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Historical Thinking Essay

Please write this essay by following the prompt. No need to make penetrating analysis but just true thoughts and feelings probably generated from a student.

learningcurveworks.com

LearningCurve is a winning solution for everyone: students come to class better prepared and instructors have more flexibility to go beyond the basic facts and concepts in class. LearningCurve’s game-like quizzes are bookspecific and link back to the textbook in LaunchPad so that students can brush up on the reading when they get stumped by a question. The reporting features help instructors track overall class trends and spot topics that are giving students trouble so that they can adjust lectures and class activities.

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LearningCurve is easy to assign, easy to customize, and easy to complete. See the difference LearningCurve makes in teaching and learning history.

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VA L U E E D I T I O N

The American Promise A History of the United States

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VA L U E E D I T I O N

The American Promise

A History of the United States

Seventh Edition

Volume 2 From 1865

James L. Roark Emory University

Michael P. Johnson Johns Hopkins University

Patricia Cline Cohen University of California, Santa Barbara

Sarah Stage

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Arizona State University

Susan M. Hartmann The Ohio State University

Boston | New York

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FOR BEDFORD/ST. MARTIN’S Vice President, Editorial, Macmillan Learning Humanities: Edwin Hill Publisher for History: Michael Rosenberg Senior Executive Editor for History: William J. Lombardo Director of Development for History: Jane Knetzger Developmental Editor: Robin Soule Associate Editor: Tess Fletcher Assistant Editor: Mary Posman Editorial Assistant: Lexi DeConti Senior Production Editor: Rosemary Jaffe Media Producer: Michelle Camisa Media Editor: Jennifer Jovin Production Manager: Joe Ford History Marketing Manager: Melissa Famiglietti Copy Editor: Lisa Wehrle Indexer: Mary White Cartography: Mapping Specialists, Ltd. Photo Editor: Cecilia Varas Photo Researcher: Naomi Kornhauser Permissions Editor: Eve Lehmann Senior Art Director: Anna Palchik Text Design: Cenveo Publisher Services Cover Design: William Boardman Cover Photo: Women at Work on the C-47 Douglas Cargo Transport, Douglas

Aircraft Company, Long Beach, California, October 1942. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Reproduction number LC-DIG- fsac-1a35359.

Composition: Cenveo Publisher Services Printing and Binding: LSC Communications

Copyright © 2017, 2015, 2012, 2009 by Bedford/St. Martin’s.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as may be expressly permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in writing by the Publisher.

Manufactured in the United States of America.

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f e d c b a

For information, write: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 75 Arlington Street, Boston, MA 02116 (617-399-4000)

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ISBN 978-1-319-06198-2 (Combined Edition) ISBN 978-1-319-06199-9 (Volume 1) ISBN 978-1-319-07010-6 (Loose-leaf Edition, Volume 1) ISBN 978-1-319-06200-2 (Volume 2) ISBN 978-1-319-07012-0 (Loose-leaf Edition, Volume 2)

Acknowledgments Acknowledgments and copyrights appear on the same page as the text and art selections they cover; these acknowledgments and copyrights constitute an extension of the copyright page.

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Preface Why This Book This Way

What is the best way to engage and teach students in their history survey course? From the beginning, The American Promise has been shaped by our firsthand knowledge that the survey course is one of the most difficult to teach and, for many, also the most difficult to take. From the outset we have met this challenge by providing a story students enjoy for its readability, clear chronology, and lively voices of ordinary Americans, and by providing a full-featured text that instructors prize for its full narrative with political backbone and the overall support for teaching. We continue to feature these qualities in the Value Edition of The American Promise in which we provide the core of the high-quality material included in the Seventh Edition — the full narrative and select images, maps, and pedagogical tools — in a two-color, trade-sized format at a low price.

We know that many students today are on a budget and that instructors want greater flexibility and more digital options in their choice of course materials. We are proud to offer a low-cost text that presents the engaging and readable narrative with a rich abundance of digital tools. Free when packaged with the print text, LaunchPad makes meeting the challenges of the survey course a great deal easier by providing an intuitive, interactive e-Book and course space with a wealth of primary sources. Ready to assign as is with key assessment resources built into each chapter, LaunchPad can also be edited and customized as instructors’ imaginations and innovations dictate. LaunchPad grants students and teachers access to a wealth of online tools and resources built specifically for our text to enhance reading comprehension and promote in-depth study. LaunchPad is loaded with the full-color e-Book with all of the features, maps, and illustrations of the full-sized edition, plus LearningCurve, an adaptive learning tool; the popular Reading the American Past primary documents collection; additional primary sources; special skills-based assessment activities; videos; chapter summative quizzes; and more.

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What Makes The American Promise Special Our experience as teachers and our frustrations with available textbooks inspired us to create a book that we could use effectively with our own students. Our knowledge of classroom realities has informed every aspect of each edition and version of The American Promise. We began with a clear chronological, political framework, as we have found that students need both the structure a political narrative provides and the insights gained from examining social and cultural experience. To write a comprehensive, balanced account of American history, we focus on the public arena — the place where politics intersects social and cultural developments — to show how Americans confronted the major issues of their day and created far-reaching historical change.

The unique approach of our narrative is reflected in our title, The American Promise. We emphasize human agency and demonstrate our conviction that the essence of America has been its promise. For millions, the nation has held out the promise of a better life, unfettered worship, equality before the law, representative government, democratic politics, and other freedoms seldom found elsewhere. But none of these promises has come with guarantees. Throughout the narrative we demonstrate how much of American history is a continuing struggle over the definition and realization of the nation’s promise.

To engage students in this American story and to portray fully the diversity of the American experience, we stitch into our narrative the voices of hundreds of contemporaries. In LaunchPad, the Value Edition is augmented with the comprehensive edition’s four-color art and map program with visual and map activities that prompt students to think critically about what they see. To help students of all levels understand American history, LaunchPad offers the best in primary sources and pedagogical aids. To help instructors teach important skills and evaluate student learning, we provide a rich assortment of assignments and assessments in the LaunchPad format. While this edition rests solidly on our original goals and premises, it breaks new ground in addressing the specific needs of today’s courses.

A New Skills Focus for the Special Features Those using LaunchPad will have access to The American Promise’s acclaimed feature program. The program has been revised to include more useful, skills-oriented assignments. The features offer primary sources, visuals, essays, and discussion questions, as well as short-answer and

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multiple-choice questions that test students’ critical reading skills. Making Historical Arguments (formerly Historical Question) now offers active, skills-based activities that demonstrate to students how historians make and support historical arguments. Analyzing Historical Evidence (formerly Documenting the American Promise) then gives students the opportunity to practice the skills introduced in Making Historical Arguments through analysis of text and visual sources. Experiencing the American Promise (formerly Seeking the American Promise) offers essays that illuminate the stories of individuals who sought their dream in America, helping students evaluate to what extent individuals make history. Finally, an enhanced Beyond America’s Borders continues to offer students a global perspective on the narrative’s themes with essays that connect U.S. history to developments around the globe.

Collectively these features provide a range of new topics and content that includes increased attention to white servant women and slave men in the seventeenth-century Chesapeake; a new focus on the weak opposition to the African slave trade in the eighteenth century; a nuanced look at urban workers’ standard of living in the Gilded Age; a spotlight on Franklin D. Roosevelt’s use of New Deal programs to rebuild the navy during the 1930s; an exploration of the federal government’s influence on the economy in the post–World War II years; a study of the impact of the Voting Rights Act; an in-depth look at the use of air power in Vietnam; an investigation of the loss of American manufacturing jobs in the twenty- first century; and much more.

Evaluation of Primary Sources Primary sources form the heart of historical study and we are pleased to offer LaunchPad users the new Analyzing Historical Evidence feature, which asks students to use historical thinking skills to consider a range of documents. Each feature juxtaposes two to four primary documents to reveal varying perspectives on a topic or issue and to provide students with opportunities to build and practice their skills of historical interpretation. Because students are so attuned to visuals and instructors deeply value their usefulness as primary sources, we have included both text and visual sources in this new feature. Images, including artifacts of daily life in Chaco Canyon, paintings of the Battle of the Little Big Horn, a 1920s mouthwash advertisement, political cartoons, and more, show students how to mine visual documents for evidence about the past.

In Analyzing Historical Evidence, feature introductions and

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document headnotes contextualize the sources, and short-answer questions at the end of the feature promote critical thinking about primary sources. New topics have been added that are rich with human drama and include “Enslavement by Marriage” and “The Nation’s First Formal Declaration of War.” These features are available both in print and online and are easily assigned in LaunchPad, along with multiple-choice quizzes that measure student comprehension.

In addition, more than 150 documents in the accompanying collection Reading the American Past are available free to users who package the reader with the main print text, and they are automatically included in the LaunchPad e-Book. Multiple-choice questions are also available for assignment to measure comprehension and hold students accountable for their reading.

LaunchPad for The American Promise also comes with a collection of more than 135 additional primary sources that instructors can choose to assign. These sources include letters, memoirs, court records, government documents, and more, and they include items by or about such people as John Smith, William Penn, Anne Hutchinson, Jonathan Edwards, Mary Jemison, Black Hawk, Rebecca Neugin, John C. Calhoun, Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, Mary Elizabeth Lease, William Jennings Bryan, Rose Pastor Stokes, Theodore Roosevelt, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, Paul Robeson, Ronald Reagan, and more.

To give students ample opportunity to practice thinking critically about primary source images, LaunchPad includes four visual activity captions per chapter. One set of questions in these activities prompts analysis of the image, while a second set of questions helps students connect the images to main points in the narrative.

Distinctive Essay Features Practice Historical Thinking Skills To demonstrate and engage students in various methods of historical thinking, LaunchPad’s Making Historical Arguments feature essays, which occur in every chapter, pose and interpret specific questions of continuing interest. We pair perennial favorites such as “Was the New United States a Christian Country?,” “How Often Were Slaves Whipped?,” “Was There a Sexual Revolution in the 1920s?,” and “Why Did the Allies Win World War II?,” with brand-new entries including “How Did Seventeenth-Century Colonists View Nature?” and “What Did

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African Americans Want from World War I, and What Did They Get?” Short-answer questions at the end of the features prompt students to

consider things such as evidence, beliefs and values, and cause and effect as they relate to the historical question at hand. These features are available both in print and online and can be easily assigned in LaunchPad, along with multiple-choice quizzes that measure student comprehension.

Helping Students Understand the Narrative Every instructor knows it can be a challenge to get students to complete assigned readings, and then to fully understand what is important once they do the reading. The American Promise addresses these problems head-on with a suite of tools in LaunchPad that instructors can choose from.

To help students come to class prepared, instructors who adopt LaunchPad for The American Promise can assign the LearningCurve formative assessment activities. This online learning tool is popular with students because it helps them rehearse content at their own pace in a nonthreatening, game-like environment. LearningCurve is also popular with instructors because the reporting features allow them to track overall class trends and spot topics that are giving their students trouble so they can adjust their lectures and class activities.

Encouraging active reading is another means for making content memorable and highlighting what is truly important. To help students read actively and understand the central idea of the chapter, instructors who use LaunchPad can also assign Guided Reading Exercises. These excercises appear at the start of each chapter, prompting students to collect information to be used to answer a broad analytic question central to the chapter as a whole.

To further encourage students to read and fully assimilate the text as well as measure how well they do this, instructors can assign the multiple- choice summative quizzes in LaunchPad, where they are automatically graded. These secure tests not only encourage students to study the book, they can be assigned at specific intervals as higher-stakes testing and thus provide another means for analyzing class performance.

Another big challenge for survey instructors is meeting the needs of a range of students, particularly the students who need the most support. In addition to the formative assessment of LearningCurve, which adapts to the needs of students at any level, The American Promise offers a number of print and digital tools for the underprepared. Each chapter opener

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includes Content Learning Objectives to prepare students to read the chapter with purpose. Once into the heart of the chapter, students are reminded to think about main ideas through Review Questions placed at the end of every major section. Some students have trouble connecting events and ideas, particularly with special boxed features. To address this, we have added a set of Questions for Analysis to the end of each feature in LaunchPad to help students understand the significance of the featured topic, its context, and how it might be viewed from different angles.

With this edition we also bring back two popular sets of end-of-chapter questions that help widen students’ focus as they consider what they have read. Making Connections questions ask students to think about broad developments within the chapter, while Linking to the Past questions cross-reference developments in earlier chapters, encouraging students to make comparisons, see causality, and understand change over longer periods of time.

Helping Instructors Teach with Digital Resources With requests for clear and transparent learning outcomes coming from all quarters and with students who bring increasingly diverse levels of skills to class, even veteran teachers can find preparing for today’s courses a trying matter. With LaunchPad we have reconceived the textbook as a suite of tools in multiple formats that allows each format to do what it does best to capture students’ interest and help instructors create meaningful lessons.

But one of the best benefits is that instructors using LaunchPad will find they have a number of assessment tools that allow them to see what it is their students do and don’t know and measure student achievement all in one convenient space. For example, LaunchPad comes with LearningCurve, an adaptive learning tool that garners more than a 90 percent student satisfaction rate and helps students master book content. When LearningCurve is assigned, the grade book results show instructors where the entire class or individual students may be struggling, and this information in turn allows instructors to adjust lectures and course activities accordingly — a benefit not only for traditional classes but invaluable for hybrid, online, and newer “flipped” classes as well. In addition, not only can instructors assign all of the questions that appear in the print book and view the responses in the grade book, they have the option to assign automatically graded multiple-choice questions for all of the book features.

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With LaunchPad for The American Promise we make the tough job of teaching simpler by providing everything instructors need in one convenient space so they can set and achieve the learning outcomes they desire. To learn more about the benefits of LearningCurve and LaunchPad, see the “Versions and Supplements” section on page xiv.

Acknowledgments We gratefully acknowledge all of the helpful suggestions from those who have read and taught from previous editions of The American Promise, and we hope that our many classroom collaborators will be pleased to see their influence in the seventh edition. In particular, we wish to thank the talented scholars and teachers who gave generously of their time and knowledge to review the previous edition in preparation for its revision: LeNie Adolphson, Sauk Valley Community College; Daniel Anderson, Cincinnati State Technical and Community College; Ian Baldwin, University of Nevada, Las Vegas; Veronica Bale, MiraCosta College; Karen Cook Bell, Bowie State University; Dustin Black, El Camino College; Nawana Britenriker, Pikes Peak Community College; Elizabeth Broen, South Florida State College; Robert Browning, University of Texas, San Antonio; Robert Bush, Front Range Community College; Brian David Collins, El Centro College; Alexandra Cornelius, Florida International University; Sondra Cosgrove, College of Southern Nevada; Rodney E. Dillon, Jr., Palm Beach State College; Wayne Drews, Georgia Institute of Technology; Edward J. Dudlo, Brookhaven College; E. J. Fabyan, Vincennes University; Randy Finley, Georgia Perimeter College; Cecilia Gowdy-Wygant, Front Range Community College; Elizabeth Green, University of South Alabama; William Grose, Wytheville Community College; Steven Heise, Holyoke Community College; Jeff Janowick, Lansing Community College; Juneann Klees, Bay College; Leonard V. Larsen, Des Moines Area Community College; Charles Levine, Mesa Community College; Kerima Lewis, Bridgewater State University; Mary Linehan, University of Texas at Tyler; Annie Liss, South Texas College; Patricia Loughlin, University of Central Oklahoma; Veronica McComb, Lenoir-Rhyne University; Walter Miszczenko, College of Western Idaho; Rick Murray, Los Angeles Valley College; Richard Owens, West Liberty University; Stacey Pendleton, University of Colorado Denver; Michael J. Pfeifer, John Jay College of Criminal Justice; Robert Lynn Rainard, Tidewater Community College; Chris Rasmussen, Fairleigh Dickinson University; George D. Salaita, Eastern Tennessee University; Robert Sawvel, University of Northern Colorado; Benjamin G. Scharff,

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West Virginia University; Mark Simon, Queens College of the City of New York; Christopher Sleeper, MiraCosta College; Janet P. Smith, East Tennessee State University; John Howard Smith, Texas A&M University– Commerce; William Z. Tannenbaum, Missouri Southern State University; Ramon C. Veloso, Palomar College; Kenneth A. Watras, Paradise Valley Community College; and Eric Weinberg, Viterbo University.

A project as complex as this requires the talents of many individuals. First, we would like to acknowledge our families for their support, forbearance, and toleration of our textbook responsibilities. Naomi Kornhauser contributed her vast knowledge, tireless energy, and diligent research to make possible the useful and attractive illustration program. We would also like to thank the many people at Bedford/St. Martin’s and Macmillan Learning who have been crucial to this project. Thanks are due to Robin Soule, developmental editor; Edwin Hill, vice president; Michael Rosenberg, publisher; William J. Lombardo, senior executive editor for history; and Jane Knetzger, director of development for history for their support and guidance. Thanks are also due to Heidi Hood, senior editor; Jennifer Jovin, media editor; Tess Fletcher, associate editor; Mary Posman, assistant editor; and Lexi DeConti, editorial assistant. For their imaginative and tireless efforts to promote the book, we want to thank executive marketing manager Melissa Famiglietti, and marketing assistant Morgan Ratner. With great skill and professionalism, senior production editor Rosemary Jaffe pulled together the many pieces related to copyediting, design, and composition. Production manager Joe Ford oversaw the manufacturing of the book. Designer Jerilyn Bockorick, copy editor Lisa Wehrle, and proofreaders Roberta Sobotka and Linda McLatchie attended to the myriad details that help make the book shine. Mary White provided an outstanding index. The covers for the book’s many versions were researched and designed by William Boardman. Media producer Michelle Camisa oversaw the timely and complex production of digital components of The American Promise.

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Versions and Supplements

Adopters of The American Promise, Value Edition and their students have access to abundant print and digital resources and tools, the acclaimed Bedford Series in History and Culture volumes, and much more. The LaunchPad course space for The American Promise provides access to the narrative as well as a wealth of primary sources and other features, along with assignment and assessment opportunities. See below for more information, visit the book’s catalog site at macmillanlearning.com, or contact your local Bedford/St. Martin’s sales representative.

Get the Right Version for Your Class The American Promise franchise offers a variety of versions to best suit your course needs. The comprehensive The American Promise features a full-color art program and a robust set of features. Understanding the American Promise, with a more modest feature program, enhances the full narrative with a question-driven approach and innovative active learning pedagogy. The American Promise: A Concise History also provides the full narrative, with a streamlined art and feature program, at a lower price. The American Promise, Value Edition offers a trade-sized two-color option with the full narrative and selected art and maps at a steeper discount. The Value Edition is also offered at the lowest price point in loose-leaf, and all versions are available as low-priced PDF e-Books. For the best value of all, package a new print book with LaunchPad at no additional charge to get the best each format offers — a print version for easy portability with a LaunchPad interactive e-Book and course space with LearningCurve and loads of additional assignment and assessment options.

Combined Volume (Chapters 1–31): available in the comprehensive, Understanding, Concise, Value, loose-leaf, and e-Book formats and in LaunchPad Volume 1, To 1877 (Chapters 1–16): available in the comprehensive,

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Understanding, Concise, Value, loose-leaf, and e-Book formats and in LaunchPad Volume 2, From 1865 (chapters 16–31): available in the comprehensive, Understanding, Concise, Value, loose-leaf, and e- Book formats and in LaunchPad

As noted below, any of these volumes can be packaged with additional titles for a discount. To get ISBNs for discount packages, visit macmillanlearning.com or contact your Bedford/St. Martin’s representative.

Assign LaunchPad — an Assessment- Ready Interactive e-Book and Course Space

Available for discount purchase on its own or for packaging with new books at no additional charge, LaunchPad is a breakthrough solution for history courses. Intuitive and easy-to-use for students and instructors alike, LaunchPad is ready to use as is, and can be edited, customized with your own material, and assigned quickly. LaunchPad for The American Promise includes Bedford/St. Martin’s high-quality content all in one place, including the full interactive e-Book with all of the full-color maps and images and features of the comprehensive edition and the companion reader Reading the American Past, plus LearningCurve formative quizzing, guided reading activities designed to help students read actively for key concepts, autograded quizzes for each primary source, and chapter summative quizzes.

Through a wealth of formative and summative assessments, including the adaptive learning program of LearningCurve (see the full description ahead), students gain confidence and get into their reading before class. These features, plus additional primary-source documents, video sources and tools for making video assignments, map activities, flashcards, and customizable test banks, make LaunchPad an invaluable asset for any instructor. For more information, visit launchpadworks.com or to arrange a demo, contact us at history@macmillan.com.

Assign LearningCurve So Your Students Come to Class Prepared

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http://history@macmillan.com
Students using LaunchPad receive access to LearningCurve for The American Promise. Assigning LearningCurve in place of reading quizzes is easy for instructors, and the reporting features help instructors track overall class trends and spot topics that are giving students trouble so they can adjust their lectures and class activities. This online learning tool is popular with students because it was designed to help them comprehend content at their own pace in a nonthreatening, game-like environment. The feedback for wrong answers provides instructional coaching and sends students back to the book for review. Students answer as many questions as necessary to reach a target score, with repeated chances to revisit material they haven’t mastered. When LearningCurve is assigned, students come to class better prepared.

Take Advantage of Instructor Resources Bedford/St. Martin’s has developed a rich array of teaching resources for this book and for this course. They range from lecture and presentation materials and assessment tools to course management options. Most can be found in LaunchPad or can be downloaded or ordered from the Instructor Resources tab of the book’s catalog site at macmillanlearning.com. Bedford Coursepack for Blackboard, Canvas, Brightspace by D2L, or Moodle. We can help you integrate our rich content into your course management system. Registered instructors can download coursepacks that include our popular free resources and book-specific content for The American Promise. Instructor’s Resource Manual. The instructor’s manual offers both experienced and first-time instructors tools for presenting textbook materials in engaging ways. It includes chapter content learning objectives, annotated chapter outlines, and strategies for teaching with the textbook, plus suggestions on how to get the most out of LearningCurve, and a survival guide for first-time teaching assistants. Guide to Changing Editions. Designed to facilitate an instructor’s transition from the previous edition of The American Promise, Value Edition to this new edition, this guide presents an overview of major changes as well as of changes in each chapter. Online Test Bank. The test bank includes a mix of fresh, carefully crafted multiple-choice, matching, short-answer, and essay questions for each chapter. Many of the multiple-choice questions feature a map, an image, or a primary-source excerpt as the prompt. All questions appear in easy-to-

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use test bank software that allows instructors to add, edit, resequence, filter by question type or learning objective, and print questions and answers. Instructors can also export questions into a variety of course management systems. The Bedford Lecture Kit: Lecture Outlines, Maps, and Images. Look good and save time with The Bedford Lecture Kit. These presentation materials include fully customizable multimedia presentations built around chapter outlines that are embedded with maps, figures, and images from the textbook and are supplemented by more detailed instructor notes on key points and concepts. America in Motion: Video Clips for U.S. History. Set history in motion with America in Motion, an instructor DVD containing dozens of short digital movie files of events in twentieth-century American history. From the wreckage of the battleship Maine to FDR’s fireside chats to Ronald Reagan speaking before the Brandenburg Gate, America in Motion engages students with dynamic scenes from key events and challenges them to think critically. All files are classroom-ready, edited for brevity, and easily integrated with presentation slides or other software for electronic lectures or assignments. An accompanying guide provides each clip’s historical context, ideas for use, and suggested questions.

Print, Digital, and Custom Options for More Choice and Value For information on free packages and discounts up to 50 percent, visit macmillanlearning.com or contact your local Bedford/St. Martin’s sales representative. Reading the American Past, Fifth Edition. Edited by Michael P. Johnson, one of the authors of The American Promise, and designed to complement the textbook, Reading the American Past provides a broad selection of more than 150 primary-source documents, as well as editorial apparatus to help students understand the sources. Available free when packaged with the print text and included in the LaunchPad e-Book. Also available on its own as a downloadable PDF e-Book. NEW Bedford Custom Tutorials for History. Designed to customize textbooks with resources relevant to individual courses, this collection of brief units, each sixteen pages long and loaded with examples, guides students through basic skills such as using historical evidence effectively,

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working with primary sources, taking effective notes, avoiding plagiarism and citing sources, and more. Up to two tutorials can be added to a Bedford/St. Martin’s history survey title at no additional charge, freeing you to spend your class time focusing on content and interpretation. For more information, visit macmillanlearning.com/historytutorials. NEW Bedford Digital Collections for U.S. History. This source collection provides a flexible and affordable online repository of discovery-oriented primary-source projects ready to assign. Each curated project — written by a historian about a favorite topic — poses a historical question and guides students step by step through analysis of primary sources. Examples include “What Caused the Civil War?”; “The California Gold Rush: A Trans-Pacific Phenomenon”; and “War Stories: Black Soldiers and the Long Civil Rights Movement.” For more information, visit macmillanlearning.com/bdc/ushistory/catalog. Available free when packaged. NEW Bedford Digital Collections Custom Print Modules. Choose one or two document projects from the collection (see above) and add them in print to a Bedford/St. Martin’s title, or select several to be bound together in a custom reader created specifically for your course. Either way, the modules are affordably priced. For more information visit macmillanlearning.com/custombdc/ushistory or contact your Bedford/St. Martin’s representative. The Bedford Series in History and Culture. More than 100 titles in this highly praised series combine first-rate scholarship, historical narrative, and important primary documents for undergraduate courses. Each book is brief, inexpensive, and focused on a specific topic or period. Revisions of several best-selling titles, such as The Cherokee Removal: A Brief History with Documents by Theda Perdue; Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, edited by David Blight; and The Triangle Fire: A Brief History with Documents by Jo Ann Argersinger, are now available. For a complete list of titles, visit macmillanlearning.com. Package discounts are available. Rand McNally Atlas of American History. This collection of more than eighty full-color maps illustrates key events and eras from early exploration, settlement, expansion, and immigration to U.S. involvement in wars abroad and on U.S. soil. Introductory pages for each section include a brief overview, timelines, graphs, and photos to quickly establish a historical context. Free when packaged. The Bedford Glossary for U.S. History. This handy supplement for the

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http://macmillanlearning.com/bdc/ushistory/catalog
http://macmillanlearning.com/custombdc/ushistory
http://macmillanlearning.com
survey course gives students historically contextualized definitions for hundreds of terms — from abolitionism to zoot suit — that they will encounter in lectures, reading, and exams. Free when packaged. Trade Books. Titles published by sister companies Hill and Wang; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Henry Holt and Company; St. Martin’s Press; Picador; and Palgrave Macmillan are available at a 50 percent discount when packaged with Bedford/St. Martin’s textbooks. For more information, visit macmillanlearning.com/tradeup. A Pocket Guide to Writing in History. This portable and affordable reference tool by Mary Lynn Rampolla provides reading, writing, and research advice useful to students in all history courses. Concise yet comprehensive advice on approaching typical history assignments, developing critical reading skills, writing effective history papers, conducting research, using and documenting sources, and avoiding plagiarism — enhanced with practical tips and examples throughout — have made this slim reference a best seller. Package discounts are available. A Student’s Guide to History. This complete guide to success in any history course provides the practical help students need to be successful. In addition to introducing students to the nature of the discipline, author Jules Benjamin teaches a wide range of skills from preparing for exams to approaching common writing assignments, and explains the research and documentation process with plentiful examples. Package discounts are available. Going to the Source: The Bedford Reader in American History. Developed by Victoria Bissell Brown and Timothy J. Shannon, this reader combines a rich diversity of primary and secondary sources with in-depth instructions for how to use each type of source. Mirroring the chronology of the U.S. history survey, each of the main chapters familiarizes students with a single type of source — from personal letters to political cartoons — while focusing on an intriguing historical episode such as the Cherokee Removal or the 1894 Pullman Strike. The reader’s wide variety of chapter topics and sources provoke students’ interest as it teaches them the skills they need to successfully interrogate historical sources. Package discounts are available. America Firsthand. With its distinctive focus on first-person accounts from ordinary people, this primary documents reader by Anthony Marcus, John M. Giggie, and David Burner offers a remarkable range of perspectives on America’s history from those who lived it. Popular Points

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of View sections expose students to different perspectives on a specific event or topic. Package discounts are available.

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Brief Contents

Preface Versions and Supplements Contents Maps and Figures

16 Reconstruction, 1863–1877

17 The Contested West, 1865–1900

18 Railroads, Business, and Politics in the Gilded Age, 1865– 1900

19 The City and Its Workers, 1870–1900

20 Dissent, Depression, and War, 1890–1900

21 Progressivism from the Grass Roots to the White House, 1890–1916

22 World War I: The Progressive Crusade at Home and Abroad, 1914–1920

23 From New Era to Great Depression, 1920–1932

24 The New Deal Experiment, 1932–1939

25 The United States and the Second World War, 1939–1945

26 Cold War Politics in the Truman Years, 1945–1953

27 The Politics and Culture of Abundance, 1952–1960

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28 Reform, Rebellion, and Reaction, 1960–1974

29 Vietnam and the End of the Cold War Consensus, 1961–1975

30 America Moves to the Right, 1969–1989

31 The Promises and Challenges of Globalization, Since 1989

Appendix Glossary Index U.S. Political/Geographic and World Maps Visual Activity About the Authors

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CONTENTS

PREFACE

VERSIONS AND SUPPLEMENTS

BRIEF CONTENTS

MAPS AND FIGURES

CHAPTER 16

Reconstruction 1863–1877

OPENING VIGNETTE: James T. Rapier emerges in the early 1870s as Alabama’s most prominent black leader

Wartime Reconstruction “To Bind Up the Nation’s Wounds” • Land and Labor • The African American Quest for Autonomy

Presidential Reconstruction Johnson’s Program of Reconciliation • White Southern Resistance and Black Codes • Expansion of Federal Authority and Black Rights

Congressional Reconstruction The Fourteenth Amendment and Escalating Violence • Radical Reconstruction and Military Rule • Impeaching a President • The Fifteenth Amendment and Women’s Demands

The Struggle in the South Freedmen, Yankees, and Yeomen • Republican Rule • White Landlords, Black Sharecroppers

Reconstruction Collapses Grant’s Troubled Presidency • Northern Resolve Withers • White Supremacy Triumphs • An Election and a Compromise

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Conclusion: “A Revolution but Half Accomplished” CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 17

The Contested West 1865–1900

OPENING VIGNETTE: Frederick Jackson Turner delivers his “frontier thesis”

Conquest and Empire in the West Indian Removal and the Reservation System • The Decimation of the Great Bison Herds • Indian Wars and the Collapse of Comanchería • The Fight for the Black Hills

Forced Assimilation and Indian Resistance Indian Schools and the War on Indian Culture • The Dawes Act and Indian Land Allotment • Indian Resistance and Survival

Mining the West Life on the Comstock Lode • The Diverse Peoples of the West

Land Fever Moving West: Homesteaders and Speculators • Tenants, Sharecroppers, and Migrants • Commercial Farming and Industrial Cowboys • Territorial Government

Conclusion: The West in the Gilded Age CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 18

Railroads, Business, and Politics in the Gilded Age 1865–1900

OPENING VIGNETTE: Mark Twain and the Gilded Age

Railroads and the Rise of New Industries Railroads: America’s First Big Business • Andrew Carnegie, Steel, and Vertical Integration • John D. Rockefeller, Standard Oil, and the Trust • New Inventions: The Telephone and the Telegraph

From Competition to Consolidation

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J. P. Morgan and Finance Capitalism • Social Darwinism, Laissez-Faire, and the Supreme Court

Politics and Culture Political Participation and Party Loyalty • Sectionalism and the New South • Gender, Race, and Politics • Women’s Activism

Presidential Politics Corruption and Party Strife • Garfield’s Assassination and Civil Service Reform • Reform and Scandal: The Campaign of 1884

Economic Issues and Party Realignment The Tariff and the Politics of Protection • Railroads, Trusts, and the Federal Government • The Fight for Free Silver • Panic and Depression

Conclusion: Business Dominates an Era CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 19

The City and Its Workers 1870–1900

OPENING VIGNETTE: Workers build the Brooklyn Bridge

The Rise of the City The Urban Explosion: A Global Migration • Racism and the Cry for Immigration Restriction • The Social Geography of the City

At Work in Industrial America America’s Diverse Workers • The Family Economy: Women and Children • White-Collar Workers: Managers, “Typewriters,” and Salesclerks

Workers Organize The Great Railroad Strike of 1877 • The Knights of Labor and the American Federation of Labor • Haymarket and the Specter of Labor Radicalism

At Home and at Play Domesticity and “Domestics” • Cheap Amusements

City Growth and City Government Building Cities of Stone and Steel • City Government and the “Bosses” • White City or City of Sin?

Conclusion: Who Built the Cities?

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CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 20

Dissent, Depression, and War 1890–1900

OPENING VIGNETTE: Frances Willard participates in the creation of the Populist Party in 1892

The Farmers Unite The Farmers’ Alliance • The Populist Movement

The Labor Wars The Homestead Lockout • The Cripple Creek Miners’ Strike of 1894 • Eugene V. Debs and the Pullman Strike

Women’s Activism Frances Willard and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and the Movement for Woman Suffrage

Depression Politics Coxey’s Army • The People’s Party and the Election of 1896

The United States and the World Markets and Missionaries • The Monroe Doctrine and the Open Door Policy • “A Splendid Little War” • The Debate over American Imperialism

Conclusion: Rallying around the Flag CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 21

Progressivism from the Grass Roots to the White House 1890–1916

OPENING VIGNETTE: Jane Addams founds Hull House

Grassroots Progressivism Civilizing the City • Progressives and the Working Class

Progressivism: Theory and Practice Reform Darwinism and Social Engineering • Progressive Government: City

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and State

Progressivism Finds a President: Theodore Roosevelt The Square Deal • Roosevelt the Reformer • Roosevelt and Conservation • The Big Stick • The Troubled Presidency of William Howard Taft

Woodrow Wilson and Progressivism at High Tide Progressive Insurgency and the Election of 1912 • Wilson’s Reforms: Tariff, Banking, and the Trusts • Wilson, Reluctant Progressive

The Limits of Progressive Reform Radical Alternatives • Progressivism for White Men Only

Conclusion: The Transformation of the Liberal State CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 22

World War I: The Progressive Crusade at Home and Abroad 1914–1920

OPENING VIGNETTE: Doughboy George “Brownie” Browne sees combat on the front lines in France

Woodrow Wilson and the World Taming the Americas • The European Crisis • The Ordeal of American Neutrality • The United States Enters the War

“Over There” The Call to Arms • The War in France

The Crusade for Democracy at Home The Progressive Stake in the War • Women, War, and the Battle for Suffrage • Rally around the Flag — or Else

A Compromised Peace Wilson’s Fourteen Points • The Paris Peace Conference • The Fight for the Treaty

Democracy at Risk Economic Hardship and Labor Upheaval • The Red Scare • The Great Migrations of African Americans and Mexicans • Postwar Politics and the Election of 1920

Conclusion: Troubled Crusade

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CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 23

From New Era to Great Depression 1920–1932

OPENING VIGNETTE: Henry Ford puts America on wheels

The New Era A Business Government • Promoting Prosperity and Peace Abroad • Automobiles, Mass Production, and Assembly-Line Progress • Consumer Culture

The Roaring Twenties Prohibition • The New Woman • The New Negro • Entertainment for the Masses • The Lost Generation

Resistance to Change Rejecting the Undesirables • The Rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan • The Scopes Trial • Al Smith and the Election of 1928

The Great Crash Herbert Hoover: The Great Engineer • The Distorted Economy • The Crash of 1929 • Hoover and the Limits of Individualism

Life in the Depression The Human Toll • Denial and Escape • Working-Class Militancy

Conclusion: Dazzle and Despair CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 24

The New Deal Experiment 1932–1939

OPENING VIGNETTE: “Migrant Mother” Florence Owens struggles to survive in the Great Depression

Franklin D. Roosevelt: A Patrician in Government The Making of a Politician • The Election of 1932

Launching the New Deal

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The New Dealers • Banking and Finance Reform • Relief and Conservation Programs • Agricultural Initiatives • Industrial Recovery

Challenges to the New Deal Resistance to Business Reform • Casualties in the Countryside • Politics on the Fringes

Toward a Welfare State Relief for the Unemployed • Empowering Labor • Social Security and Tax Reform • Neglected Americans and the New Deal

The New Deal from Victory to Deadlock The Election of 1936 • Court Packing • Reaction and Recession • The Last of the New Deal Reforms

Conclusion: Achievements and Limitations of the New Deal CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 25

The United States and the Second World War 1939–1945

OPENING VIGNETTE: Colonel Paul Tibbets drops the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan

Peacetime Dilemmas Roosevelt and Reluctant Isolation • The Good Neighbor Policy • The Price of Noninvolvement

The Onset of War Nazi Aggression and War in Europe • From Neutrality to the Arsenal of Democracy • Japan Attacks America

Mobilizing for War Home-Front Security • Building a Citizen Army • Conversion to a War Economy

Fighting Back Turning the Tide in the Pacific • The Campaign in Europe

The Wartime Home Front Women and Families, Guns and Butter • The Double V Campaign • Wartime Politics and the 1944 Election • Reaction to the Holocaust

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Toward Unconditional Surrender From Bombing Raids to Berlin • The Defeat of Japan • Atomic Warfare

Conclusion: Allied Victory and America’s Emergence as a Superpower CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 26

Cold War Politics in the Truman Years 1945–1953

OPENING VIGNETTE: Helen Gahagan Douglas, congresswoman and loyal Truman ally, supports the Marshall Plan, the creation of NATO, and the war in Korea

From the Grand Alliance to Containment The Cold War Begins • The Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan • Building a National Security State • Superpower Rivalry around the Globe

Truman and the Fair Deal at Home Reconverting to a Peacetime Economy • Blacks and Mexican Americans Push for Their Civil Rights • The Fair Deal Flounders • The Domestic Chill: McCarthyism

The Cold War Becomes Hot: Korea Korea and the Military Implementation of Containment • From Containment to Rollback to Containment • Korea, Communism, and the 1952 Election • An Armistice and the War’s Costs

Conclusion: The Cold War’s Costs and Consequences CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 27

The Politics and Culture of Abundance 1952–1960

OPENING VIGNETTE: Vice President Richard Nixon debates Russian premier Nikita Khrushchev

Eisenhower and the Politics of the “Middle Way” Modern Republicanism • Termination and Relocation of Native Americans •

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The 1956 Election and the Second Term

Liberation Rhetoric and the Practice of Containment The “New Look” in Foreign Policy • Applying Containment to Vietnam • Interventions in Latin America and the Middle East • The Nuclear Arms Race

New Work and Living Patterns in an Economy of Abundance Technology Transforms Agriculture and Industry • Burgeoning Suburbs and Declining Cities • The Rise of the Sun Belt • The Democratization of Higher Education

The Culture of Abundance Consumption Rules the Day • The Revival of Domesticity and Religion • Television Transforms Culture and Politics • Countercurrents

The Emergence of a Civil Rights Movement African Americans Challenge the Supreme Court and the President • Montgomery and Mass Protest

Conclusion: Peace and Prosperity Mask Unmet Challenges CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 28

Reform, Rebellion, and Reaction 1960–1974

OPENING VIGNETTE: Fannie Lou Hamer leads grassroots struggles of African Americans for voting rights and political empowerment

Liberalism at High Tide The Unrealized Promise of Kennedy’s New Frontier • Johnson Fulfills the Kennedy Promise • Policymaking for a Great Society • Assessing the Great Society • The Judicial Revolution

The Second Reconstruction The Flowering of the Black Freedom Struggle • The Response in Washington • Black Power and Urban Rebellions

A Multitude of Movements Native American Protest • Latino Struggles for Justice • Student Rebellion, the New Left, and the Counterculture • Gay Men and Lesbians Organize

The New Wave of Feminism A Multifaceted Movement Emerges • Feminist Gains Spark a

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Countermovement

Liberal Reform in the Nixon Administration Extending the Welfare State and Regulating the Economy • Responding to Environmental Concerns • Expanding Social Justice

Conclusion: Achievements and Limitations of Liberalism CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 29

Vietnam and the End of the Cold War Consensus 1961–1975

OPENING VIGNETTE: Lieutenant Frederick Downs Jr. is wounded in Vietnam and returns home to a country divided over the war

New Frontiers in Foreign Policy Meeting the “Hour of Maximum Danger” • New Approaches to the Third World • The Arms Race and the Nuclear Brink • A Growing War in Vietnam

Lyndon Johnson’s War against Communism An All-Out Commitment in Vietnam • Preventing Another Castro in Latin America • The Americanized War • Those Who Served

A Nation Polarized The Widening War at Home • The Tet Offensive and Johnson’s Move toward Peace • The Tumultuous Election of 1968

Nixon, Détente, and the Search for Peace in Vietnam Moving toward Détente with the Soviet Union and China • Shoring Up U.S. Interests around the World • Vietnam Becomes Nixon’s War • The Peace Accords • The Legacy of Defeat

Conclusion: An Unwinnable War CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 30

America Moves to the Right 1969–1989

OPENING VIGNETTE: Phyllis Schlafly promotes conservatism

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Nixon, Conservatism, and Constitutional Crisis Emergence of a Grassroots Movement • Nixon Courts the Right • The Election of 1972 • Watergate • The Ford Presidency and the 1976 Election

The “Outsider” Presidency of Jimmy Carter Retreat from Liberalism • Energy and Environmental Reform • Promoting Human Rights Abroad • The Cold War Intensifies

Ronald Reagan and the Conservative Ascendancy Appealing to the New Right and Beyond • Unleashing Free Enterprise • Winners and Losers in a Flourishing Economy

Continuing Struggles over Rights Battles in the Courts and Congress • Feminism on the Defensive • The Gay and Lesbian Rights Movement

Ronald Reagan Confronts an “Evil Empire” Militarization and Interventions Abroad • The Iran-Contra Scandal • A Thaw in Soviet-American Relations

Conclusion: Reversing the Course of Government CHAPTER REVIEW

CHAPTER 31

The Promises and Challenges of Globalization Since 1989

OPENING VIGNETTE: Colin Powell adjusts to a post–Cold War world

Domestic Stalemate and Global Upheaval: The Presidency of George H. W. Bush

Gridlock in Government • The Cold War Ends • Going to War in Central America and the Persian Gulf • The 1992 Election

The Clinton Administration’s Search for the Middle Ground Clinton’s Reforms • Accommodating the Right • Impeaching the President • The Booming Economy of the 1990s

The United States in a Globalizing World Defining America’s Place in a New World Order • Debates over Globalization • The Internationalization of the United States

President George W. Bush: Conservatism at Home and Radical

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Initiatives Abroad The Disputed Election of 2000 • The Domestic Policies of a “Compassionate Conservative” • The Globalization of Terrorism • Unilateralism, Preemption, and the Iraq War

The Obama Presidency: Reform and Backlash Governing during Economic Crisis and Political Polarization • Redefining the War on Terror

Conclusion: Defining the Government’s Role at Home and Abroad CHAPTER REVIEW

APPENDIX

The Declaration of Independence The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union The Constitution of the United States Amendments to the Constitution with Annotations (including the six unratified amendments)

GLOSSARY

INDEX

U.S. POLITICAL/GEOGRAPHIC AND WORLD MAPS

VISUAL ACTIVITY

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

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Maps and Figures

CHAPTER 16

MAP 16.1 A Southern Plantation in 1860 and 1881

MAP 16.2 The Election of 1868

MAP 16.3 The Reconstruction of the South

MAP 16.4 The Election of 1876

CHAPTER 17

MAP 17.1 The Loss of Indian Lands, 1850–1890

MAP 17.2 Western Mining, 1848–1890

MAP 17.3 Federal Land Grants to Railroads and the Development of the West, 1850–1900

CHAPTER 18

MAP 18.1 Railroad Expansion, 1870–1890

MAP 18.2 The Election of 1884

CHAPTER 19

MAP 19.1 Economic Regions of the World, 1890

MAP 19.2 The Impact of Immigration, to 1910

MAP 19.3 The Great Railroad Strike of 1877

CHAPTER 20

MAP 20.1 The Election of 1892

MAP 20.2 The Election of 1896

MAP 20.3 The Spanish-American War, 1898

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MAP 20.4 U.S. Overseas Expansion through 1900

CHAPTER 21

MAP 21.1 National Parks and Forests

MAP 21.2 The Panama Canal, 1914

MAP 21.3 The Election of 1912

CHAPTER 22

MAP 22.1 U.S. Involvement in Latin America and the Caribbean, 1895–1941

MAP 22.2 European Alliances after the Outbreak of World War I

MAP 22.3 The American Expeditionary Force, 1918

MAP 22.4 Women’s Voting Rights before the Nineteenth Amendment

MAP 22.5 Europe after World War I

MAP 22.6 The Election of 1920

CHAPTER 23

MAP 23.1 Auto Manufacturing

MAP 23.2 The Shift from Rural to Urban Population, 1920–1930

MAP 23.3 The Election of 1928

FIGURE 23.1 Manufacturing and Agricultural Income, 1920–1940

CHAPTER 24

MAP 24.1 The Election of 1932

MAP 24.2 Electoral Shift, 1928–1932

MAP 24.3 The Tennessee Valley Authority

CHAPTER 25

MAP 25.1 Axis Aggression through 1941

MAP 25.2 Japanese Aggression through 1941

MAP 25.3 Western Relocation Authority Centers

MAP 25.4 The European Theater of World War II, 1942–1945

MAP 25.5 The Pacific Theater of World War II, 1941–1945

CHAPTER 26

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MAP 26.1 The Division of Europe after World War II

MAP 26.2 The Election of 1948

MAP 26.3 The Korean War, 1950–1953

CHAPTER 27

MAP 27.1 The Interstate Highway System, 1930 and 1970

MAP 27.2 The Rise of the Sun Belt, 1940–1980

CHAPTER 28

MAP 28.1 The Election of 1960

MAP 28.2 The Rise of the African American Vote, 1940–1976

MAP 28.3 Urban Uprisings, 1965–1968

CHAPTER 29

MAP 29.1 U.S. Involvement in Latin America and the Caribbean, 1954–1994

MAP 29.2 The Vietnam War, 1964–1975

MAP 29.3 The Election of 1968

CHAPTER 30

MAP 30.1 The Election of 1976

MAP 30.2 Worldwide Oil Reserves, 1980

MAP 30.3 The Middle East, 1948–1989

CHAPTER 31

MAP 31.1 Events in Eastern Europe, 1989–2002

MAP 31.2 Events in the Middle East, 1989–2011

MAP 31.3 The Election of 2000

MAP 31.4 The Election of 2012

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16 Reconstruction 1863–1877

C O N T E N T L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E S

After reading and studying this chapter, you should be able to: ◆ Identify the challenges facing reconstruction efforts.

◆ Describe President Johnson’s reconstruction plan and the ways in which it aligned and differed from Lincoln’s.

◆ Recount the significance of the Fourteenth Amendment and why President Johnson advised southern states to reject it. Explain the terms of radical reconstruction and how Johnson’s interventions led some in Congress to seek his impeachment.

◆ Describe the provisions of the Fifteenth Amendment, and explain why some women’s rights advocates were dissatisfied with it.

◆ Describe how congressional reconstruction altered life in the South. Explain why the North abandoned reconstruction, including the role of Grant’s troubled presidency and the election of 1877 in this abandonment.

IN 1856, JOHN RAPIER, A FREE BLACK BARBER IN FLORENCE, ALABAMA, urged his four freeborn sons to flee the increasingly repressive and dangerous South. James T. Rapier chose Canada, where he went to live with his uncle in a largely black community and studied Greek and Latin in a log schoolhouse. In a letter to his father, he vowed, “I

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will endeavor to do my part in solving the problems [of African Americans] in my native land.”

The Union victory in the Civil War gave James Rapier the opportunity to redeem his pledge. In 1865, after more than eight years of exile, the twenty-seven-year-old Rapier returned to Alabama, where he presided over the first political gathering of former slaves in the state. He soon discovered, however, that Alabama’s whites found it agonizingly difficult to accept defeat and black freedom. They responded to the revolutionary changes under the banner “White Man — Right or Wrong — Still the White Man!”

During the elections of 1868, when Rapier and other Alabama blacks vigorously supported the Republican ticket, the recently organized Ku Klux Klan went on a bloody rampage. A mob of 150 outraged whites scoured Rapier’s neighborhood seeking four black politicians they claimed were trying to “Africanize Alabama.” They caught and hanged three, but the “nigger carpetbagger from Canada” escaped. After briefly considering fleeing the state, Rapier decided to stay and fight.

In 1872, Rapier won election to the House of Representatives, where he joined six other black congressmen in Washington, D.C. Defeated for reelection in 1874 in a campaign marked by ballot-box stuffing, Rapier turned to cotton farming. But persistent black poverty and unrelenting racial violence convinced him that blacks could never achieve equality and prosperity in the South. He purchased land in Kansas and urged Alabama’s blacks to escape with him. In 1883, however, before he could leave Alabama, Rapier died of tuberculosis at the age of forty-five.

Union general Carl Schurz had foreseen many of the troubles Rapier encountered in the postwar South. In 1865, Schurz concluded that the Civil War was “a revolution but half accomplished.” Northern victory had freed the slaves, he observed, but it had not changed former slaveholders’ minds about blacks’ unfitness for freedom. Left to themselves, whites would “introduce some new system of forced labor, not perhaps exactly slavery in its old form but something similar to it.” To defend their freedom, Schurz concluded, blacks would need federal protection, land of their own, and voting rights. Until whites “cut loose from the past, it will be a dangerous experiment to put Southern society upon its own legs.”

As Schurz understood, the end of the war did not mean peace. Indeed, the nation entered one of its most turbulent eras — Reconstruction. Answers to the era’s central questions — about the

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defeated South’s status within the Union and the meaning of freedom for ex-slaves — came not only from Washington, D.C., where the federal government played an active role, but also from the state legislatures and county seats of the South, where blacks eagerly participated in politics. The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution strengthened the claim of African Americans to equal rights. The struggle also took place on the South’s farms and plantations, where former slaves sought to become free workers while former slaveholders clung to the Old South. A small band of white women joined in the struggle for racial equality, and soon their crusade broadened to include gender equality. Their attempts to secure voting rights for women were thwarted, however, just as were the efforts of blacks and their allies to secure racial equality. In the contest to determine the consequences of Confederate defeat and emancipation, white Southerners prevailed.

James T. Rapier In 1874, when Representative James T. Rapier spoke before Congress on behalf of a civil rights bill, he described the humiliation of being denied service at inns all along his route from Montgomery to Washington. Elsewhere in the world, he said, class and religion were invoked to defend discrimination. But in America, “our distinction is color.” Alabama Department of Archives and History, Montgomery, Alabama.

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Wartime Reconstruction Reconstruction did not wait for the end of war. As the odds of a northern victory increased, thinking about reunification quickened. Immediately, a question arose: Who had authority to devise a plan for reconstructing the Union? President Abraham Lincoln firmly believed that reconstruction was a matter of executive responsibility. Congress just as firmly asserted its jurisdiction. Fueling the argument were significant differences about the terms of reconstruction.

In their eagerness to formulate a plan for political reunification, neither Lincoln nor Congress gave much attention to the South’s land and labor problems. But as the war rapidly eroded slavery and traditional plantation agriculture, Yankee military commanders in the Union-occupied areas of the Confederacy had no choice but to oversee the emergence of a new labor system. Freedmen’s aspirations played little role in the plans that emerged.

“To Bind Up the Nation’s Wounds” As early as 1863, Lincoln began contemplating how “to bind up the nation’s wounds” and achieve “a lasting peace.” While deep compassion for the enemy guided his thinking about peace, his plan for reconstruction aimed primarily at shortening the war and ending slavery.

Lincoln’s Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction in December 1863 set out his terms. He offered a full pardon, restoring property (except slaves) and political rights, to most rebels willing to renounce secession and to accept emancipation. When 10 percent of a state’s voting population had taken an oath of allegiance, the state could organize a new government and be readmitted into the Union. Lincoln’s plan did not require ex-rebels to extend social or political rights to ex-slaves, nor did it anticipate a program of long-term federal assistance to freedmen. Clearly, the president looked forward to the rapid, forgiving restoration of the broken Union.

Lincoln’s easy terms enraged abolitionists such as Wendell Phillips of Boston, who charged that the president “makes the negro’s freedom a mere

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sham.” He “is willing that the negro should be free but seeks nothing else for him.” Comparing Lincoln to the Union’s most passive general, Phillips declared, “What McClellan was on the battlefield — ‘Do as little hurt as possible!’ — Lincoln is in civil affairs — ‘Make as little change as possible!’” Phillips and other northern Radicals called instead for a thorough overhaul of southern society. Their ideas proved to be too drastic for most Republicans during the war years, but Congress agreed that Lincoln’s plan was inadequate.

In July 1864, Congress put forward a plan of its own. Congressman Henry Winter Davis of Maryland and Senator Benjamin Wade of Ohio jointly sponsored a bill that demanded that at least half of the voters in a conquered rebel state take the oath of allegiance before reconstruction could begin. The Wade-Davis bill also banned almost all ex-Confederates from participating in the drafting of new state constitutions. Finally, the bill guaranteed the equality of freedmen before the law. Congress’s reconstruction would be neither as quick nor as forgiving as Lincoln’s. When Lincoln refused to sign the bill and let it die, Wade and Davis charged the president with usurpation of power.

Undeterred, Lincoln continued to nurture the formation of loyal state governments under his own plan. Four states — Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Virginia — fulfilled the president’s requirements, but Congress refused to seat representatives from the “Lincoln states.” Lincoln admitted that a government based on only 10 percent was not ideal, but he argued, “We shall sooner have the fowl by hatching the egg than by smashing it.” Massachusetts senator Charles Sumner responded, “The eggs of crocodiles can produce only crocodiles.” In his last public address in April 1865, Lincoln defended his plan but for the first time expressed publicly his endorsement of suffrage for southern blacks, at least “the very intelligent, and … those who serve our cause as soldiers.” The announcement demonstrated that Lincoln’s thinking about reconstruction was still evolving. Four days later, he was dead.

Land and Labor Of all the problems raised by the North’s victory in the war, none proved more critical than the South’s transition from slavery to free labor. As federal armies invaded and occupied the Confederacy, hundreds of thousands of slaves became free workers. In addition, Union armies controlled vast territories in the South where legal title to land had become unclear. The Confiscation Acts passed during the war punished “traitors” by taking away their property. The question of what to do with federally

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occupied land and how to organize labor on it engaged ex-slaves, ex- slaveholders, Union military commanders, and federal government officials long before the war ended.

In the Mississippi valley, occupying federal troops announced a new labor code. It required landholders to give up whipping, sign contracts with ex-slaves, pay wages, and provide food, housing, and medical care. The code required black laborers to enter into contracts, work diligently, and remain subordinate and obedient. Military leaders clearly had no intention of promoting a social or economic revolution. Instead, they sought to restore traditional plantation agriculture with wage labor. The effort resulted in a hybrid system that one contemporary called “compulsory free labor,” something that satisfied no one.