Figure 1.-- |
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Congress dominated by Radical Republicans refused to recognize the Southern regimes organized under President Johnson's Reconstruction policies. Congress insisted the seceeding states to adopt new state constitutions permitting black suffrage. This put America in the seemingly ironic condition that the ex-Confederate states now granted black sufferage , but 16 of the Union states did not permit black suffrage. Radical Reublicans thus proposed a Constitutional amendment to guarantee black sufferage (February 1869). Here there were two motivations. There was on the part of many Republicans to guarantee this central civil right to all black citizens. There was also the political advantage that virtually all the newly enfranchised blacks would vote Republicam. The Amendment read, "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." It was ratified February 3, 1870.
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