Civil War and Reconstruction

The Civil War (1861-1865) was the bloodiest conflict in American history — 750,000 killed. It ended slavery but left the country deeply divided. RECONSTRUCTION (1865-1877) was the effort to rebuild and integrate 4 million newly freed people as citizens. It was partly successful, mostly failed — and its unfinished business still echoes today.

The central cause was SLAVERY. Northern states had abolished slavery by the mid-1800s. Southern states' economies depended on enslaved labor (cotton, tobacco, sugar).\n\nKey tensions:\n- Should new Western states allow slavery?\n- Could enslaved people escape to free states?\n- Would the federal government abolish slavery?\n\nIn 1860, Abraham Lincoln won the presidency on an anti-slavery-expansion platform. Eleven Southern states SECEDED from the Union to form the Confederacy. War began April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter.

- **Fort Sumter (April 1861)** — war begins\n- **Antietam (Sept 1862)** — bloodiest single day in US history\n- **Emancipation Proclamation (Jan 1, 1863)** — freed enslaved people in rebel states\n- **Gettysburg (July 1863)** — Union victory, turning point\n- **Gettysburg Address (Nov 1863)** — Lincoln's famous 272-word speech\n- **Appomattox (April 9, 1865)** — General Lee surrenders\n- **Lincoln assassinated (April 14, 1865)** — just 5 days later\n\nSlavery was officially abolished by the 13th Amendment in December 1865.

With slavery ended, HUGE questions remained:\n\n- How would the South rebuild economically?\n- How would freed Black people become citizens?\n- What would happen to former Confederate leaders?\n\nThree Reconstruction Amendments changed the Constitution:\n\n- **13th (1865)** — abolished slavery\n- **14th (1868)** — birthright citizenship, equal protection under law\n- **15th (1870)** — voting rights regardless of race\n\nBlack men voted. Black men were elected to Congress. Schools and colleges for Black students opened.

Reconstruction ended in 1877 when federal troops left the South. White Southerners quickly:\n\n- Passed JIM CROW laws enforcing segregation\n- Used poll taxes and literacy tests to block Black voting\n- The KKK terrorized Black communities\n- Economic systems (sharecropping) kept Black people in poverty\n\nBy 1900, most gains had been reversed. This "Jim Crow South" lasted until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s-60s.

- **Abraham Lincoln** — President during the war; assassinated\n- **Ulysses S. Grant** — Union General, later 18th President\n- **Robert E. Lee** — Confederate General, surrendered at Appomattox\n- **Frederick Douglass** — former enslaved person, great abolitionist speaker\n- **Harriet Tubman** — Underground Railroad, Union spy\n- **Clara Barton** — nurse, founded American Red Cross\n- **Hiram Revels** — FIRST Black US Senator (1870, Mississippi)\n- **Sojourner Truth** — abolitionist and women's rights advocate\n- **Andrew Johnson** — President after Lincoln, opposed Reconstruction protection

The unfinished work of Reconstruction shaped:\n\n- The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s-60s\n- Ongoing debates about voting rights, policing, and equality\n- The modern US political geography\n- How Americans understand "freedom" and "equality"\n\nHistorian Eric Foner calls Reconstruction "America's unfinished revolution." The ideals — universal citizenship, equal rights — remain aspirations we're still working toward.