Grand Old Partisan spotlights a momentous instance of Republicans defending African-Americans from Democrat oppression. As civil war ended, the GOP-controlled 38th Congress established the Freedmen's Bureau. This federal agency managed schools and hospitals and legal clinics and food pantries.
A year later, the GOP-controlled 39th Congress passed a second Freedmen's Bureau bill. It guaranteed to emancipated slaves "any of the civil rights or immunities belonging to white persons, including the right to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold and convey real and personal property, and to have full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and estate, including the constitutional right of bearing arms."
Republican Congressman John Bingham noted that the bill enumerated the same rights and privileges enumerated in the 1866 Civil Rights Act.
This day of 1866, Andrew Johnson, the Democrat President, vetoed the second Freedmen's Bureau bill. Within hours, Republicans voted to override his veto, and passed it into law.
Here is a Video Version of this article on YouTube: https://youtu.be/tMVqPy90vcs
Michael Zak is author of Back to Basics for the Republican Party, a history of GOP civil rights achievement.
Each day, Michael Zak's grandoldpartisan YouTube channel and Grand Old Partisan blog celebrate more than seventeen decades of Republican heroes and heroics. And, see Speech Raves for audience feedback from his presentations in thirty-one states so far.
He also wrote the 2005 Republican Freedom Calendar.
Clarence Thomas cited Back to Basics for the Republican Party in a Supreme Court decision.
See www.youtube.com/q?v=IzxKCiXc5Qc for a brief video of a Texas Republican praising Back to Basics for the Republican Party.
"This is the most amazing book about politics that I have ever read. The Overview should be required reading for anyone with even a minor interest in government. The remainder is an enthralling history lesson that I will never forget. For years, we have all been misled about the true nature of the GOP. This is the real deal! Read it and be proud!"
"Michael Zak wrote the definitive history of the GOP."
"Back to Basics for the Republican Party is the most significant contribution to the Republican Party in the last twenty years apart from Ronald Reagan."
"Back to Basics for the Republican Party is more important to our party now than ever before."
and
"one of the best books I ever read"
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