Which Reconstruction-era plan is described as requiring a 50 percent loyalty oath and black voting rights for readmission of Confederate states?

Which Reconstruction-era plan is described as requiring a 50 percent loyalty oath and black voting rights for readmission of Confederate states?

• A. Emancipation Proclamation
• B. Treaty of Fort Laramie
• C. Alaska Purchase
• D. Wade-Davis Bill

Answer: (D)

The main idea tested here is how different Reconstruction plans defined when Southern states could rejoin the Union and what rights would be guaranteed as part of that readmission. The plan described—requiring a 50 percent loyalty oath and guaranteeing black voting rights for readmission—fits the Wade-Davis Bill. Proposed by Radical Republicans in 1864, it was a much stricter alternative to Lincoln’s ten-percent plan. It would not recognize a state’s government until at least half of white male citizens took a loyalty oath to the United States, and it included provisions to protect the civil and voting rights of freedpeople as part of the readmission process. This reflected a belief that reconstruction should be tightly controlled by Congress and that newly admitted states must secure rights for former slaves. Other options don’t fit because they address entirely different issues. The Emancipation Proclamation was a wartime order freeing slaves in Confederate-held areas, not a plan for readmitting states. The Treaty of Fort Laramie and the Alaska Purchase concern Native American treaties and U.S. territorial expansion, not postwar reconstruction of the states.

The main idea tested here is how different Reconstruction plans defined when Southern states could rejoin the Union and what rights would be guaranteed as part of that readmission. The plan described—requiring a 50 percent loyalty oath and guaranteeing black voting rights for readmission—fits the Wade-Davis Bill. Proposed by Radical Republicans in 1864, it was a much stricter alternative to Lincoln’s ten-percent plan. It would not recognize a state’s government until at least half of white male citizens took a loyalty oath to the United States, and it included provisions to protect the civil and voting rights of freedpeople as part of the readmission process. This reflected a belief that reconstruction should be tightly controlled by Congress and that newly admitted states must secure rights for former slaves.

Other options don’t fit because they address entirely different issues. The Emancipation Proclamation was a wartime order freeing slaves in Confederate-held areas, not a plan for readmitting states. The Treaty of Fort Laramie and the Alaska Purchase concern Native American treaties and U.S. territorial expansion, not postwar reconstruction of the states.