to join the confederacy, and its population remained loyal to the union throughout the civil war. this 90 minute event took place in knoxville tennessee. >> good afternoon, i welcome to the afternoon session of reconstruction tennessee. i serve on the centennial -- the sesquicentennial commission. it is my pleasure to welcome and introduce our session moderator dr. todd groce. dr.groce is the -- dr. groce is the president and ceo of the georgia historical society. he has had -- led institutions for raising $50,000 for capital endowment. born in virginia but more importantly, raised in

tennessee, he graduated from the university of memphis. while in graduate school, he taught american history at the university of tennessee and maryland college -- maryville college. he served five years and was the executive director of the east tennessee historical society and taking it through the next well -- level. in 1990 four, he was named the executive director of the georgia historical society. dr. groce: understands the power that history has to transform the future. he says, "the essence of what it means to be an american can be found in our history. when we understand the story of our unique democratic

institutions and traditions, how they were created, then we understand america. that is why it is crucial to teach our state's and nation's history, the survival of the republic depends upon it. it is also important to take an honest and unblinking look at the plast -- at the past. history is about understanding what happened and why based on the documentary evidence presented to us. we have to be willing to see the path as it was an accepted on our own terms, even if that contradicts what we always believed." and now, i will turn the panel over to his leadership. thank you. dr. groce: thank you laura, it is a real pleasure to see everyone out there today. we have a very good panel of

distinguished historians. dr. bobby levick and dr. tracy mckenzie from wheat and college. what i would like to do is jump right into the program, on behalf of them, welcome to everybody, we are delighted to hold this event. the site -- despite nearly half -- many if not most americans continue to see reconstruction as a dark and tragic era in our nation's history. indeed, little of the romance and fascination of the civil war applies to reconstruction, even though the two can be seen as one continuous event linked by common goals. the reunification of the nation, the destruction of slavery, and the freedom of african-americans. for decades, many, if not many

americans, except -- accept the myth of america, and this was in my hometown's newspaper in savanna last week about the surrender at appomattox. it talks about "the surrender and peace at appomattox." having surrendered confederate soldiers, the reunification of the nation would have been quickly achieved if a vengeful north had not stopped through the imposition of federal power to punish the white south of a tyrannical and alien state government run by northern carpetbaggers and incompetent former slaves. as the myth goes, there was the

heroic efforts of the ku klux klan and they rose up redeeming -- rose up, redeeming their state and transforming white civilization. this was made popular by movies and books such as "worth of a nation and it gave a sheen of respectability for jim crow. as historian jg -- james goodman observed, this is through decades of lynching and disfranchisement and-heightened prejudiced -- disfranchisement and heightened prejudiced. this afternoon, our panel of experts will tackle the problem of reconstruction, it's myths its realities, its successes

its failures, and how it came to shape and distort our understanding of the civil war. so gentlemen, thank you for being here and welcome. it's a jump right into it. what is cute -- what was reconstruction. -- one was reconstruction? -- what was reconstruction? tracy? dr. mckenzie the term -- dr. mckenzie: the term itself is more ambiguous than we typically use it, we are typically topping -- talking about what the federal government role was through the long-term consequences of the war. i like to tell my students that

if they studied the american civil war and stop their studies at appomattox, than they are not really interested in the civil war at all. that is true, because most of the issues were not really solved in april of 1865. some things were clear, the union had been preserved slavery had been abolished, but what they really would mean for the life of the country and the kind of union being preserved and what it would mean for former slaves, what it would mean for the balance of power politically between the democratic and republican parties, what it would mean for regional power, all of these are questions that are still up in the air. when we think of the mindset of southerners in the summer of 1865, the first thing that comes to mind is uncertainty. it is powerful and pervades

almost all ranks of society. so the period we refer to in reconstruction is where there is a national conversation as well as considerable conflict and violence trying to answer the question of -- trying to enter the long-term questions of the civil war. it is almost impossible to exaggerate how high the stakes are. dr. groce: we can't perceive this as one even went, you can say there is the civil war and it has ended and now there is peace, or do we really have peace? what happens as we get into reconstruction? can we talk about what it was and what is meant? >> yes, let's talk about one of the things that tracy meant here, historians like to call this period the second american revolution. it might even be more accurate to call it american resolution -- revolution?

what do we mean by that? one of the things that is absolutely clear and absolutely front and center in this issue is that the nation, the united states will be something new, it will be remade by this experience. where we see this morph -- this most fundamentally is in slavery. it is worth $3 billion, and that $3 billion is an incredible sum of money. per capita, white southerners are on balance richer than those of the north at the start of the civil war. one of the things that happened is frankly, a compensation -- confiscation of wealth. the united states is going to decide that it is no longer going to be a country that has property as persons built into its framework. united states had been a pro

slavery country for 50 of the first 72 years. that is all going to change and it is going to change through military force, it is going to change through the actions of enslaved people themselves becoming formerly slave people and free people. the 13th amendment will amend slavery and the 14th amendment will assure broad citizenship and the 15th amendment will allow voting rights regardless of rates -- race. this is absolutely a sea change in what the united states will be. dr. groce: dr. levitt -- dr. lovett? dr. lovett: i wrote down a little something because i wanted students to understand -- i am retired now -- there is an

african-american deal in reconstruction which is a failed experiment to many african-americans today. but most importantly, for us to be reminded that 150 years is nothing for people who were emancipated from slavery after 400 years. so naturally south african american writers like to boys -- dubois would understand why we have the perspective of seeing the reconstruction in 1835. my ancestors were enslaved persons who arrived at the port of trusted and annapolis from africa -- the port of charleston

and annapolis from africa. from north carolina in 1851 they came via the domestic slave trade, so our journey has been from west africa, the caribbean into charleston, into north carolina, and finally into tennessee, to where i am today. there it is a very -- that is a very short period of time. that is why we see it differently. during the great depression small landholders, this is during the aftermath of reconstruction, and laborers, this huge family, the cotton family moved to memphis.

and at the time, my mother's sister was just three months old , she told me just the other day. she still resided in the city in 1979. in the 40's, my post slavery family endured two generations of reconstruction. widespread lynching, economic repression and the triumph of tennessee era -- tennessee jim crow. most of all, most all of my family except for the 1851 generation of mary and henry houston, was still alive. all the generations except for the first generation. it shows you how short of this period is that we are talking about.

five generations lived under one roof in south memphis in a three room house. my preschool teacher was my great-great-grand uncle. his name was julius. my baby brother like the naming practices of slavery, is named julius, and he still lives in memphis. reminiscing of work assignments given out to old slaves during slavery times, julius was a babysitter for all of us toddlers. everybody had children in the house. he was blind and he was the one who stayed home and took care of all of us. he was our teacher. that is where i learned my tennessee history. he could talk about history and west tennessee all the way back

to slavery, which his parents were slaves. and therefore, we learned firsthand of a version of what happened through that 150 years. but anyway, his sister callie my great grandmother, she died in the upstairs bedroom while they were marching in the civil rights movement in downtown memphis in 1960-9061. -- 1960-1961. i was coming home from high school when they were bringing out her body from the house. she was a second-generation from slavery. i am going to use this as my basis that african americans had a peculiar institution of slavery and we have a peculiar

view of civil war and reconstruction so that will help hopefully in looking at some of those peculiar things. we are trying to see it from their eyes and mine. the civil war -- the real dispute was not about slaves and it was not about slavery. although slaves and slavery were a chief controversy, those two events in american history. but abraham lincoln and most american citizens had wanted the country to join the age of enlightenment. they have been talking about that since 1787 and in the cut the tuition in 1789. there was an intellectual and cultural revival that was going on in the western world at that time.

economically, the industrial revolution, and i think that reconstruction was about an income decision for this young american nation. and many dispute that -- one of those was slavery theories and compromises that was passed just to get the contribution -- get the constitution approved, but those issues were never solved. so the north won the war with the help of 200,000 african-american men. they won the war. so they won the right to dictate what direction the nation would follow. there would be no slavery.

and negro americans would become citizens. that was a radical decision that had not been made before. indians would not be citizens, they were to be put in reservations, and here is the most radical decision that would come to kate reconstruction. -- that would complicate reconstruction. this is a decision that was made by northerners. number 2 -- number three native americans would be left out. but a decision had to be made. and number four, mexican americans would remain as spoils

of war. the war had only been a few years ago and decisions had to be made, and those decisions were made towards the reconstruction time including in the 1870's and 1880's. number five, the idea of american democracy but how would american democracy pan out since the civil war? in american democracy, they decided it would be refined also they decided it would be extended, and that is where the 14th and 15th amendments come in and later the 20th amendment. it is going to be refined and it is going to be amended. it is not going to be the old jacksonian democracy. number six, repudiation of the

state's white theory -- state's writes theory, and we are debating that today in the supreme court -- state's rights theory and we are debating that today in the supreme court. this also gives the government citizens which it did not have in 1787, and finally, they rejected the elite class as a basis of the american social order. that one is still going on about the disparity of wealth and 1% of the nation controlling the rest of the nation. that was the decision made after the civil war made by those in the north in it reconstruction.

-- in reconstruction. and finally, the pursuit of the theory of capitalism and free labor. they were not just talking anymore about this, they made a decision, and especially if you read the letters and the writings of abraham lincoln that is what he is talking about when he is talking about slavery has to go. it was a threat to free labor and lincoln and others made the decision this country is going to be based on capitalism and free labor. those, as i see it, where the real reconstruction issues. dr. groce: so, then, to summarize very broadly i inc. this is very important, because i think one of the questions we are going to get towards the end, how is this a success and how is this a failure?

we have an agenda that is set to remake the south by making it a true democracy and we are going to end slavery and we are going to create now a government system where a union is going to be held together -- where the union is going to be held together. you are talking about states; ri -- states' rights. so we have all this scholarship over the past 50 years about reconstruction and what it was that the public still has this sort of negative image. where does that come from and why du think that continues to persist? where does that image come from -- and why do you think that exists? where does that image come from?

anyone? >> to get the ball rolling, one of the reasons we see public resistance is that it is incredibly messy and complicated. it is very hard, state-by-state it is a very, sort of, difficult process. secondarily, it is because of the stories themselves. people like us appear at this table, except for 100 years ago we are largely white historians, we are largely in the for all of something called the dunning school for a period of years, starting in the 19 teens started by wbe devoid -- d. b. e.

dubois. a second ago, he talks about how africans reconstructed democracy in america. one of the things that the dunning school at the turn of the century argues is not only of that african americans are sort of inferior, but more importantly, incapable of democracy, incapable of self government. i think one of the main things in his work himself is to suggest that some people were not fit to participate in american democracy. so for dunning and dunning's school, we see this finally overturned in the era of civil rights, but it is something that has hung with us and permeated the discourse about what was

going on in reconstruction and what it was about. dr. mckenzie: let me just jump in and add a few things. i think there are a lot of factors going on and one thing that immediately pops out to me is popular culture, i don't think we should under estimate -- underestimate the popularity of feature-length films. one of the first feature-length films in america is "birth of a nation," at it resented reconstruction in the most lurid kinds of tones and "gone with the wind," which reinforced that. it had the same kind of message. dr. groce: tracy, remind us of what woodrow wilson said? dr. mckenzie: birth of a nation -- "birth of a nation" was screened at the white house, and i am not sure what he said, and

something to the effect of writing history with lightning and wilson totally endorsed it. this particular reading of the american past. it is a kind of very negative view of reconstruction that is consistent with political ideology that is reflexively skeptical for the potential of government to be used as a positive agent in change or social justice. so if that is one of's view, a negative understanding of reconstruction becomes one of the great exhibits of evidence to reinforce that. i think the negative view of reconstruction, if we could narrow it it for folks are little bit it has been upheld by white southerners, and it has been psychologically very comforting. not long after the civil war, southern whites began to create

their own history of the civil war, and it was a history that had very little to do about slavery at all. it would have been preposterous to say that, but almost immediately after the war that almost immediately became the argument. for white southerners, at least, they will begin to create a story which says that there had really not been a race problem in this part of the country, and race relations has been relatively harmonious, but it is that sort of damn yankees idea where there began to be a race problem, so reconstruction again became one of those great examples of that. the argument -- there are sort of two dimensions to this argument -- one was that african

americans were quite content as slaves and it was only under a free society that racial conflict came to the fore, and the second issue was that slavery was being phased out or was being phased out gradually without violence and much more effectively in the long turn then at the point of a bayonet. this, again, feeds into an interpretation where race problems were created and if the government had just let itself alone, everything would have worked out well. a historian named david potter writing in the 1960's, he taught at harvard and was a georgia native, and he said the truth is just not very psychologically satisfying to white southerners. i think that has something to do why this presentation of reconstruction is so persistent. if i may add one other thing

you talked about how complicated it is, and history is messy. i start this with my students, and i say this in latin, and it is the idea that history is complicated. with reconstruction, there was some ugly aspects to it. while in the north, there was a dimension of a voice for federal activism that was motivated by the highest principles and by really genuine commitment to social justice, there was a lot of self interest and partisan scheming and manipulation. so it is not fair to say that it was all noble or also interested, because it was both. there is a grain of truth to this negative perception of reconstruction. dr. groce: i deal with folks all the time who want to talk about just giving us the facts, when talking about the past, just give me all of these facts let's not go through the interpretation.

but they don't understand just how complex -- they understand the world that we are living in today is complex but they want something that is very simple, and we just want a straightforward answer to something, and we all know if i were to ask you what is going on in this room right now everybody have a different interpretation and a different understanding. that is a fact, but what it -- what is it all about? i think this is something that is a real challenge for us as historians, people don't understand the purpose of history and how many words. let's talk a little bit about tennessee in itself. because this is what the session is about. how is tennessee different, how did it have a different story than the rest of the cell? -- of the south? dr. harlow: tennessee is quite

different, and i am working on a book, and i am a student right now since i am working on a book. i am learning all kinds of things while doing research, and you try to reeducate yourself so that you can be nor -- be more intelligent on that subject. i think the argument is that one of the reasons there is such a negative interpretation of that historical event reconstruction, which some historians target at 1865 and others in 1877 and other say and tell 1890 and in my book i go on to say it goes until 1896, and so many say, what is the period that is covered in a reconstruction? my argument is, from what i have learned, the family that i mentioned, and so on, this era

of reconstruction never ended for african-americans. it is as important today as it was 150 years ago, because many of the issues that i listed have never been concluded in american history and in american life, but one of the reasons that people don't like reconstruction today is because we continue to base reconstruction on that argument of race relations. as people say today in certain cities, we've got to improve race re;atlations, and it wasn't race relations, it was race. once slavery was now based on race, as i see it, after the revolutionary war and after

indentured servitude and redemption contracts and conflict contracts ended and slavery was purely based on race , and that was what was upset by the civil war. the civil war and its aftermath completely restructured southern society. despite the fact that there was sharecropping and dear slavery conditions still experienced by many of the former slaves, it was completely reconstruction -- reconstructed. and then the 14th amendment which we argue in the supreme court today, that argument is aced on the 14th amendment, the most radical part of the -- based on the 14th amendment, the most radical part of the constitution. of course, aced on that, people began -- based on that, people

began to resent society. it began to reconstruct all of society and society is still being reconstructed as it was not completely reconstructed by 1877 18 80, or 18 -- 1880 or 1890, or 1896. it was about one word, and it was about race. people don't like to talk about it today, despite all of the things going on, people will say, no, that is not the problem. bad relations, you know? it is about once that word became the basis of how reconstruction would go then of

course it has been a complex issue, reconstruction. remember, northerners were also against slavers. but remember, there were many who were not for it. there were northern missionaries who would help to keep these people down here, we don't want them to cross the ohio river and come up there and compete with us socially and economically. as i said in my civil rights book, civil rights never crossed the ohio river in the 1960's. i think we have to do more work on what race meant in america in the 18th century and the 19th century and the 20th century and now, here we are a short time later in the 21st century.

what did race do and how did it play a role to americans in the north and south? these were revolutionary changes. this was a radical change in the constitution. that radical change in the constitution made a proposed radical change in american society, and we've got to put all of that together to finally try to understand what really happened and why some of us do not like reconstruction. but frederick douglass said when he was asked the same question before his death in 1895, and incidentally, he spoke here in knoxville, he spoken chattanooga, he came to speak in nashville, he spoke in memphis he toured this state during reconstruction three times. and douglass said the past is not dead and it cannot die as

people would wish the past would die, and we won't talk about it. he said, the past is not dead and the past cannot die, there are no bygones, said douglass. the evil that men do continues long after they are dead. we would rather forget the bad part of history and only remember the heart -- the part that we can glorify and celebrate, so i think we need to keep in mind that one big word, and it is probably going to end up in two volumes covering slavery and the civil war and reconstruction in tennessee because it is a complex one missing one word, and that word is how did race play in these historical events? dr. groce: it was revolutionary in the sense, particularly that you've got an example where

there is a slave population that is freed and within just a couple of years they are voting, many of them are holding office, this was an extraordinary revolutionary experiment really, in america. there is writing about the role of the military in reconstruction, and one of the things pointed out was that surrender was not the end of the war but a turning point in the war, and that wartime continues even when open hostilities may have ended, there was still guerrilla activity, and paramilitary organizations, and the white south only exceeds the federal power when the power did not threaten their control over african-americans. so just because they are silent and because they have been defeated on the battlefield doesn't mean they have been

subdued, or they have changed their thinking overnight about the issues of race. well, let's talk about tennessee. we've got some interesting characters in tennessee, and we had lunch together earlier, and we were talking about some of those. we have a president of the united states during the first era of reconstruction, he was specifically from east tennessee. tennessee's's story is not the rest of the confederate south. so -- tennessee's story is not the restsame as the rest of the confederate south. dr. mckenzie: i think this is something that most people is familiar with and generally how we tend to forget, and this is how staunchly unionist the state of tennessee was.

about 60% of voters in tennessee voted against secession. i don't know if that is so much an expression to the union as it is an tip the two wars -- antipathy towards tennessee. so what ever the forces are behind that, there was a very strong unionist population in east tennessee around 30,000 east tennessee at males will go into the northern army, that is more than some northern states, and this contingent becomes a kind of foundation for the beginning of an indigenous republican party within the state. the leader of this movement, there are really two, and you referred to them both, one was green county's andrew johnson who serves as a united states

senator when the war begins and as a military governor of tennessee and becomes a vice president shortly after the war is over, and then carson brownlow who had spent part of his youth in the lands near knoxville and becomes a leading unionist leader as well. so you have a political situation in the immediate aftermath of the war, for all intents and purposes, all the state's unionist had any political voice. a combination of andrew johnson in the white house and carson brownlow as the governor will help that for a brief period of time. the electorate is disenfranchised and the unionist majority has a stranglehold on the government, and they work very quickly to try and cooperate with federal policy

that is being fashioned by washington d.c. the centerpiece of that is as professor lovett was suggesting, the 14th amendment. every state who participated in the rebellion would have to agree to that in order to be enfolded again in the national government. nashville acted very quickly to do that, so tennessee is the first state to ratify the 14th amendment. and in so doing that, tennessee is able to escape from implications passed in march of 1867 called the first reconstruction act. the first reconstruction act establishes military rule for the defeated confederacy. the confederacy is divided into military diction -- military

areas and they are subject to military rule. among all the confederate states, tennessee is the one that is not included in that military rule. so it is a very unique story and second thing, and i won't go into much detail, but the second thing turns out faster here. because the governor of the state legislature actually -- vanquished by 1869. i 1870, you have a conservative majority that has gained control of the state, and any potential for dramatic change in race relations, the window had closed for that. dr. groce: one of the things that we do move very quickly on in 1870 is african-american voting. brownlow reveals that he is a racist guy who has harsh

feelings against african-americans, so why is he ever kidding for african-american voting rights? dr. mckenzie: most americans are unionist, and that is going to be the support for the brownlow government, so the only thing to perpetuate control is to in definitely -- indefinitely -- that renders state government fundamentally essentially illegitimate. so brownlow's feeling pressure from the very beginning to back away from the policy that had disenfranchised loyal white confederates. so if you are gradually going to ring him more and more of that white population back into the confederate, you are going to lose the state government unless you can put the ballot in the hands of the state of tennessee's black male population. they will try to enfranchise

blacks as early as 1870's -- the 1870's. dr. harlow: i think apart -- a part we are missing is a black initiative. what were blacks doing about these issues? were they in front of brownlow over the following brownlow -- or were they following brownlow? and they were in front of brownlow on the suffrage issue. in 1864, 6 men returned from syracuse, new york, the national colored men's convention from west tennessee and middle tennessee -- convention, three were from west tennessee and three were from middle tennessee.

one of the issues was abolishment of slavery. you had the emancipation proclamation, which didn't even pretend to free slaves in tennessee because lincoln exempt in tennessee like he did a couple of other states. so african-americans had taken in their own initiatives to push for constitutional emancipation. because remember, the proclamation, the next president can throw it out the door, it was just a proclamation by lincoln. it was nothing official or constitutional. so we knew that, african-americans, and in syracuse, new york that was one of the first goals they established, was the constitutional abolishment of slavery. secondly, if all of these african-americans, 33,000 of

them, were going to die on the civil war battlefield, they wanted the right to vote. suffrage was on the agenda and at -- on the agenda at syracuse at the coalition. so they formed her first civil rights organization, and that was the national equal rights league. if you look at the national equal rights league of 1864 that is prior to the agenda, they are pushing for the right to vote they knew that they needed political power, because politics is meant for an american environment. that is how this wealthy country split up, who gets something and who gets nothing and who gets the crumbs? that is what politics is for, it is not about civil rights. so they pushed for that.

january 1, 1865, they brought the president of the national equal rights league to tennessee, and he spoke in the house of representatives to more than 2000 people. and we look at his speech, he is calling for equal rights and suffrage, that is, the right to vote. the very next month, march 5, tennessee becomes the first state, other than maryland and missouri to abolish slavery on its own, and they abolished slavery on march 5, just months after all of that activity by african-americans. then, the next month, april 5 when they are closing in on richmond including 25,000 troops under grant, they pass, of course the 14th amendment

ratification. so there are things going on around brownlow and before brownlow and they are initiated eye blacks. -- by blacks. in fact, the first thing they will do when they are confronted by andrew johnson is that they will place this upon his shoulders and johnson will have a very bad session, as many know, with that delegation of lack leaders saying, are you going to support suffrage? are you going to support equal rights? one of the things that i learned from my old advisor at the university of arkansas, who recently passed, was for a long time, we were writing history with blacks as the object in the sentence. and we missed the point because

we did not put them in the front of the sentence as the predicate. as the actors. we did not say, blacks did this, blacks did that, rather, things were done to him things were done for him, and consequently we missed the point of history. so brownlow'is no -- brownlow's not having pressure from northern republicans to do this in february 1867, but he is having pressure from african-americans within tennessee. by the time he gets the suffrage will pass through the general assembly, blacks have had dooku state colored men's conventions -- have had two state colored men's conventions of their own. when we look at the objections that they established, one of them was suffrage.

so brownlow is also reacting, i think, not only to what northern radical republicans want him to do in order to save the republican party and in order to save tennessee and to keep them in power as long as he possibly can, but behind the scenes african-americans are in the front of that sentence. they are taking the action. they are the actors. they are saying, we want the right to vote. we have served in the military. we have saved the union. we have restored the union. we have saved democracy. now we want the right to vote. so brownlow had a lot of support from black voters in tennessee, but that was not only from a unionist but also from black tennesseans. dr. groce: one important thing we need to add here -- dr.

lovett: one important thing we need to add here is that reconstruction -- and we tend to think about reconstruction as what was or was not done -- but one of the things that we need to bear in mind is the incredible of violent resistance to the idea of things that are faster -- professor lovett was talking about. we had nathan bedford forrest and his grand wizards, and one of the things that happened in tennessee because it does not have military occupation by the united states army is that there is no federal force from the outside to protect the vote for african-americans. so governor romo is in a position where he creates what is called the state guard -- governor brownlow is in a

position where he creates what is called the state guard. in 1867, when you have an opportunity for african-americans to vote for the first time in tennessee, what do you have? violence. 1868, may be the worst year for violence are crusty united states, maybe in american history, 1869, conservatives are going to be rising, and you will see violence again. the state guard is created by brownlow as sort of a militia. it is going to play across the south for voting for african-americans and violent from white to revolutionary -- counterrevolutionary activity. dr. groce: so what is the legacy of reconstruction? what were the successes? were there any?

we talk about the failures of reconstruction. were there any successes that came out of reconstruction and why did it come to an end the way it did? dr. holder: i think it is actually important to say, and for myself, it is not a failure it is a political program to expand american citizenship maybe a coup d'etat may be an appropriate term, but i think one of the things that we have to bear in mind when we look at anything in american history is the maximum amount of contingency and the things that hang in the balance, and i think looking at the massive amount of change that occurs in american history during this period are

people who were held as property tenures later are voting a citizens -- ten years later are voting as citizens. as professor lovett already mentioned, it is not race -- racism but race. part of the american fabric changes. dr. harlow: i think a lot of the successes -- dr. lovett: i don't think success is in in 1896, and that is because you had plessy versus ferguson, and that overturned on a lot of things that had gone in during reconstruction. the supreme court itself is

saying that separate but equal is ok and we have to deal with that until brown versus board of education in 1954 when another supreme court says it is not ok. but here are the successes, one of those would be the 13th amendment, december 18, 1865 which was a radical amendment. remember now what is going across the seas in 1862. this was a radical change, because i believe it is only three sentences, or if it is that many, maybe two to sentences -- two sentences, it abolishes slavery just like that. because it abolishes slavery by one stroke of the pen by 1865,

it nullifies three sections of the 1877 -- 1787 constitution. it nullifies the act by those states. and incidentally, the last state that existed then to ratify the 13th amendment was mississippi. that was january 2013, that mississippi finally ratified the constitution. talking about civil war and the reconstruction still continuing, they believed it was still on, because they had ratified that amendment until just recently. if you look in the federal register, finally, january of 2013, mississippi had that ratified. 150 years later, almost. the other thing is, well, that

is a radical positive change because it changes african-americans from property to persons. that was a great success of reconstruction. they are no longer property. they are persons. and then the 14th amendment the 1866 civil rights bill that is embodied into the 14th amend it, that says that they are now also citizens. it simply says all persons born in these united states are citizens of these united states, a very clever amendment that was passed, and that was one of the most positive. it endures today. we had the supreme court discussing the 14th amend today about equal rights and

the 15th amendment which is the right to vote that will be protected. it does not say anything about race color. the constitution of united states in 1897 said nothing about white or black. these are very clever amendment that change the structure of american society and radically changed our constitution. but most importantly when the republicans in tennessee decided that african-americans could vote, you are talking about men. consequently, what does that do it every, 1867? it radicalize the. -- them. that is going to be a big fight.

now you are saying a black man is equal to me? he can step up to the polls and vote? and so black men were masculinized for the first time because all of the masculinity had been taken out of them during the days of slavery. that is why many of these people are going to relish the right to vote. because it gives them masculinity. one of the speakers at the 1865 colored men convention in tennessee, meeting international at the st. john's of physical church, which is still there today -- episcopal church, which is still there today in nashville. he said, we are ready have a one right -- the right to have a gun. he was a sergeant. he said, we have the gun

now we are going to get the ballot. black and were very conscious of the fact that fighting in the civil war did not give them masculinity completely. but if they get the right to vote they will be able to step up to the polls and vote just like any other man. that has been debated. do black men need to be equal to white men in american society? i think those were the successes of the reconstruction. we'll get the failure completely of reconstruction until the 1890 land grab amendment, which allowed federal money to go to states who denied blacks higher education. they could set up a separate school. that was a big confession on the part of the north, a part of this nation that we are going to allow them to segregate on the

basis of race. now some of the masculine the is taking away. and finally the u.s. supreme court in 1896, messi versus ferguson says, don't worry about it, everything is ok. you can discriminate as long as you make it equal. you can put him on this car as long as you given an equal car on the railroad. this case, to me, is when we began talking about the failure of reconstruction. as you can probably tell from my words, it has been continuous reconstruction -- it has never ended. we have never solved all of these problems in our society. professor groce: how are you going to a compass that? is it better to have an army in

the south and hold them at the units point -- at bayonet poiuntnt? or is having them have their civil rights the means through which to do that? ultimately the nation comes to a point that that is the success that we have. we can't keep the army there forever. so we are going to see it as a success because we are unable to bring african-american into the voting body politic. dr. harlow: successes failures, and why does it come to an end the way that it does? my daughter said that when i died, the epitaph on my tombstone will be "it is compl icated." [laughter] i don't know if is a good legacy were not, but as historians we learn the complexity of history. i think the panel has captured

the ingenuity. certainly the 13th and 14th amendments are landmarks. they are see changes in a way that the mobile government functions. they are sea changes that are truly realized essentially later. we want to emphasize that the president has established if we don't on innovation -- if we build on innovation or emphasized the greek to which these were not utilized, these instruments are very persistent in the late 19th century. it largely depends upon your perspective. i think what we learn from reconstruction is, that to the degree that it was an experience to promote a different racial order in america, it was a experience with a dramatic advance in popular opinion, not just in the form of the states, but in the country as a whole. when civil war printout, 93% of african-american males are

disqualified voting, explicitly on the basis of their race by state law. the u.s. military in 1860 did not allow people of color to serve in the u.s. army. that actually changed before the u.s. color troops could be created. in the blink of an eye, when black enfranchisement was imposed in the south, it was dramatically ahead of what the nation as a whole had in terms of any broad commitment to enforcing. i post that with my students -- how might it have been different? was there a consensus to use military force for a long period of time? at consensus did not consist. there was a great deal of skepticism and suspicion about a sustaining army in peacetime which is what they had been calling for. when all is said and done, remaking the racial map in the

south was vastly more difficult than defeating the robert -- defeating the armies of robert e lee. i do not feel it wasn't cultural commitment to win in that regard. dr. harlow: it may depend on the battlefield, but they are not subdued. in construction, we see the continuance of an allowance and complete erosion of african-american -- dr. lovett: i think we forget that spanish-american war of 1898. that was about the time that we conciliation took place between northern whites and a southern whites. they all agreed pretty much on plessy versus ferguson. that was their consultation that

we don't take into consideration. there is a we conciliation -- a re-conciliation and they pretty much agree on some things. one of the things they agree on is about race. as people say, martin luther king got in trouble when he tried to take the civil rights movement to chicago. you had a bloody end because a lot of space between how southern whites think and how northern whites think. we sometimes separate that, and say, so that was more keen already because they have more black amongst them, as when a missionary said coming down into kenzie. -- into tennessee. my god, there are so many blackstone your, it looks like a cloud of smoke. -- so many blacks down here it looks like a close look.

they do not have many blacks in the north. most of them lived in the south. southerners lived around a lot of blacks all the time. they looked at race a little more differently than a northerners, but not too much different. there is not that much of a difference. wallace proved that in his campaign for president in the 1960's, he won as much as he did north as he did south, the most. we have to look at that reconciliation as a whole conciliation of the north and south about how to deal with race by 1899. and then look at in supreme court cases that have passed 1899 and 1904. there really is a political we

conciliation about how race will be handled in america one generation after the civil war had ended. we have to take those things into consideration. we also need to, in our study of reconstruction focus on immigration. by the end of that reconstruction immigration has impacted this country for, what 60 years? one of the things i cover in the book is a whole chapter on immigration and slavery in tennessee. then immigration in the civil war in tennessee. non-anglicans coming to the country in droves by the 1840's and 1850's. they are not english. they are coming from non-english

countries. the ladies of the american revolution will tell you that. they will say, we are the original american, and those other people who can, they are the russians. my brother in indiana said, people who are from the south russia are taking our jobs. americans looked at all of these people coming in from germany some of the irish, i will be talking about jews. all of these people are coming in in the 1840's-18 50's, and then there is really a proliferation in the 1890's. i think most of you would agree if you look at the 1890's census. have they are in to how america will be remain? -- remade? what role do they think

blacks play in that society? there was the rise in new york against the draft. those rights were because he passed the emancipation proclamation. there were people saying, i cannot going to be drafted to fight slaves who will come up here and take my job. there is that whole component which i am working on, of immigration from a europe in the 1830's 1840's and 1850's, especially in a place like memphis. those people were going to be immigrants by the time the war breaks out in 1861. we need to take the reconcil iation into consideration. you may set it earlier or later. and then, of course, figure in

how the mass event of immigration affects what is going on in tennessee and the nation in that generation after the civil war? they had some thing to say about this too. they have something to say about race. as you will see in the publications from 1900-1915 those that came out during that period of time. there are other dynamics went on. those will affect the first reconstruction and then how reconstruction continues up until today. dr. groce: another part of the reconviction story, if we are going to bring the nation taken -- together again, we stop talking about slavery and focus on what the two sides have in

common. that provides the platform for the reconciliation. but at the same time as you pointed out, african-american rights have deteriorated. and it was not a coincidence that happened at the same time. dr. lovett: the important thing is that northern white and southern whites agreed on the matters of race, how race is going to fit into society. we forget that from time to time. we don't like to talk about it. the best book i have ever read, and i made my students read in american history, is a book by a german psychologist. his book is simple entitled "the question of a german guilt." which is a series of lectures date in a university in germany over and over again, the question of german guilt. he says, we don't like to talk

about what happened in germany because everybody is guilty. he says his physical guilt, i can take a gun and shoot you but then it metaphysical guilt. nobody wants to talk about those things, how they played a part. northerners did not want to talk about what they did during slavery. but they built an industrial machine. they built capitalism out of slavery. the textile mills were there. they were making their wealth off of the south, and the south was making its wealth off of the slaves. they were not innocent. and northerners recognized that they were not innocent of slavery. they were transporting the slaves from rhode island over to west africa. a booming industry for them in

the north, even though they were abolishing slavery. in modern times, it is like what carl gasper says, the question of german guilt -- germany, you need to talk about this, but germans do not talk about this. america, you need to talk about this, but americans do not want to. they only want to talk about the military history of the civil war, who won the war, who won this battle, the glorification of generals and officers and all about. and they don't want to talk about the social-political issues and economic issues of the civil war. northerners do not want to talk about it either. they are not having the kind of celebrations we are having right now down south and in tennessee by the time of civil war and reconstruction in the north. but they should be because the primary problem has not been solved.

dr. groce: one last question before we open it up to the audience. looking at the recent experience in iraq, what lessons can we draw from the period of reconstruction about how wars and and how america ends its wars? dr. harlow: i don't have an answer to that question. [laughter] but what i can say is that for a long time, historians thought that it was no real significant occupation of the south during reconstruction. part of that was because of the things you are ready talked about, where white supremacist backlash was so profound that it seemed like there was no support federally for the right to free people, equal voting, etc.. what historians are now starting to find out, and there is a fine book bycalled "after appomattox."

what others are showing is that there wasn't an occupation, in fact there was an obligation -- an occupation, and by global standards, it is a profound occupation. in fact, the force that would have been required is so much more profound than what anyone could have imagined at the time. andrew johnson says yeah, you can use the force of the military. use the force luke. sorry. [laughter] there is more where that came from. i was terrible. [laughter] in all seriousness, the issue is that the lesson, if there is such a thing to be learned from history, is that often times the task is far greater than you could possibly imagine. and often times, the work required to do what you think is

necessary is far greater than you can imagine. and you want to approach the tasks with humility. and honesty and the clarity of purpose that is not clouded by a variety of limiting processes. in american reconstruction, the fault on the ground -- default on the ground was that having any troops whatsoever in the american south is foolhardy. it turns out there was not enough to do the job. in our own time, a little bit of caution, thinking that maybe this will be harder than we think is a useful concept. dr. groce: greg uses the concept that peace would follow, not create world.

it is interesting when you think that lessons or experiences recently in which we declared a war to be over, and yet it really isn't over. the turmoil continues, the fighting continues, but just on another level. let us opened up to q&a from the audience. i think we have a microphone over here. if you would please, make your way to the microphone so that everyone can figure question. and if you would please, ask a question as opposed to making a statement. that would be wonderful. [laughter] and the panelists appear would have something to respond to. thank you very much. >> reconstruction is in many ways an active nationbuilding. it is an economic, social, political act of remaking a nation into something new. it is not the only place this is happening around the world. how does it compare to germany

russia japan italy -- places around the world that are going through either major emancipation's, major political unification, other kinds of major social transformations at that exact time in the 1860's? how would an international -- transnational perspective make the reconstruction process look differently? dr. groce: i need to ask the panel to answer that rather than myself. dr. harlow: one thing that is significant that was said over 30 years ago writing a book called "nothing but freedom." what he says in that book is that the u.s., what is different about american emancipation is that freedom comes with

citizenship rights and the vote. at least for men. and in other places, it comes with land or something like that, but that inclusion in the polity that all people were born in the united states would be part of the fabric of the country is something that is distinctive. dr. groce: other questions? i take it that there are no other questions. thank you very much. get our panel a round of applause, please. [applause] >> the civil war airs here every saturday at six clark and 10:00 p.m. eastern time. to watch more of our civil war programming anytime, visit our website cspan.org/history.

you are watching american history tv, all weekend, every weekend on c-span3. this sunday night at 8:00 eastern on first ladies, influence and image, we look at the personal lives of three first ladies. and harrison never set foot in the white house because her husband william henry harrison died after a month and office. letitia tyler becomes first lady went john tyler assumes the presidency. but she passes away just a year and a half later. the president remarried julia tyer, which is the first photographed first lady. sunday night at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span original series -- first ladies, influence and image. examining public and private lives of the women who build the role of first lady, from martha washington to michelle obama.