Legacies of the Civil War Threaten the Republic, 1865–1872
Legacies of the Civil War Threaten the Republic, 1865–1872
Once the Civil War ended, liberal republicans expressed fears that the great expansion of government power during the war was endangering America's republican form of government. War measures that they had accepted as necessary to defeat the Slave Power had created new types of concentrated power and a corrupt government, which threatened the very institutions the measures were designed to save. Between 1865 and 1872, liberal republicans focused on the threats stemming from President Andrew Johnson's use of the patronage system, from the currency laws, and from protective tariffs and the growth of monopolies, all of which they felt created corruption and threatened the virtue needed for republican institutions to survive. They feared that monopolies, by growing large and powerful, could subvert the political process and take control of the government.
Keywords: war measures, concentrated power, patronage system, currency laws, protective tariffs, monopolies, corruption
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