Reconstruction Era Timeline

Reconstruction Era Timeline

1622

The first African slaves are brought to the British colonies in North America, which will eventually become the United States of America.

1803

The Louisiana Purchase adds about 800,000 square miles of new territory to the United States.

1820

The Missouri Compromise allows Missouri to be admitted to the Union as a slave state, while Maine is admitted as a free state, thus maintaining the balance between states where slavery is allowed and where it is illegal. Slavery is prohibited in any of the lands of the Louisiana Purchase that are north of the Missouri border.

1848

The U.S. victory in the Mexican-American War brings a large area of new territory into the United States, including what will become the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California.

February 28, 1854

The Republican Party is formed by politicians—most of them from the Northern states—who favor protections for business interests, public support for internal improvements (like roads and services), and social reforms, especially an end to slavery.

May 30, 1854

The Kansas-Nebraska Bill, which reverses the Missouri Compromise by allowing the status of slavery in Kansas and Nebraska to be decided by settlers, is signed into law.

May 19–20, 1856

U.S. senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts gives his "Crime against Kansas" speech in which he insults proslavery supporters of the Kansas-Missouri bill of 1854.

August 21, 1858

Future president Abraham Lincoln and U.S. senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois hold the first in a series of seven debates on the issue of slavery; they take place over a period of two months.

November 6, 1860

Illinois Republican Abraham Lincoln is elected president, sending shockwaves of panic through the South, where many believe that Lincoln will immediately take steps to outlaw slavery.

February 4, 1861

Seven Southern states that have seceded (broken away) from the Federal Union form a government of their own called the Confederate States of America, or the Confederacy. They establish their capitol in Richmond, Virginia, with former U.S. senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi as president. In April and May, four more Southern states will join the Confederacy.

April 12–13, 1861

A successful Confederate attack on the Union outpost at Fort Sumter, South Carolina, marks the beginning of the American Civil War.

May 24, 1861

Three Virginia slaves who have escaped from their plantation and fled to a Union army camp are labeled "contraband" (property confiscated during a war) by Union general Benjamin Butler.

July 21, 1861

The Confederate army defeats Union forces at the first Battle of Bull Run in Virginia, not far from Washington, D.C.

November 7, 1861

The U.S. Navy occupies the city of Port Royal in the Sea Islands off the shore of South Carolina. The white plantation owners in the area have already fled, leaving behind a large population of slaves.

February 24, 1862

The Union army takes control of Nashville, Tennessee. In early April, they will also win a victory at Shiloh, Tennessee.

March 13, 1862

Congress passes an Article of War that prohibits the Army from returning runaway slaves to their masters.

April 25, 1862

Union naval forces under Commander David Farragut capture the important southern city of New Orleans, Louisiana.

May 13, 1862

South Carolina slave Robert Smalls steals a Confederate navy ship from Charleston Harbor and turns it over to the Union forces.

July 17, 1862

President Abraham Lincoln signs the Second Confiscation Act, which declares free all slaves who escape to the Union lines.

September 17, 1862

The Union army wins a decisive victory at the Battle of Antietam near Sharpsburg, Maryland.

September 27, 1862

The First Louisiana Native Guard, made up of African Americans from New Orleans's free black community, becomes the first official black regiment to join the Union army.

1863

The Militia Act, passed on July 17, 1862, allows former slaves to enroll in the U.S. Army.

January 1, 1863

President Abraham Lincoln signs the Emancipation Proclamation, which declares forever free most of the four million slaves living in the Confederate states. Excluded are approximately 450,000 slaves in the loyal border states, the 275,000 in Union-held Tennessee, and those in the parts of Virginia and Louisiana that are under Union control.

January 25, 1863

The Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Infantry becomes the first African American regiment in the North to join the Union army.

March 1863

The group of idealistic northern missionaries and teachers known as Gideon's Band arrives in Port Royal, South Carolina, intending to assist the large population of former slaves living there.

May 1863

The all-black Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment departs from Boston for South Carolina, where the soldiers will win acclaim for their bravery during a battle at Fort Wagner.

July 1–3, 1863

At Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, the Union army wins an important victory, forcing the Confederate army to retreat into Virginia.

July 4, 1863

After an eight-week siege, Union forces under General Ulysses S. Grant defeat Confederate troops in Vicksburg, Mississippi.

July 13–16, 1863

Nearly a thousand people are killed or wounded in a bloody race riot in New York City that highlights northern opposition to the war and white hostility toward African Americans.

November 1863

At Beaufort, South Carolina, the First South Carolina Volunteers become the first Union regiments of black soldiers to be formed in the Confederate states.

December 8, 1863

President Abraham Lincoln issues his Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, also known as the Ten Per Cent Plan. The plan allows almost any Southerner who will take an oath of loyalty to the United States to receive a full pardon and all rights of a U.S. citizen. Once 10 percent of a Southern state's population have signed the oath, the state may form a new government. Lincoln's plan is criticized by several members of Congress as too lenient toward the Confederacy.

March 1864

Davis Bend, Mississippi, is the site of an experiment in which about 5,000 blacks are given control over their own land and labor. The freed people not only establish their own government but, by 1865, raise almost 2,000 bales of cotton, earning a profit of $160,000.

July 4, 1864

President Abraham Lincoln pocket-vetoes the Wade-Davis Bill, which would have allowed a Southern state to be readmitted to the Union only after 50 percent of those who voted in 1860 signed a loyalty oath.

September 2, 1864

The Southern city of Atlanta, Georgia, falls to Union forces under General William T. Sherman.

November 8, 1864

Abraham Lincoln is reelected president.

November 16, 1864

Union general William T. Sherman leaves Atlanta, Georgia, and begins his "March to the Sea," which ends on December 21 when he takes control of the coastal city of Savannah without a fight.

January 16, 1865

Union general William T. Sherman issues his Special Field Order #15, which sets aside land along the Georgia coast for settlement by African Americans.

January 31, 1865

Congress passes the Thirteenth Amendment, officially abolishing slavery in the United States.

March 3, 1865

The U.S. Department of War establishes the Freedmen's Bureau, a federal agency authorized to assist the former slaves in their transition to freedom by distributing clothing, food, fuel, and medical care and to help coordinate the establishment of black schools. Later, the agency's powers will be expanded to set up black schools and handle legal cases brought by blacks.

April 3, 1865

Union forces capture Richmond, Virginia, the Confederate capitol. The next day, President Abraham Lincoln travels down from Washington, D.C., to stroll through the city.

April 9, 1865

Confederate general Robert E. Lee formally surrenders to the Union army at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia.

April 14, 1865

Southern actor John Wilkes Booth shoots Abraham Lincoln while the president is attending a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. Lincoln dies the next day, and Vice President Andrew Johnson is sworn in as president.

May 29, 1865

Choosing not to wait until Congress is in session, President Andrew Johnson announces his plan for the Reconstruction of the South. His program is so lenient toward the Confederacy that it will allow most of those who dominated Southern politics before the war to return to power.

Summer 1865

The Southern states hold conventions to form state governments under President Andrew Johnson's plan. They put in place new laws called Black Codes that are meant to restrict the employment options and personal freedom of African Americans. At the same time, Southern blacks hold Freedmen's Conventions throughout the South, at which they discuss and record their views.

Fall 1865

Noted orator and writer Frederick Douglass undertakes a speaking tour in support of voting and civil rights for freedmen. The following year, Douglass speaks and writes against the policies of President Andrew Johnson, who refused to use his federal powers to pursue voting rights for freedmen or to interfere with states on civil rights issues.

December 1865

Politician and former Union general Carl Schurz reports on conditions in the South, warning that blacks need the federal government's protection from hostile white Southerners. Although President Andrew Johnson ignores the report, many Northerners are horrified by its contents.

December 6, 1865

In an address to the Thirty-ninth Congress, President Andrew Johnson announces that the reconstruction of the South has been completed. Congress disagrees, and refuses to seat the new Southern representatives and senators.

December 18, 1865

After being named House chairman of a joint congressional committee on Reconstruction, U.S. representative Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania declares that it is the duty of Congress to supervise Reconstruction and demand tough terms of the former Confederate states, rejecting President Andrew Johnson's authority to define the terms of Reconstruction.

January 1866

Alexander Stephens, former vice president of the Confederate States of America, is elected to the U.S. Senate in Georgia under the Reconstruction Plan initiated by President Andrew Johnson. Congress, however, rejects the plan and does not allow Stephens to serve.

April 9, 1866

A Congress dominated by a group called the Radical Republicans passes the Civil Rights Bill over President Andrew Johnson's veto. This legislation guarantees that all persons born in the United States (except for Native Americans) are to be considered U.S. citizens with full protection of "person and property" under the law.

May 1, 1866

A three-day race riot begins in Memphis, Tennessee. When it is over, forty-six blacks will have died.

June 13, 1866

Congress approves the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which makes it illegal for any state to deny equality before the law to any male citizen.

July 16, 1866

Over President Andrew Johnson's veto, Congress passes a bill extending the life and expanding the powers of the Freedmen's Bureau.

July 30, 1866

Thirty-four blacks and three whites die in a race riot in New Orleans, Louisiana.

August 28, 1866

President Andrew Johnson embarks on what will prove to be a disastrous "swing around the circle" speaking tour.

November 1866

The Republicans win a landslide victory in the midterm elections. They are now in control of every Northern state legislature and government, and the Radicals Republicans in the U.S. Congress are at their peak of power.

March 2, 1867

Over President Andrew Johnson's veto, Congress passes the first in a series of Reconstruction Acts. This one divides the South into five military districts, to be run by military commanders until the states meet the federal requirements for forming new governments. Seeking to prevent Johnson from overriding the Republicans' Reconstruction efforts, Congress also passes the Tenure of Office Act, which limits the president from dismissing government officials who have been approved by Congress.

May 1867

Former Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest becomes the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, a white terrorist group formed a year earlier.

Fall 1867

In accordance with the Reconstruction Act, the former states of the Confederacy hold constitutional conventions. Nearly a million and a half voters are registered, including about seven hundred thousand African Americans.

February 1868

After President Andrew Johnson dismisses Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, whose political views differ from his own, Congress impeaches him on the grounds that he has violated the Tenure of Office Act and other charges.

May 1868

U.S. senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts offers a fierce argument in favor of removing President Andrew Johnson from office.

May 16, 1868

President Andrew Johnson is acquitted of violating the Tenure of Office Act. He escapes being dismissed from office by one vote.

June 1868

The states of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, and South Carolina are readmitted to the Union under the Reconstruction plan developed by the Republicans in Congress.

August 11, 1868

The death of U.S. representive Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania a longtime advocate for black equality, represents waning congressional advocacy concern for African American civil rights.

November 3, 1868

Civil War hero Ulysses S. Grant is elected president. The votes cast by newly enfranchised African Americans play a key role in his win.

1869

The newly formed Reconstruction governments are established.

February 26, 1869

Jefferson Davis, former president of the Confederate States of America, is released from prison following delays in his trial and a general amnesty proclamation for ex-Confederates by President Andrew Johnson.

May 1869

The National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) is founded by Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

February 25, 1870

Hiram Revels of Mississippi, the first African American to serve in the U.S. Senate, takes over the seat once occupied by former Confederate president Jefferson Davis.

March 30, 1870

The Fifteenth Amendment, which bars state governments from denying or abridging voting rights "on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude," becomes part of the U.S. Constitution.

May 31, 1870

In response to the widespread violence that had terrorized Southern blacks, Congress passes the first of three Enforcement Acts designed to protect the civil and political rights of African Americans.

1871

Congress declares that the Indian nations are no longer sovereign, an act that will lead to the gradual relocation of all Native Americans onto reservations.

April 20, 1871

The second Enforcement Act, known as the Ku Klux Klan Act, is passed by Congress.

May 1, 1872

The Liberal Republican Party nominates New York newspaper editor Horace Greeley for president. Two months later, the Democratic Party also nominates Greeley.

November 5, 1872

President Ulysses S. Grant wins reelection.

December 11, 1872

African American P. B. S. Pinchback becomes acting governor of Louisiana, serving for a little less than one month.

September 18, 1873

The period of serious economic decline known as the Panic of 1873 begins, set off by the bankruptcy of Jay Cooke, one of the most powerful bankers in the country. More than a million people lose their jobs, thousands of businesses close, and agricultural prices and land values fall. Miners and factory workers react to wage cuts with violent strikes.

March 11, 1874

With the death of U.S. senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, the waning influence of the Radical Republicans of Congress effectively ends. The Radical Republicans had controlled Reconstruction policy.

Fall 1874

To keep blacks away from the polls in the November elections in Mississippi, a program of terrorism called the "Mississippi Plan" is put into effect. Widespread violence and intimidation are successfully employed as weapons to prevent blacks from exercising their voting rights. Similar effects will be achieved by the same means in other states during the 1876 elections, leading to victories by white supremacists across the South.

November 1874

Blanche K. Bruce of Mississippi becomes the first African American to be elected to a full term to the U.S. Senate.

March 1, 1875

Congress passes the Civil Rights Act, which is meant to reinforce the government's commitment to protecting black rights. Key provisions of the act will be found unconstitutional in the Slaughterhouse Cases, which will come before the Supreme Court in the 1880s.

December 9, 1875

The Whiskey Ring corruption scandal erupts when President Ulysses S. Grant's private secretary, Orville E. Babcock, is charged with participating in fraud involving tax revenues.

November 7, 1876

The results of the presidential election in which Republican Rutherford B. Hayes narrowly beats Democrat Samuel J. Tilden are disputed. Four months later, in a compromise that will allow the Redemption movement to overthrow the southern Reconstruction governments, Democrats agree to accept Hayes's election if the government will leave the South to manage its own affairs.

April 1877

Federal troops are withdrawn from the state capitols of South Carolina and Louisiana, allowing white supremacists known as "Redeemers" to take control of these states' governments. Soon the Redemption movement will have overthrown all of the Reconstruction governments.

Summer 1877

President Rutherford B. Hayes tours the South and makes speeches announcing the end of Reconstruction.

Spring 1879

Discouraged by the overthrow of the multiracial Reconstruction governments by white supremacists, some Southern blacks migrate to the new western state of Kansas. Members of the Exoduster movement, as it is called, seek wider employment opportunities, protection of civil rights, and an escape from the anti-black violence that plagues the South.

1880

Poverty is widespread in the South, where the per capita income is only 40 percent of that of the North.

1881

Influential black leader Booker T. Washington is named principal of the Tuskegee Institute, which will soon become the leading black educational institution in the nation.

1887

The first Jim Crow law is enacted in Florida. This system of legalized segregation mandates separate schools and public facilities (such as hospitals, prisons, hotels, restaurants, parks, waiting rooms, elevators, cemeteries, and drinking fountains) for blacks and whites.

1894

W. E. B. Du Bois, who will become the leading black intellectual and founder of the Niagara Movement, earns a Ph.D. from Harvard University.

September 18, 1895

African American activist Booker T. Washington delivers his famous Atlanta Compromise Speech, in which he tells a white audience that blacks are more interested in economic advancement than political and social equality.

1896

In the Plessy v. Ferguson case, the Supreme Court validates the concept of "separate but equal," asserting that the Fourteenth Amendment was never intended to prevent social segregation.

January 1, 1913

African American communities across the nation hold Jubilee celebrations to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.

1929

The stock market crash marks the onset of the Great Depression, a period of economic hardship that will last until the entrance of the United States into World War II.

1955–56

Civil rights advocates take part in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, refusing to ride on the city buses of Montgomery, Alabama, until they are integrated. Many believe that this event inaugurates the Civil Rights Movement.

1965

The passage of the Voting Rights Act marks a new era in public and government commitment to the guarantee of black civil and political rights.