How would the U.S. continue to be a prosperous country now that the plantations have been burned and the South is devastated in population, resources, and labor?

Many people and organizations lobby the U.S. Congress for passage of bills that affect them. In this scenario, you will be one of those stakeholders, representing your state (Connecticut). Perhaps you are the governor of the state of Connecticut. You write a detailed memo with your carefully thought-out proposal about how your state, Connecticut would like to proceed with the Reconstruction of the Union. This proposal must be palatable enough for the other side to accept, while remaining true to your home state. Think about the success of the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1830. The meat of your paper will be this proposal, which will come to life after you provide the necessary historical context of your state.
At this point in U.S. History, national leaders had several challenges to face:
• How the U.S. as a governmental experiment is perceived on the world stage: is it resilient or a failure?
• How would the U.S. continue to be a prosperous country now that the plantations have been burned and the South is devastated in population, resources, and labor?
• Will the U.S. continue to be an agricultural country, or only an industrial one? What is the cost of sacrificing agriculture?
• How will the U.S. incorporate freedmen into society? Are they worthy ofequal rights?
• How do you bring back a resistant South while providing for the rights the North insists?
• Can the U.S. prevent another Civil War?
Four Sections of your State Memo:
1. History: Brief recap (1-2 paragraphs) of your state’s history (Connecticut), to include:
1. Purpose for its founding (economic, religious, political)
2. Development as agricultural or industrial
3. Relationship with slavery

2. Connecticut’s perspective on the Compromise of 1850 and the antebellum period of disunion (1-2 paragraphs)
a. Support with a quote from the class readings assigned for April 13 (I will attach in documents)
3. Secession and Civil War (1-2 paragraphs)
1. South/Border: Did it secede (leave the Union)? What were its reasons for
staying or leaving?
2. North: What were your reasons for fighting in the Civil War?
4. Recommendations for Reconstruction (2-3 pages). Now that the war is over, how would you bring the South back into the Union? There are several plans to consider: Lincoln’s plan, Johnson’s plan, Radical Republicans’ plan, or a mashup of these. You have the benefit ofhindsight, but you’re writing in the past. Some questions (you don’t have to answer all of them) to consider about civil rights, economics, politics:
1. Would you be lenient for expediency, or tough to protect African Americans?
2. Would you make it a short transition or a long duration? What do you lose based on your choice?

3. Will you compensate slaveholders for their freed slaves? How will they be
profitable without slaves?
4. What do you do with the freed men laborers? Do you turn them into wage
laborers? They prefer their own land, but can’t afford it, and the southern
plantation owners don’t want to give away their land.
5. Will you require the southern states to pass amendments protecting blacks or their civil rights? Are laws enough?

6. How will you protect freed men? Is it enough to give them the right to vote?
What will you do about the Ku Klux Klan?
7. The problem of education at the federal level is that the Constitution leaves it as a state issue per Amendment X (Connecticut rights): what do you do with the Freedmen’s Bureau and education for freedmen?
8. What do you do with the Confederate elite? Do you give them pardons or punishments?

9. Do you allow Confederates to join the U.S. Congress again? If not, how is that allowing the South to be part of the Union? If so, how do you prevent having the same conflicts as before?

10. Do you prohibit secession so no state can leave the union again?

11. Who will pay for southern debt? Will you make them pay reparations for
initiating the feud?
12. What will you do about the South’s ruined economy? Burned plantations? Who
will pay for the debt and restore necessary agriculture for both food production
and cotton exports? Who will work cotton plantations now?
13. How do you prevent an economic recession?

14. How do you prevent corruption and extortion in government, or carpetbaggers
and scalawags from taking advantage of southerners?
15. How do you appease both the South and the Radical Republicans? How do you