Nearly everywhere there was a lack of certainty and efficiency due to the concurrent and sometimes conflicting jurisdictions of state government, army commanders, Bureau authorities, and even the President acting upon or through any of the others.
The standing of the Southern state organizations was in doubt after the refusal of Congress to recognize them.

Nevertheless, in spite of this uncertainty they continued to function as states during the year of controversy which followed; the courts were opened and steadily grew in influence; here and there militia and patrols were reorganized; officials who refused to "accept the situation" were dismissed; elections were held; the legislatures revised the laws to fit new conditions and enacted new laws for the emancipated blacks.

To all this progress in reorganization, the action of Congress was a severe blow, since it gave notice that none of the problems of reconstruction were yet solved.

An increasing spirit of irritation and independence was observed throughout the states in question, and at the elections the former Confederates gained more and more offices.

The year was marked in the South by the tendency toward the formation of parties, by the development of the "Southern outrages" issue, by an attempt to frustrate radical action, and finally by a lineup of the great mass of the whites in opposition to the Fourteenth Amendment and other radical plans of Congress.
The Joint Committee on Reconstruction, appointed when Congress refused to accept the work of President Johnson, proceeded during several months to take testimony and to consider measures.