Civil War and Reconstruction, 1861-1877
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
In 1861, the United States faced its greatest crisis to that time. The northern and southern
states had become less and less alike - socially, economically, politically. The North had become
increasingly industrial and commercial while the South had remained largely agricultural. More
important than these differences, however, was African-American slavery. Northerners generally
wanted to limit the spread of slavery; some wanted to abolish it altogether. Southerners generally
wanted to maintain and even expand the institution. Thus, slavery became the focal point of a
political crisis.
Following the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, eleven
southern states eventually seceded from the Federal Union in 1861. They sought to establish an
independent Confederacy of states in which slavery would be protected. Northern Unionists, on
the other hand, insisted that secession was not only unconstitutional but unthinkable as well.
They were willing to use military force to keep the South in the Union. Even Southerners who
owned no slaves opposed threatened Federal coercion. The result was a costly and bloody civil
war. Almost as many Americans were killed in the Civil War as in all the nation's other wars
combined.
After four years of fighting, the Union was restored through the force of arms. The
problems of reconstructing the Union were just as difficult as fighting the war had been. Because
most of the war was fought in the South, the region was devastated physically and economically.
Helping freedmen and creating state governments loyal to the Union also presented difficult
problems that would take years to resolve.
Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 and again in 1864. His first inauguration,
on March 4,1861, featured an unprecedented amount of security around the president-elect,
spurred by the approaching onset of the U.S. Civil War.
Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates which
addressed popular sovereignty and slavery. Guided by the phrase in the Declaration of
Independence that “All men are created equal,” Lincoln spoke against slavery. While Lincoln
opposed slavery, he also was well aware of Constitutional boundaries to what actions the
president could take.
The war brought the issue of emancipation to the forefront, but Lincoln postponed
executive action until he felt he had clear authority. Congress passed legislation in July 1862 and
after months of working with his cabinet, on January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation. The Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or
designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not end
slavery, but it did change the basic character of the Civil War. The North was now fighting to
create a new Union without slavery.
As the war continued, both sides suffered enormous loss in numerous battles. For
example, more than 50,000 people died in the Battle of Gettysburg. On November 19, 1863,
Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address during the dedication of that battle cemetery.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, validated on December 18, 1865, ended
slavery in the United States, but Lincoln did not live to see that ratified. On April 14, 1865, John
Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln while he was attending a play at Ford’s Theater. Lincoln died early
the next morning.
The South During the Civil War
Most of the fighting during the American Civil War took place on Southern soil. In part,
this was the result of the war strategies of both sides. To win the war, the South had only to
survive. On the other hand, for the North to win, the Union had to be restored. Thus, Union
forces had to conquer the South in order to win the war. War action around their homes created
many hardships for Southerners.
The hardships increased or intensified for other reasons as well. As an agricultural region,
the South had more difficulty than the North in manufacturing needed goods--for both its
soldiers and its civilians. One result was that Southern civilians probably had to make more real
sacrifices during the war than Northern civilians did. In addition, part of Union war strategy was
to use the Navy to blockade Southern ports. The Union hoped to stop the flow of goods between
the South and other countries and strangle its foe economically.
The North During the Civil War
The Civil War had fewer devastating effects on the North than the South simply because
most of the combat of the Civil War occurred on Southern soil. Even so, it is difficult to imagine
a civil war that does not affect all portions of the society in which it takes place, and the Civil
War affected the North and its civilians in many ways.
From time to time, Confederate cavalry raided into the North to bring the war home to
Northerners and, they hoped, to influence Northern morale and support for the war. Southern
supporters living in the North or border states sometimes fought deadly guerrilla warfare or
simply bushwacked people they considered enemies in those regions. On the other hand,
Unionists in the border states often mistreated Confederate sympathizers who lived among them.
The war affected the Northern economy both positively and negatively and changed the life
course of many women.
African-American Soldiers During the Civil War
In 1862, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation opened the door for African
Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Although many had wanted to join the war effort earlier,
they were prohibited from enlisting by a federal law dating back to 1792. President Lincoln had
also feared that if he authorized their recruitment, border states would secede from the Union. By
the end of the war, approximately 180,000 African-American soldiers had joined the fight.
In addition to the problems of war faced by all soldiers, African-American soldiers faced
additional difficulties created by racial prejudice. Although many served in the infantry and
artillery, discriminatory practices resulted in large numbers of African-American soldiers being
assigned to perform non-combat, support duties as cooks, laborers, and teamsters. African-
American soldiers were paid $10 per month, from which $3 was deducted for clothing. White
soldiers were paid $13 per month, from which no clothing allowance was deducted. If captured
by the Confederate Army, African-American soldiers confronted a much greater threat than did
their white counterparts.
In spite of their many hardships, African-American soldiers served the Union Army well
and distinguished themselves in many battles. Of their service to the nation Frederick Douglass
said, "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letters U.S., let him get an eagle on
his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pockets, and there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right of citizenship in the United States." African-
American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union Army. It is estimated that one-third
of all African Americans who enlisted lost their lives.
Civil War Soldiers' Stories
It is virtually impossible to measure the human costs of the Civil War, the hardships and
suffering it caused. What we do know is that millions of people grieved for the loss of loved
ones. In all, around 360,000 Union soldiers died as a direct result of the war. The Confederacy
lost 260,000 dead. Many more soldiers were wounded; some wounds maimed their victims for
life. The overall number of dead that resulted from the Civil War nearly equals the number of
American soldiers killed in every other military action up to the present.
The documents listed tell stories of and about soldiers during the Civil War. Several
address the reasons why young men and boys joined up enthusiastically. Others tell of the
experience and suffering of being a prisoner of war. Still others speak about action during the
war and provide glimpses into how the Civil War was fought and how the soldiers experienced
the war.
The Freedmen
The Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment freed all slaves in the United
States. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in the South faced new difficulties: finding
a way to forge an economically independent life in the face of hostile whites, little or no
education, and few other resources, such as money. The situation was made all the more difficult
because of attitudes such as those of freedman Houston Hartsfield Holloway, who said "...we
colored people did not know how to be free and the white people did not know how to have a
free colored person about them." In fact, many African Americans were quite prepared for
freedom, as they demonstrated in 1865 and after by demanding their civil rights, the vote, the
reunion of their families, education and economic opportunities.
For its part, the federal government established the Freedmen's Bureau, a temporary
agency, to provide food, clothing, and medical care to refugees in the South, especially freed
slaves. Special boards were established to set up schools for African Americans in the South, and
black and white teachers from the North and South worked to help young and old become
literate. Some African Americans in the South were encouraged to move to Northern cities
where jobs would be available. Extending the vote to black Americans was hotly debated.
Reconstruction and Rights
When the Civil War ended, leaders turned to the question of how to reconstruct the nation.
One important issue was the right to vote, and the rights of black American men and former
Confederate men to vote were hotly debated.
In the latter half of the 1860s, Congress passed a series of acts designed to address the
question of rights, as well as how the Southern states would be governed. These acts included the
act creating the Freedmen's Bureau, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction
Acts. The Reconstruction Acts established military rule over Southern states until new
governments could be formed. They also limited some former Confederate officials' and military
officers' rights to vote and to run for public office. (However, the latter provisions were only
temporary and soon rescinded for almost all of those affected by them.) Meanwhile, the
Reconstruction acts gave former male slaves the right to vote and hold public office.
Congress also passed two amendments to the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
made African-Americans citizens and protected citizens from discriminatory state laws. Former
Confederate states did not get congressional representation until they adopted this amendment.
The Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed African American men the right to vote.
Most of the documents in this section are related to the right to vote and how voting
actually occurred in Southern states. Other rights are also discussed in some of the documents.
As you read the documents, weigh the various arguments that are made. Also, look for
similarities with issues or concerns that have been raised in more recent U.S. history.
The Travails of Reconstruction
The aftermath of any war is difficult for the survivors. Those difficulties are usually even
worse after a civil war. Such was certainly the case in the period after the U.S. Civil War.
With several notable exceptions, most of the fighting during the Civil War took place in
the South. As a result, most of the devastation of the war affected the South and its people to a
much greater extent than people in the North. In addition, portions of the South were occupied by
Federal armies from virtually the very beginning of the war. Over time, Union forces occupied
more and more Southern territory and governed those places as well.
Reconstruction was a period of political crisis and considerable violence. Many white
Southerners envisioned a quick reunion in which white supremacy would remain intact in the
South. In this vision, African Americans, while in some sense free, would have few civil rights
and no voice in government. Many Northerners, as well as Andrew Johnson, who succeeded to
the presidency after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, shared these views. On the other
hand, both black Southerners and a large number of Northern Republicans thought that before
the Southern states were restored to their place in the Union, the federal government must secure
the basic rights of former slaves.
Conflicts over the nature of Reconstruction led to President Andrew Johnson's
impeachment by Congress. Congress was in recess from shortly after Johnson took the oath of
office in April 1865 until December 1865. While Congress was in recess, Johnson, a member of
the Democratic party, started a process of Southern Reconstruction that included pardoning those
former Confederates willing to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. After Congress
returned, Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 and two Freedmen's Bureau bills. Many
members of the Republican Party objected to these and some of the other policies Johnson put
into place.
In the election of 1866, a large number of Republicans who opposed Johnson’s
Reconstruction program were elected to Congress and proceeded to roll back some of Johnson’s
policies, institute military law in the southern states, and implement measures that reined in the
power of the President. In March of 1867, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act, which was
intended to prevent Johnson from replacing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In February of
1868, Johnson fired Stanton, and in response the House of Representatives prepared and sent
forward articles of impeachment. Johnson was tried by the Senate in 1868 and was found not
guilty.
In passing civil rights legislation and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
U.S. Constitution, the Republican Congress was attempting, for the first time in history, to create
a truly interracial democracy. Faced with violent opposition in the South and a retreat from the
ideal of racial equality in the North, Reconstruction proved short-lived. It would take another
century for the nation to begin to live up to this era's promise of equality for all its citizens.
