The Election of 1876 – end of the Reconstruction Era

I was looking through my grandparents photographs from the 1920’s and ran across this photo of my Grandmother Margaret Kerr Bearden. Curious about the underlined phrase, I looked up the Democratic nominee for President in the election of 1876.

“An informal deal was struck to resolve the dispute: the Compromise of 1877, which awarded all 20 electoral votes to Hayes. In return for the Democrats’ acquiescence to Hayes’s election, the Republicans agreed to withdraw federal troops from the South to end the Reconstruction Era of the United States. The Compromise effectively ceded power in the Southern states to the Democratic Redeemers, who went on to pursue their agenda of returning the South to a political economy resembling that of its pre-war condition, including the disenfranchisement of black voters.” – Wikipedia

Ironically, President Hays was a US Army Brevet Major General in the American Civil War, wounded 5 times.

Margaret and Julian Bearden were grandchildren of Union & Confederate soldiers. They were also life-long Democrats.

#reconstruction