Post Civil War w/ Lincoln

So, what would happen if President Lincoln is not assassinated following the end of the Civil War?

From what I recall, Johnson based his reconstruction plans on the plans Lincoln had drawn up during the war and that were offered to the South if they would end the war early.
Since they didn't I've read somewhere that there is speculation that Lincoln would have issued a harsher reconstruction period on the South. Does anybody know if that is true or not?

Is there any chance that new states will be created instead of merely reinstating the old ones? Also, any way to enforce racial equality and prevent the KKK and Jim Crow?
Maybe encouraging northern settlers to move to the "southern territories" and also preventing those who'd fought for the Confederacy from voting or being elected to office?
 
Hmm..I'm drawing blanks on this one. Maybe its partly because I feel lincoln would have ended up being assassinated at some point after the Confederates loose. I mean heck, the south left the union because lincoln got elected in the first place.

Although, maybe it would have happened later in life, when he was possibly more vulnerable...
 
Since Lincoln's position was that the hadn't the authority to secede, as so were still US states, just in rebellion, then I think he would reinstate them, rather than creating new states or treating them as conquered territories.

His tone in his second inaugural address (charity for all, malice toward none) just weeks before his assassination does not indicate a harsher attitude toward the South.

If the Reconstruction were harsher, the pendulum would swing back even farther toward the KKK and Jim Crow when it ended.
 
Lincoln's plan was actually much, much nicer than Johnson's. I can't remember the specifics (this is coming from my 4th grade state history course) but I seem to recall something about a 10% plan. Where if 10% of the population agreed to rejoin the Union the state would be let back in.

In the long run I'm not sure what this would do.
 
Lincoln would not have counter-redistributed the land of the slaveowning elite. His policies would be gentler like Johnson's, and the Radicals get muzzled.
 
John Frederick Parker has done an excellent TL on this; I would recommend looking for ideas there.

Thank you :)

One thing about Lincoln's Reconstruction plan I do want to emphasize here is, while Lincoln was looking to be lenient toward the southern states, he was also brought around, by the end of the war, to the idea that negro enfranchisement was necessary in some form -- he was indicating openness to universal male suffrage, but was drawing the line at extending the vote to Union veterans.
 
Could I put in a plug for William C Harris With Charity For All ?

This is a good account of Lincoln's efforts to reconstruct occupied Southern states during the war. Besides the much written-about "Louisiana Experiment" it covers Arkansas and Tennessee on more detail than most popular histories, and also the less well-known attempts in Florida and North Carolina.

Regarding Lincoln's future plans, Harris takes the view that while not identical with Andrew Johnson's they would be closer to his apprach than to the Radicals'. He doesn't see any sign that Lincoln was moving nearer to their position.
 
Top