Political parties
republicAn party Following the Civil War the republican party felt they needed a change after the death of former Republican President Abraham Lincoln. This change as due to the re-admittance of the states of secession. The Republican disputed over this issue, saying that they should not be allowed back into the Union with out consequence. The radicals remained anti-slavery as well as still wanting to achieve peace but still felt that the southern states that made up the Confederacy should pay. The leading Radical Republican was Senator Charles Sumner. Sumner and many others believed that by the act of secession and war they had forfeited "all civil and political rights under the Constitution."
|
Democratic party The Democratic party was virtually the same the remained pro-slavery and actually had something in common with the republicans, they also wanted peace. The party had a brief pro-slavery problem though. The candidates the party had chosen as voices, failed to defend their pro-slavery position in the Democratic National Convention, this was the cause of a splitting of the democratic party. Still the South was trying to achieve peace and felt they could do so by means of rejoining the Union, but they knew that this process would not come easy and the new Republican party made sure of it. The Democrats knew that eventually that they would have to accept the abolition of slavery to achieve peace.
|
Tindall, George and David Shi. (2007). America, A Narrative History. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.