |
override | when Congress votes by a 2/3 majority in both houses to stop a presidential veto so that a bill passed by Congress can become a law; part of Congress' ability to check the power of the president |
Governor William Brownlow | became governor of TN when Andrew Johnson became vice-president; stripped voting rights from former Confederate soldiers and gave all men, including African Americans, the right to vote in TN state elections |