members of Congress. Before December the appointed local officials had been
succeeded by elected officers; members of Congress were on their way to
Washington; the state legislatures were assembling or already in session; and
the elected governors were ready to take office. It was understood that as
soon as enough state legislatures ratified the Thirteenth Amendment to make it
a part of the Constitution, the President would permit the transfer of
authority to the new governors. The legislature of Mississippi alone was
recalcitrant about the amendment, and before January 1866, the elected
officials were everywhere installed except in Texas, where the work was not
completed until March. When Congress met in December 1865, the President
reported that all former Confederate States except Texas were ready to be
readmitted. Congress, however, refused to admit their senators and
representatives, and thus began the struggle which ended over a year later
with the victory of the radicals and the undoing of the work of the two
Presidents.

The plan of the Presidents was at best only imperfectly realized. It was found
impossible to reorganize the Federal Administration in the South with men who
could subscribe to the "ironclad oath," for nearly all who were competent to
hold office had favored or aided the Confederacy. It was two years before more
than a third of the post offices could be opened. The other Federal
departments were in similar difficulties, and at last women and
"carpetbaggers" were appointed. The Freedmen's Bureau, which had been
established coincidently with the provisional governments, assumed
jurisdiction over the Negroes, while the army authorities very early took the
position that any man who claimed to be a Unionist should not be tried in the
local courts but must be given a better chance in a provost court. Thus a
third or more of the population was withdrawn from the control of the state
government. In several states the head of the Bureau made arrangements for
local magistrates and officials to act as Bureau officials, and in such cases