The colonies lacked a powerful aristocratic class mainly because

The colonies lacked a powerful aristocratic class mainly because they were not very old societies, created from the emigration of British citizens from working classes and religious minorities to America in search of greater freedoms.

Thus, there were no economically powerful families or groups with respect to others, nor large landowners against small owners. This led to the generation of equitable societies, where equality among citizens was real and not merely a legal statement lacking of factual veracity.

The states that had seceded, during the reconstruction engineered by Johnson were first supposed to sign papers stating that they would not secede again from the union. congress refused to sit also representative from these states until they complied with the reconstruction demands, and one by one they all complied.