Reconstruction

To whom it may concern,

                  The Colony of Peace and Love has been doing well, as far as health goes, but after that attack on Fort Sumter in 1861, President Lincoln decided to round up an army of volunteers from every state and unfortunately, along with Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee ("Timelineof Secession"), our state of Virginia has decided to leave the Union. We have been faced with the challenge of relocating and trying our best to do the right thing. The tension between the South and the North is mainly about freeing the slaves and giving them rights. The North, as well as us, encourages it and the South, of course, is completely against it. The Colony of Peace and Love support the North because we do not believe in slavery. It is morally wrong and very hypocritical of the South to shout about wanting rights when the only people they are talking about are white men. We will not be intimidated into keeping our opinions to ourselves and for that reason, we have settled in Washington. However, if we would've openly displayed our support in Virginia we would be harassed and possible killed by members of Ku Klux Klan (KKK) for even thinking about helping slaves escape. Even though we are against the South’s way of thinking we are support seeing the South being rebuilt because there is talk about creating public schools for African Americans (Butchart). Most Southerners talk about how “dumb” or “uncivilized they are but we believe that they were never given the chance to become educated and everyone should be given the opportunity to better himself or herself. Now that the North has officially won the war every state that has left is wondering how to get back in and in the past there have been a few plans: Lincoln’s 10% Plan (1864), Andrew Johnson’s Plan, and, the plan we are leaning more towards, the Radical Republican’s Plan. While all plans require the acceptance of the 13^th amendment (abolish slavery) the Radical Republican’s Plan requires the acceptance of the 14^th (Equal Protection under the law) and 15^th (the right to vote) amendment. “They [are] demand[ing] harsher measures in the South, and more protection for the Freedmen, and more guarantees that the Confederate nationalism was totally eliminated.” (Wikipedia) This plan requires the South to divide into five zones (mixing multiple states in one zone), follow Martial laws and military occupation, accept the 13^th, 14^th, and 15^th amendments (state and federal), and disenfranchise the confederate leaders. We agree with this plan because this war caused a lot of damage and the South should not be let back in just because the war is technically over. They should suffer the consequences in order to understand that we are not, the Union, desperate to have them back but we do want all the violence to end.