Manliness Quotes
This statement in the President’s Second Inaugural. Infuriated the politicians of the Southern States. Remember, at the time there was brutal discrimination throughout most of the South, and more important to the South than the fact if the discrimination was their perverse view that this was a right, proper and necessary state of affairs for the welfare of the people and was required by Christianity’s mandates as they read the Scripture. For the President to state so publicly that discrimination was contrary to the law, justice, good faith, citizenship and fairness was a major shock. Since the early days of reconstruction after the Civil war in the Grant Administration, no president had spoken so publicly and openly against the Southern status quo.
Some whites began to understand the negative effect that slavery had on the Negroes. He like many Northerners interested in the rehabilitation of former slaves was convinced that a strong education program was necessary and the ex-slaves should not be dependent in their ex-masters for the education and acclimation to American life. However, with a President (Andrew Johnson) uninterested in Black development and a local white population totally opposed to such efforts only a little progress was made and the consequences affected America for the next 100 years.