. Civil war and reconstruction in Alabama . eoretical,abohtion of slavery, he suggested that the newly estabhshed govern-ments might, as a measure of expediency, confer the privilege of votingupon the best negroes. He considered the matter of the suffragebeyond the control of the central government. The enfranchise-ment of the negro as a measure of revenge, and as a means of keepingthe southern whites down and the Republican party in power, neverentered his thoughts. President Johnson succeeded to the policy of Lincoln, or, atleast, to Lincolns belief that restoration was a matter for the exec
. Civil war and reconstruction in Alabama . eoretical,abohtion of slavery, he suggested that the newly estabhshed govern-ments might, as a measure of expediency, confer the privilege of votingupon the best negroes. He considered the matter of the suffragebeyond the control of the central government. The enfranchise-ment of the negro as a measure of revenge, and as a means of keepingthe southern whites down and the Republican party in power, neverentered his thoughts. President Johnson succeeded to the policy of Lincoln, or, atleast, to Lincolns belief that restoration was a matter for the execu-tive attention, not for the legislative. He asserted that secession 1 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol. VI, pp. 5-12. 2 Proclamation, Dec. 8, 1863, in Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol. VI,p. 213. Proclamation, July 8, 1864, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol. VI, p. 223.* Lincoln to Reverdy Johnson, Nicolay and Hay, p. Nicolay and Hay, Vol. IX, p. 457; Vol. X, p. Nicolay and Hay, Vol. VIII, p. Andrew Johnson. Charles Sumner. Thaddeus Stevens. RECONSTRUCTION LEADERS. CONSERVATIVE THEORIES 337 was null and void from the beginning; that a state could not committreason; that by the attempted revolution the vitality of the statewas impaired and its functions suspended but not destroyed; thatit was the duty of the executive to breathe into the inanimate statethe hfe-giving breath of the Constitution. He recognized no powerin Congress to pass laws preliminary to or restricting the admissionof duly qualified representatives of the states.^ The plan of Lincoln was, in theory and at first in practice, objec-tionable. It would recognize as the pohtical people of a state theloyal minority, which would be an ohgarchy, and the principle ofthe rule of majorities would thus be repudiated. Those who claimedto be loyal were not promising material for a new political people,and the 10 per cent governments were treated with just the plan
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