Why Were The Radical Republicans Radical?

[My Name Is Kate]

I don't know on what grounds anyone would think they were inherently morally superior to anyone else, no matter what their life experience or historical background may be.

And I can't see how the Radical Republicans could have expected their demands on the South to take hold, when the North was also openly practicing racism and segregation.

I was surprised to read in the link in the first post, that several hundred thousand mercenary soldiers from Germany and Ireland fought for the Union during the Civil War.