Collapse of the Reconstruction Timeline

  • Period: to

    Redemption

    Between 1869 and 1875, Democrats recaptured the state governments of Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. This is what the Democrats called their return to power in the South.
  • Grant Scandals

    During the early 1870s, scandals plagued the Grant administration. These scandals diverted public attention away from conditions in the South.
  • Amnesty Act

    With the Amnesty Act, passed in May 1872, Congress returned the right to vote and the right to hold federal and state offices—revoked by the Fourteenth Amendment—to about 150,000 former Confederates, who would almost certainly vote Democratic.
  • Slaughterhouse Cases

    Slaughterhouse Cases
    Most civil rights were ruled to be state, rather than
    federal, rights and therefore unprotected by the
    Fourteenth Amendment.
  • Panic of 1873

    Panic of 1873
    In September 1873, Cooke’s banking firm, the nation’s largest dealer in government securities, went bankrupt, setting off a series of financial failures known as the panic of 1873. Smaller banks closed, and the stock market temporarily collapsed.
  • Slaughterhouse Cases

    Slaughterhouse Cases
    Most civil rights were ruled to be state, rather than federal, rights and therefore unprotected by the Fourteenth Amendment.
  • Panic of 1873

    Panic of 1873
    Cooke’s banking firm, the nation’s largest dealer in government securities, went bankrupt, setting off a series of financial failures known as the panic of 1873. Smaller banks closed, and the stock market temporarily collapsed.
  • U.S. v. Cruikshank

    U.S. v. Cruikshank
    The Fourteenth Amendment was ruled not to grant
    the federal government power to punish whites who
    oppressed blacks.
  • U.S. v. Reese

    U.S. v. Reese
    The Fifteenth Amendment was determined not to
    grant voting rights to anyone, but rather to restrict
    types of voter discrimination.
  • US v. Cruikshank

    US v. Cruikshank
    The Fourteenth Amendment was ruled not to grant the federal government power to punish whites who oppressed blacks.
  • US v. Reese

    US v. Reese
    The Fifteenth Amendment was determined not to grant voting rights to anyone, but rather to restrict types of voter discrimination.
  • Compromise of 1877

    Compromise of 1877
    The price they demanded was the withdrawal of federal troops from Louisiana and South Carolina—two of the three Southern states that Republicans still governed. Second, the Democrats wanted federal money to build a railroad from Texas to the West Coast and to improve Southern rivers, harbors, and bridges. Third, they wanted Hayes to appoint a conservative Southerner to the cabinet. In the Compromise of 1877, Republican leaders agreed to the demands, and Hayes was inaugurated.