 The Unionist-dominated state government was bitterly divided during the postwar period between Conservative Republicans, allies of Andrew Johnson who preferred a return to a prewar state of affairs (though with emancipation intact), and the Radical Republicans, allies of Brownlow who sought civil rights for blacks and retribution against former Confederates.Conservatives, badly outnumbered, used parliamentary tactics such as quorum busts to thwart Radical initiatives, leading to frequent showdowns in the House and Senate.In spite of these divisions, the state government ratified the Thirteenth and Fourteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution, allowing Tennessee to become the first former Confederate state readmitted to the Union in 1866.