Changes

===Postwar===

===Postwar===

Civil war and [[Reconstruction]] issues polarized the parties until the [[Compromise of 1877]] finally ended the political warfare.  War issues resonated for a quarter century, as Republicans waved the "bloody shirt" (of dead union soldiers), and Democrats warned against Black supremacy in the South and plutocracy in the North. The modernizing Republicans who had founded the party in 1854 looked askance at the undisguised corruption of [[Ulysses S. Grant]] and his war veterans, bolstered by the solid vote of freedmen. The dissenters formed a "[[Liberal Republican]]" Party in 1872, only to have it smashed by Grant's reelection.  By the mid 1870s it was clear that Confederate nationalism was dead; all but the most ardent Republican “Stalwarts” agreed that the southern Republican coalition of African American [[Freedmen]], [[scalawags]] and [[carpetbaggers]] was helpless and hopeless.  In 1874 the Democrats won big majorities in Congress, with economic depression a major issue.  People asked how much longer could the Republicans use the Army to impose control in the South. <ref>Foner (1988)</ref>

Civil war and [[Reconstruction]] issues polarized the parties until the [[Compromise of 1877]] finally ended the political warfare.  War issues resonated for a quarter century, as Republicans waved the "bloody shirt" (of dead union soldiers), and Democrats warned against Black supremacy in the South and plutocracy in the North. The modernizing Republicans who had founded the party in 1854 looked askance at the undisguised corruption of [[Ulysses S. Grant]] and his war veterans, bolstered by the solid vote of freedmen. The dissenters formed a "[[Liberal Republican]]" Party in 1872, only to have it smashed by Grant's reelection.  By the mid 1870s it was clear that Confederate nationalism was dead; all but the most ardent Republican “Stalwarts” agreed that the southern Republican coalition of African American [[Freedmen]], [[scalawags]] and [[carpetbaggers]] was helpless and hopeless.  In 1874 the Democrats won big majorities in Congress, with economic depression a major issue.  People asked how much longer could the Republicans use the Army to impose unnecessary control in the South. <ref>Foner (1988)</ref>

[[Image:1869USG.JPG|thumb|400px|1869 cartoon attacks imperial splendor of Grant's inauguration in contrast to Jefferson's republican simplicity (upper left)]]

[[Image:Grant68a.jpg|thumb|300px|1868 campaign poster]]

[[Rutherford Hayes]] became President after a highly controversial electoral count, demonstrating that the corruption of Southern politics threatened the legitimacy of the presidency itself. After Hayes removed the last federal troops in 1877, the Republican Party in the South sank into oblivion, kept alive only by the crumbs of federal patronage.<ref> Vincent P. De Santis, ''Republicans Face the Southern Question'' (1969) </ref>  

[[Rutherford Hayes]] became President after a highly controversial electoral count, demonstrating that the corruption of Southern politics threatened the legitimacy of the presidency itself. After Hayes removed the last federal troops in 1877, the Republican Party in the South sank into oblivion, kept alive only by the crumbs of federal patronage.<ref> Vincent P. De Santis, ''Republicans Face the Southern Question'' (1969) </ref>

===Climax and Collapse, 1890-1896===

===Climax and Collapse, 1890-1896===