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The Facts of Reconstruction is John Roy Lynch's fascinating and detailed account of the USA's political situation following the conclusion of the American Civil War. As a Speaker in the Mississippi House of Representatives, John R. Lynch was one of the first-ever black politicians. As such, the victory of the Union forces in 1865 directly influenced his life and career. Simply by virtue of emancipation, Lynch was a major stakeholder in the reconstruction efforts between the Union north and the secessionist south. He consequently felt obliged to author this retrospective history covering the major political events and turning points. Immediately after the American Civil War concluded, the USA was in a fractured and fraught state. The assassination of Abraham Lincoln, who sought to mend bridges and reconcile with the secessionist states, exacerbated the situation further. The 1860s, 1870s and 1880s were thus a tumultuous time for American politics, in which reforms were hard fought and incremental in the various states and nationally at the federal level. Writing in 1913, Lynch charts the journey made over those difficult decades, drawing on his personal experience as a member of Mississippi's House of Representatives, and the national record. He charts the various elections, and the evolution of the Republican and Democratic parties as distinct wings of the political landscape. Various events, such as the rise of Democratic radicalism in the South, and the election of Grover Cleveland to the Presidency, are detailed. In all, The Facts of Reconstruction offers a reasonable overview of a transitional period in U.S. politics from an insider. The ongoing racial conflicts following the emancipation of African American slaves are charted alongside the personal traits, ideals and acts of the various politicians of the time.

The author of this American history text, The Facts of Reconstruction, has endeavored to present facts of Reconstruction as they were and are, rather than as he would like to have them, and to set them down without the slightest regard to their effect upon the public mind, except so far as that mind may be influenced by the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. In his efforts along these lines he has endeavored to give expression to his ideas, opinions and convictions in language that is moderate and devoid of bitterness, and entirely free from race prejudice, sectional animosity, or partisan bias. The Reconstruction era was the period from 1863 (the legal end of most slavery in the United States) or 1865 (the end of the Confederacy) to 1877. In the context of the history of the United States, the term has two applications: the first applies to the complete history of the entire country from 1865 to 1877 following the Civil War; the second, to the attempted transformation of the 11 ex-Confederate states from 1863 to 1877, as directed by Congress. Reconstruction ended the remnants of Confederate nationalism and of slavery, making the Freedmen citizens with civil rights apparently guaranteed by three new Constitutional amendments. Three visions of Civil War memory appeared during Reconstruction: the reconciliationist vision, which was rooted in coping with the death and devastation the war had brought; the white supremacist vision, which included terror and violence; and the emancipationist vision, which sought full freedom, citizenship, and Constitutional equality for African Americans.[2] Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson both took moderate positions designed to bring the South back into the union as quickly as possible, while Radical Republicans in Congress sought stronger measures to upgrade the rights of African Americans, including the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, while curtailing the rights of former Confederates, such as through the provisions of the Wade–Davis Bill. Johnson, a former Tennessee Senator and former slave owner, followed a lenient policy toward ex-Confederates. Lincoln’s last speeches show that he was leaning toward supporting the enfranchisement of all freedmen, whereas Johnson was opposed to this.[3] Johnson’s interpretations of Lincoln’s policies prevailed until the Congressional elections of 1866. Those elections followed outbreaks of violence against blacks in the former rebel states, including the Memphis riots of 1866 and the New Orleans riot that same year. The subsequent 1866 election gave Republicans a majority in Congress, enabling them to pass the 14th Amendment, take control of Reconstruction policy, remove former Confederates from power, and enfranchise the freedmen. A Republican coalition came to power in nearly all the southern states and set out to transform the society by setting up a free labor economy, using the U.S. Army and the Freedmen's Bureau. The Bureau protected the legal rights of freedmen, negotiated labor contracts, and set up schools and churches for them. Thousands of Northerners came south as missionaries, teachers, businessmen and politicians. Hostile whites began referring to these politicians as “carpetbaggers”. In early 1866, Congress passed the Freedmen’s Bureau and Civil Rights Bills and sent them to Johnson for his signature. The first bill extended the life of the bureau, originally established as a temporary organization charged with assisting refugees and freed slaves, while the second defined all persons born in the United States as national citizens with equality before the law. After Johnson vetoed the bills, Congress overrode his veto, making the Civil Rights Act the first major bill in the history of the United States to become law through an override of a presidential veto.

The Reconstruction era was the period from 1863 to 1877 in American history. It was a significant chapter in the history of American civil rights. The term has two applications: the first applies to the complete history of the entire country from 1865 to 1877 following the American Civil War; the second, to the attempted transformation of the 11 ex-Confederate states from 1863 to 1877, as directed by Congress. Reconstruction ended the remnants of Confederate secession and ended slavery, making the newly-free slaves citizens with civil rights ostensibly guaranteed by three new Constitutional amendments. Three visions of Civil War memory appeared during Reconstruction: the reconciliationist vision, which was rooted in coping with the death and devastation the war had brought; the white supremacist vision, which included segregation and the preservation of the traditional cultural standards of the South; and the emancipationist vision, which sought full freedom, citizenship, and Constitutional equality for African Americans.

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John Roy Lynch was an African-American Republican statesman, author, lawyer and army officer. Born as a slave in Louisiana, he was freed under the Emancipation Proclamation. His father was an Irish migrant and his parents had a common-law union. After serving for so many years in the state legislature, John was voted as the first African-American Speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives; he was the first African-American to maintain this standing in the country. Throughout Reconstruction after the American Civil War, he was one of the first generation of African Americans from the South voted to the United States House of Representatives. Struggled with cumulative restraints in Mississippi, John took up law studies, admitted to the bar, and went back to Washington, DC to practice his legal profession. After the American Civil War, John, who became a servant in Mississippi, started his profession in politics by first becoming Justice of the Peace, and after as Mississippi State Representative. He was just 26 years of age when he was voted to the United States Congress. There, he persevered to be an activist, presenting numerous bills and defending on those. Probably his best struggle was in the extensive argument advocating the Civil Rights Act of 1875 to prohibit inequity in civic places. John became the first African American chosen after an emotional address given by Theodore Roosevelt to the designation of Temporary Chairman of the Republican National Convention in Chicago, Illinois. Through the Spanish-American War of 1898, he was designated as Treasury Auditor and later as Paymaster under the Republicans. He then started serving with the Regular Army with travels of work in the United States, Cuba and the Philippines. John stepped down from the Army, and wedded Cora Williams. They lived in Chicago, where he continued his legal profession. He also came to be associated in real estate.

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