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Of the People
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Of the People
A H i st ory of t he
U n i t e d Stat e s
w it h Sou r c e s
Volume 2 • Since 1865
Third Edition
James Oakes
City University of New York Graduate Center
Michael McGerr
Indiana University–Bloomington
Jan Ellen Lewis

Rutgers University, Newark
Nick Cullather
Indiana University–Bloomington
Jeanne Boydston
University of Wisconsin–Madison
Mark Summers
University of Kentucky–Lexington
Camilla Townsend
Rutgers University, New Brunswick
Karen M. Dunak
Muskingum University
New York Oxford

Oxford University Press
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ISBN: 978-0-19-025489-6

Printing number: 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America

on acid-free paper
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Jeanne Boydston
1944–2008
Historian, Teacher, Friend
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Brief Contents
Maps xxvi
Features xxviii
Preface xxx
About the Authors xli
Chapter 15 Reconstructing a Nation, 1865–1877 450
Chapter 16 The Triumph of Industrial Capitalism, 1850–1890 480
Chapter 17 Cultural Struggles of Industrial America, 1850–1895 508
Chapter 18 The Politics of Industrial America, 1870–1892 536
Chapter 19 Industry and Empire, 1890–1900 562
Chapter 20 A United Body of Action, 1900–1916 594
Chapter 21 A Global Power, 1914–1919 624
Chapter 22 The Modern Nation, 1919–1928 652
Chapter 23 A Great Depression and a New Deal, 1929–1940 682
Chapter 24 The Second World War, 1941–1945 710
Chapter 25 The Cold War, 1945–1952 742
Chapter 26 The Consumer Society, 1945–1961 772
Chapter 27 “The Table of Democracy,” 1960–1968 804
Chapter 28 Living with Less, 1968–1980 836
Chapter 29 The Triumph of Conservatism, 1980–1991 868
Chapter 30 The Globalized Nation, 1989–2001 902
Epilogue “A Nation Transformed,” 2001–2014 934
Appendix A Historical Documents A-1
Appendix B Historical Facts and Data B-1
Glossary G-1
Photo Credits C-1
Index I-1
vii
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Contents
Maps xxvi
Features xxviii
Preface xxx
New to the Third Edition xxxii
Hallmark Features xxxiii
Supplements xxxiii
Acknowledgments xxxvi
About the Authors xli
Chapter 15 Reconstructing a Nation, 1865–1877 450

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: John Dennett Visits a Freedmen’s Bureau Court 452
Wartime Reconstruction 453

The Meaning of Freedom 454
Experiments with Free Labor 455
Lincoln’s Ten Percent Plan Versus the Wade-Davis Bill 456
Presidential Reconstruction, 1865–1867 457
The Political Economy of Contract Labor 458
Resistance to Presidential Reconstruction 459
Congress Clashes with the President 459
Origins of the Fourteenth Amendment 460
Congressional Reconstruction 462
The South Remade 462
The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson 463
Radical Reconstruction in the South 464
Achievements and Failures of Radical Government 464
The Political Economy of Sharecropping 465
The Gospel of Prosperity 468
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Reconstructing America’s Foreign Policy 469
The Retreat from Republican Radicalism 469

Republicans Become the Party of Moderation 470
Reconstructing the North 470
The Fifteenth Amendment and Nationwide African American Suffrage 470
Women and Suffrage 471
The Rise and Fall of the National Labor Union 472
The End of Reconstruction 472
Corruption Is the Fashion 472
viii
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Contents ix
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: An Incident at Coushatta, August 1874 473

Liberal Republicans Revolt 474
“Redeeming” the South 475
The Twice-Stolen Election of 1876 477
Conclusion 478
Chapter 15 Primary Sources
15.1 P etroleum V. Nasby [David Ross Locke], A Platform for Northern
Democrats (1865) S15-2
15.2 Mississippi Black Code (1865) S15-3
15.3 S harecropping Contract between Alonzo T. Mial and Fenner Powell
(1886) S15-7
15.4 Joseph Farley, An Account of Reconstruction S15-8
15.5 E xcerpt from the Testimony of Gadsden Steel from Proceedings in the
Ku Klux Trials at Columbia, S. C. in the United States Circuit Court,
November Term (1871) S15-9
Chapter 16 The Triumph of Industrial Capitalism,

1850–1890 480
AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Rosa Cassettari 482
The Political Economy of Global Capitalism 483

The “Great Depression” of the Late Nineteenth Century 483
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: The Global Migration of Labor 484
America Moves to the City 486
The Rise of Big Business 488
The Rise of Andrew Carnegie 488
Carnegie Dominates the Steel Industry 489
Big Business Consolidates 490
A New Social Order 492
Lifestyles of the Very Rich 492
The Consolidation of the New Middle Class 493
The Industrial Working Class Comes of Age 494
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: Within the Reach of All 495
Sharecropping Becomes Wage Labor 496
Clearing the West for Capitalism 498
The Overland Trail 498
The Origins of Indian Reservations 499
The Destruction of Indian Subsistence 501
The Economic Transformation of the West 502
Cattlemen: From Drovers to Ranchers 502
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x Contents
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: Mining Camps in the West 503

Commercial Farmers Subdue the Plains 505
Changes in the Land 506
Conclusion 506
16.1 Chief Joseph, Account of His Visit to Washington, DC (1879) S16-2
16.2 Visual Document: Alfred R. Waud, “Bessemer Steel Manufacture” (1876) S16-3
16.3 Jacob Riis, Excerpt from How the Other Half Lives (1890) and Visual
Document: Jacob Riis, “Bandits’ Roost” (1887); “Italian Mother and Baby,
Ragpicker, New York” (1889) S16-4
16.4 Joseph Kirkland, Excerpt from “Among the Poor of Chicago” (1892) S16-6
16.5 George Steevens, Excerpt from The Land of the Dollar (1897) S16-8
Chapter 17 Cultural Struggles of Industrial America,

1850–1895 508
AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Anthony Comstock’s Crusade Against Vice 510
The Varieties of Urban Culture 511

Minstrel Shows as Cultural Nostalgia 512
The Origins of Vaudeville 513
Sports Become Professional 513
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: World’s Fairs 515
The Elusive Boundaries of Male and Female 516

The Victorian Construction of Male and Female 516
Victorians Who Questioned Traditional Sexual Boundaries 517
Immigration as a Cultural Problem 518
Josiah Strong Attacks Immigration 519
From Immigrants to Ethnic Americans 519
The Catholic Church and Its Limits in Immigrant Culture 520
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: “The Chinese Must Go” 522
Immigrant Cultures 523
The Creation of High Culture 524
High Culture Becomes Moral Crusade 525
Cultural Establishment Versus Mass Culture 525
Social Darwinism and the Growth of Scientific Racism 528
Artistic Realism Finds an American Voice 529
The Advance of Literary Realism 529
Painting Reality 531
Is Photography Art? 532
Conclusion 534
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Contents xi

17.1 J ames Blake and Charles Lawlor, “Sidewalks of New York” (1894) and Charles
Hoyt, “The Bowery” (1891) S17-2
17.2 Emma Lazarus, “The New Colossus” (1883) S17-4
17.3 J osiah Strong, Excerpts from “The Superiority of the Anglo-Saxon Race”
(1885) S17-5
17.4 Russell H. Conwell, “Acres of Diamonds” (1860s-1920s) S17-7
Chapter 18 The Politics of Industrial America,

1870–1892 536
AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Luna Kellie and the Farmers’ Alliance 538
Two Political Styles 539

The Triumph of Party Politics 539
Masculine Partisanship and Feminine Voluntarism 540
The Women’s Christian Temperance Union 541
The Critics of Popular Politics 541
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: The “Crusade” Against Alcohol 542
The Enemy at the Gates 543
Economic Issues Dominate National Politics 544
Greenbacks and Greenbackers 544
Weak Presidents Oversee a Stronger Federal Government 545
Government Activism and Its Limits 549
States Discover Activism 550
Cities: Boss Rule and New Responsibilities 550
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Foreign Policy: The Limited Significance of
Commercial Expansion 551
Middle-Class Radicalism 553

Henry George and the Limits of Producers’ Ideology 553
Edward Bellamy and the Nationalist Clubs 554
Discontent Among Workers 554
The Knights of Labor and the Haymarket Disaster 555
Agrarian Revolt 556
The Rise of the Populists 557
Conclusion 560
18.1 New York World, “How Tim Got the Votes” (1892) S18-2
18.2 N
ew York Herald, “Tim Sullivan’s Queer Canvass” (1895) S18-3
18.3 Tammany Times, “And Reform Moves On” (1895) S18-5
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xii Contents
18.4 Henry George, Excerpts from “That We Might All Be Rich” (1883) S18-5
xcerpts from The Famous Speeches of the Eight Chicago Anarchists in Court
18.5 E
(1886) S18-8
Chapter 19 Industry and Empire, 1890–1900 562

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: J. P. Morgan 564
The Crisis of the 1890s 565

Hard Times 566
The Overseas Frontier 566
The Drive for Efficiency 568
Progress and Force 568
Corporate Consolidation 570
A Modern Economy 570
Currency and the Tariff 570
The Cross of Gold 571
The Battle of the Standards 571
The Retreat from Politics 573
The Lure of the Cities 573
Inventing Jim Crow 574
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: Galveston, Texas, 1900 575
The Atlanta Compromise 577
Disfranchisement and the Decline of Popular Politics 578
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: The Wilmington Race Riot 579
Organized Labor Retreats from Politics 580
American Diplomacy Enters the Modern World 581
Sea Power and the Imperial Urge 582
The Scramble for Empire 583
War with Spain 584
The Anti-Imperialists 587
The Philippine-American War 587
The Open Door 588
Conclusion 592
19.1 William Jennings Bryan, Excerpts from “Cross of Gold” Speech (1896) S19-2
19.2 Booker T. Washington, “The Atlanta Compromise” (1895) S19-4
19.3 Theodore Roosevelt, Excerpts from “The Strenuous Life” (1899) S19-6
19.4 Visual Document: Louis Dalrymple, “School Begins” (1899) S19-9
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Contents xiii
Chapter 20 A United Body of Action, 1900–1916 594

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Alice Hamilton 596
Toward a New Politics 597

The Insecurity of Modern Life 597
The Decline of Partisan Politics 599
Social Housekeeping 599
Evolution or Revolution? 601
The Progressives 602
Social Workers and Muckrakers 602
Dictatorship of the Experts 604
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: Public Response to The Jungle 605
Progressives on the Color Line 607
Progressives in State and Local Politics 608
Redesigning the City 608
Reform Mayors and City Services 609
Progressives and the States 609
The President Becomes “The Administration” 611
The Executive Branch Against the Trusts 611
The Square Deal 612
Conserving Water, Land, and Forests 613
TR and Big Stick Diplomacy 614
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: The Hetch Hetchy Valley 615
Taft and Dollar Diplomacy 617
Rival Visions of the Industrial Future 618
The New Nationalism 619
The 1912 Election 619
The New Freedom 620
Conclusion 622
20.1 Jane Addams, Excerpts from Twenty-Years at Hull House with Autobiographical
Notes (1910) S20-2
20.2 Upton Sinclair, Excerpts from The Jungle (1906) S20-4
20.3 Visual Document: Lewis Wickes Hine, National Child Labor Committee
Photographs (early 1900s) S20-7
20.4 Woodrow Wilson, Campaign Speech at Indianapolis (1912) S20-9
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xiv Contents
Chapter 21 A Global Power, 1914–1919 624

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Walter Lippmann 626
The Challenge of Revolution 627

The Mexican Revolution 628
Bringing Order to the Caribbean 628
A One-Sided Neutrality 629
The Lusitania’s Last Voyage 630
The Drift to War 630
The Election of 1916 631
The Last Attempts at Peace 631
War Aims 632
The Fight in Congress 632
Mobilizing the Nation and the Economy 633
Enforcing Patriotism 633
Regimenting the Economy 634
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: Eugene Debs Speaks Out Against the War 635
The Great Migration 638
Reforms Become “War Measures” 639
Over There 640
Citizens into Soldiers 641
The Fourteen Points 641
The Final Offensive 642
Revolutionary Anxieties 645
Wilson in Paris 645
The Senate Rejects the League 646
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: The Influenza Pandemic of 1918 647
Red Scare 650
Conclusion 651
21.1 Eugene Debs, Excerpts from Canton, Ohio Speech (1918) S21-2
21.2 George Creel, Excerpts from How We Advertised America (1920) S21-4
21.3 Visual Document: James Montgomery Flagg, “I Want You” (1917) S21-6
21.4 Woodrow Wilson, “Fourteen Points” Speech (1918) S21-7
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Contents xv
Chapter 22 The Modern Nation, 1919–1928 652

AMERICA PORTRAIT: “America’s Sweetheart” 654
A Dynamic Economy 655

The Development of Industry 655
The Trend Toward Large-Scale Organization 656
The Transformation of Work and the Workforce 657
The Defeat of Organized Labor 658
The Decline of Agriculture 659
The Urban Nation 659
A Modern Culture 660
The Spread of Consumerism 660
New Pleasures 661
A Sexual Revolution 663
Changing Gender Ideals 664
The Family and Youth 664
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: Flappers and Feminists 665
The Celebration of the Individual 666
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: “Flaming Youth” on Campus 667
The Limits of the Modern Culture 668

The Limits of Prosperity 668
The “Lost Generation” of Intellectuals 669
Fundamentalist Christians and “Old-Time Religion” 669
Nativists and Immigration Restriction 670
The Rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan 670
Mexican Americans 671
African Americans and the “New Negro” 672
A “New Era” in Politics and Government 674
The Modern Political System 674
The Republican Ascendancy 676
The Politics of Individualism 676
Republican Foreign Policy 677
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: “Jazz-band partout!” 678
Extending the “New Era” 680
Conclusion 680
22.1 Warren G. Harding, Excerpts from “Return to Normalcy” Speech (1920) S22-2
22.2 Bruce Barton, Excerpts from The Man Nobody Knows: A Discovery of the
Real Jesus (1925) S22-3
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xvi Contents
22.3 Visual Document: Colgate & Co. Advertisement (1925) S22-6

22.4 Robert Lynd and Helen Lynd, Excerpt from “Remaking Leisure in
Middletown” (1929) S22-6
Chapter 23 A Great Depression and a New Deal,

1929–1940 682
AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Dorothea Lange 684
The Great Depression 685

Causes 685
Descending into Depression 686
Hoover Responds 689
The First New Deal 691
The Election of 1932 691
FDR Takes Command 693
Federal Relief 694
The Farm Crisis 694
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: The Civilian Conservation Corps and a New Brand
of Environmentalism 695
The Blue Eagle 698
The Second New Deal 699
Critics Attack from All Sides 699
The Second Hundred Days 700
Social Security for Some 701
Labor and the New Deal 702
The New Deal Coalition 703
Crisis of the New Deal 704
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: The Global Depression 705

Conservatives Counterattack 706
The Liberal Crisis of Confidence 708
Conclusion 708
23.1 Fortune, “No One Has Starved” (1932) S23-2
23.2 Franklin D. Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address (1933) S23-4
23.3 V
isual Document: Dorothea Lange, Farm Security Administration
Photographs (1930s) S23-7
23.4 Letters to Eleanor Roosevelt (1936) S23-8
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Contents xvii
Chapter 24 The Second World War, 1941–1945 710

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: A. Philip Randolph 712
Island in a Totalitarian Sea 713

A World of Hostile Blocs 713
The Good Neighbor 714
America First? 715
Means Short of War 716
Turning the Tide 718
Midway and Coral Sea 718
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Carrier 720
Gone with the Draft 721
The Winning Weapons 723
The Second Front 725
Organizing for Production 725
A Mixed Economy 726
Industry Moves South and West 727
New Jobs in New Places 728
Women in Industry 729
Between Idealism and Fear 730
Japanese Internment 732
No Shelter from the Holocaust 732
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: Manzanar 733
Closing with the Enemy 735

Taking the War to Europe 735
Island Hopping in the Pacific 736
Building a New World 737
The Fruits of Victory 738
Conclusion 740
24.1 Franklin D. Roosevelt, “Four Freedoms” Speech (1941) S24-2
24.2 Visual Document: Norman Rockwell, “Freedom of Speech” (1943) S24-6
24.3 Letter from James G. Thompson to the Editor of the Pittsburgh Courier
(1942) S24-7
24.4 Letters from Polly Crow to her Husband During World War II (1944) S24-8
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xviii Contents
Chapter 25 The Cold War, 1945–1952 742

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Matt Cvetic 744
Origins of the Cold War 745

Ideological Competition 746
Uneasy Allies 746
From Allies to Enemies 747
National Security 748
The Truman Doctrine 748
Containment 750
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: The Nevada Test Site 752
Taking Risks 753
Global Revolutions 754
Korea 754
NSC-68 756
The Reconversion of American Society 757
The Postwar Economy 757
The Challenge of Organized Labor 757
Opportunities for Women 759
Civil Rights for African Americans 760
The Frustrations of Liberalism 762
The Democrats’ Troubles 762
Truman’s Comeback 763
Fighting the Cold War at Home 764
Doubts and Fears in the Atomic Age 764
The Anti-Communist Crusade 765
The Hunt for Spies 766
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: The Hollywood Ten 767
The Rise of McCarthyism 769
Conclusion 770
25.1 Winston Churchill, Excerpts from “The Sinews of Peace” (1946) and
Philadelphia Inquirer, Interview with Josef Stalin (1946) S25-2
25.2 X [George F. Kennan], Excerpts from “The Sources of Soviet
Conduct” (1947) S25-3
25.3 Statements by the United Auto Workers and General Motors (1945) S25-5
25.4 Harry S. Truman, Excerpts from Special Message to the Congress
Recommending a Comprehensive Health Program (1945) S25-7
25.5 J oseph McCarthy, Excerpts from Wheeling, West Virginia Speech
(1950) S25-8
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Contents xix
Chapter 26 The Consumer Society, 1945–1961 772

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: The Ricardos 774
Living the Good Life 775

Economic Prosperity 775
The Suburban Dream 776
The Pursuit of Pleasure 776
A Homogeneous Society? 779
The Discovery of Conformity 779
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: Eisenhower’s Interstate Highway System 780
The Decline of Class and Ethnicity 781
The Resurgence of Religion and Family 781
Maintaining Gender Roles 782
Persisting Racial Differences 783
The Survival of Diversity 785
The Eisenhower Era at Home and Abroad 786
“Ike” and 1950s America 786
Modern Republicanism 787
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: “ The Fantastic, Real-Life, Dream-Come-True
Adventure of the Barstow Family of Wethersfield,
Connecticut” 788
An Aggressive Cold War Strategy 789
Avoiding War with the Communist Powers 791
Crises in the Third World 791
Challenges to the Consumer Society 794
Rebellious Youth 794
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Consumerism and the Cold War 795
The Beat Movement 796
The Rebirth of Environmentalism 797
The Struggle for Civil Rights 797
The Crisis of “Misplaced Power” 800
Conclusion 802
26.1 Harry Henderson, Excerpts from “The Mass-Produced Suburbs. I. How People
Live in America’s Newest Towns” (1953) S26-2
26.2 H. H. Remmers & D. H. Radler, Excerpts from “Teenage Attitudes” (1958) S26-4
26.3 United States Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization, Excerpts from “Survive
Nuclear Attack” (1960) S26-7
26.4 Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Farewell Radio and Television Address to the
American People” (1961) S26-10
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xx Contents
Chapter 27 “The Table of Democracy,” 1960–1968 804

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: The A&T Four 806
New Approaches to Power 807

Grassroots Activism for Civil Rights 807
The New Liberalism 807
The New Conservatism 808
The New Left 808
The Presidential Election of 1960 809
The New Frontier 809
Style and Substance 809
Civil Rights 811
Flexible Response and the Third World 812
Two Confrontations with the Soviets 813
Kennedy and Vietnam 814
The Great Society 815
Lyndon Johnson’s Mandate 815
“Success Without Squalor” 816
Preserving Personal Freedom 817
The Death of Jim Crow 818
The American War in Vietnam 819
Johnson’s Decision for War 819
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: “ The Long Cool Summer” of Greenville,
Mississippi 820
Fighting a Limited War 822
The War at Home 822
The Great Society Comes Apart 825
The Emergence of Black Power 825
The Youth Rebellion 827
The Rebirth of the Women’s Movement 828
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: International Student Protest, 1968 830
Conservative Backlash 831
1968: A Tumultuous Year 831
Conclusion 834
27.1 Martin Luther King, Jr., “Statement to the Press at the Beginning of the Youth
Leadership Conference” (1960) and Student Non-Violent Coordinating
Committee, Statement of Purpose (1960) S27-2
27.2 John F. Kennedy, Excerpts from Inaugural Address (1961) S27-3
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Contents xxi
27.3 Testimony of Marian Wright, Examination of the War on Poverty; Hearings

Before the Subcommittee on Employment, Manpower, and Poverty of the
Committee on Labor and Public Welfare (1967) S27-4
27.4 Lyndon B. Johnson, Excerpts from Address at Johns Hopkins University,
“Peace Without Conquest” (1965) S27-7
27.5 Mario Savio, “An End to History” (1964) S27-9
Chapter 28 Living with Less, 1968–1980 836

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: “Fighting Shirley Chisholm” 838
A New Crisis: Economic Decline 839

Weakness at Home 839
The Energy Crisis 840
Competition Abroad 841
The Multinationals 841
The Impact of Decline 841
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Carl Gerstacker’s Dream 842
Confronting Decline: Nixon’s Strategy 844

A New Foreign Policy 844
Ending the Vietnam War 845
Chile and the Middle East 847
Taming Big Government 847
An Uncertain Economic Policy 848
Refusing to Settle for Less: Struggles for Rights 849
African Americans’ Struggle for Racial Justice 849
Women’s Liberation 850
Mexican Americans and “Brown Power” 851
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: “ROAR”! 852
Asian American Activism 854
The Struggle for Native American Rights 855
Homosexuals and Gay Power 856
Backlash: From Radical Action to Conservative Reaction 857
“The Movement” and the “Me Decade” 857
The Plight of the White Ethnics 858
The Republican Counterattack 858
Political Crisis: Three Troubled Presidencies 859
Watergate: The Fall of Richard Nixon 859
Gerald Ford and a Skeptical Nation 860
“Why Not the Best?”: Jimmy Carter 862
Conclusion 866
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xxii Contents

28.1 T
estimony of Gerald Dickey, Mergers and Industrial Concentration; Hearings
Before the Subcommittee on Antitrust and Monopoly of the Committee on the
Judiciary (1978) S28-2
28.2 R ichard Nixon, “First Annual Report to the Congress on United States Foreign
Policy for the 1970’s” (1970) S28-4
28.3 N ew York Radical Women, Principles (1968) and Pat Maxwell, “Homosexuals
in the Movement” (1970) S28-6
28.4 S tatements by Roman Pucinski, Ethnic Heritage Studies Centers; Hearings
Before the General Subcommittee on Education of the Committee on
Education and Labor (1970) S28-8
28.5 J immy Carter, Address to the Nation on Energy and National Goals: “The
Malaise Speech” (1979) S28-9
Chapter 29 The Triumph of Conservatism, 1980–1991 868

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Linda Chavez 870
Creating a Conservative Majority 871

The New Economy 871
The Rehabilitation of Business 872
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: Silicon Valley 873
The Rise of the Religious Right 874
The 1980 Presidential Election 875
The Reagan Revolution at Home 876
The Reagan Style 876
Shrinking Government 877
Reaganomics 878
The 1984 Presidential Election 879
The Reagan Revolution Abroad 879
Restoring American Power 880
Confronting the “Evil Empire” 881
The Reagan Doctrine in the Third World 882
The Middle East and Terrorism 884
The United States and the World Economy 884
The Battle over Conservative Social Values 885
Attacking the Legacy of the 1960s 885
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Japanese Management, American Workers 886
Women’s Rights and Abortion 887
Gays and the AIDS Crisis 888
African Americans and Racial Inequality 890
“The Decade of the Hispanic” 892
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Contents xxiii
From Scandal to Triumph 892

Business and Religious Scandals 893
Political Scandals 893
Setbacks for the Conservative Agenda 894
A Vulnerable Economy 894
Reagan’s Comeback 896
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: Reagan at the Berlin Wall 898
Conclusion 900
29.1 Jerry Falwell, Excerpts from Listen, America! (1980) S29-2
29.2 R onald Reagan, Excerpts from “Address to the Nation on the Economy”
(1981) S29-3
29.3 N ational Conference of Catholic Bishops, Excerpts from “The Challenge of
Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response” (1983) S29-5
29.4 Excerpts from the Republican and Democratic Party Platforms on the State of
the American Family (1984) S29-7
29.5 T estimony of Major Paul Kelly, Homelessness in America; Hearing Before the
Subcommittee on Housing and Community Development of the Committee
on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs (1983) S29-10
Chapter 30 The Globalized Nation, 1989–2001 902

American Portrait: James Sharlow 904
The Age of Globalization 905

The Cold War and Globalization 905
New Communications Technologies 905
Multinationals and NGOs 906
Expanding Trade 906
Moving People 907
Contesting Globalization 907
A New Economy 908
From Industry to Information 908
A Second Economic Revolution? 908
Downsizing America 909
Boom and Insecurity 910
Democratic Deadlock 911
George H. W. Bush and the End of the Reagan Revolution 911
American Landscape: Seattle 912
The Rebellion Against Politics as Usual 914
Clinton’s Compromise with Conservatism 916
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xxiv Contents
Domestic Dissent and Terrorism 917

Scandal 918
Culture Wars 919
STRUGGLES FOR Democracy: “Temporarily Closed,” 1995–1996 920

African Americans in the Post–Civil Rights Era 921
“Family Values” 923
Multiculturalism 923
Women in the Postfeminist Era 925
Contesting Gay and Lesbian Rights 926
Redefining Foreign Policy in the Global Age 927
The New World Order 927
The Persian Gulf War 928
Retreating from the New World Order 929
A New Threat 931
Conclusion 932
30.1 K enichi Ohmae, “Declaration of Interdependence Toward the World–2005”
(1990) and Helena Norberg-Hodge, “Break Up the Monoculture”
(1996) S30-2
30.2 S olomon D. Trujillo, “Opportunity in the New Information Economy”
(1998) S30-4
30.3 W illiam J. Clinton, Excerpts from “Address Before a Joint Session of the
Congress on the State of the Union” (1996) S30-5
30.4 E xcerpts from National Defense Authorization Act of 1994 (1993) and Defense
of Marriage Act (1996) S30-7
30.5 George H. W. Bush, Excerpts from “Address Before a Joint Session of the
Congress on the Cessation of Hostilities in the Persian Gulf Conflict”
(1991) S30-9
Epilogue “A Nation Transformed,” 2001–2014 934

American Portrait: Lt. Craig Mullaney 936
Twin Crises 937

Bush 43 937
9/11 937
The Global War on Terror 938
The Iraq War 939
Iraq and Afghanistan in Turmoil 939
Financial Crisis 940
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Contents xxv
STRUGGLES FOR Democracy: “Gitmo” 942
Obama and the Promise of Change 943

Confronting Economic Crisis 944
Ending the Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq 945
The Politics of Frustration 946
A Second Term 947
A Government and a Nation “Of the People”? 947
A Diverse Society of Color 948
LGBT Rights 949
The Return of Economic Inequality 950
Unending War? 951
Conclusion 952
Epilogue Primary Sources
E.1 G
eorge W. Bush, Excerpts from “Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress
on the United States Response to the Terrorist Attacks of September 11”
(2001) SE-2
E.2 R
obert B. Reich, “Income Inequality in the United States” (2014) and Scott
Winship, “Choosing Our Battles: Why We Should Wage a War on Immobility
Instead of Inequality” (2014) SE-4
Appendices
Appendix A: Historical Documents A-1
The Declaration of Independence A-1
The Constitution of the United States of America A-3
Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address A-22
Appendix B: Historical Facts and Data B-1
US Presidents and Vice Presidents B-1
Admission of States into the Union B-3
Glossary G-1
Photo Credits C-1
Index I-1
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Maps
15–1 Reconstruction and Redemption 463
15–2 Sharecropping 467
15–3 The Effect of Sharecropping in the South: The Barrow Plantation in
Oglethorpe County, Georgia 468
15–4 The Presidential Election, 1876 478
16–1 Patterns of Global Migration, 1840–1900 484
16–2 The Growth of Railroads, 1850–1890 489
16–3 Major American Industries, ca. 1890 491
16–4 The Overland Trail 498
17–1 Houses of Prostitution, 1850–1859 and 1900–1909 518
17–2 Population of Foreign Birth by Region, 1880 520
18–1 The Election of 1888 549
19–2 Spanish-American War, Caribbean/Spanish-American War, Pacific 586
19–3 The Imperial World 590
20–1 Growth of Public Lands 614
20–2 United States in the Caribbean 618
21–1 Mexican Invasion Routes to Veracruz 629
21–2 Western Front, 1918 643
23–1 Extent of the Dust Bowl 688
23–2 The Presidential Election of 1932 692
23–3 TVA Projects 698
24–1 World War II in the Pacific, 1942–1945 719
24–2 World War II in Europe, 1942–1945 726
24–3 The Manhattan Project 728
25–1 Cold War in Europe, 1950 751
25–2 The Korean War, 1950–1953 755
25–3 The 1948 Presidential Election 764
26–1 America’s Cold War Alliances in Asia 793
26–2 America’s Cold War Alliances in the Middle East 794
26–3 African Americans Attending Schools with White Students in Southern
and Border States, 1954 798
27–2 America’s War in Vietnam, 1965–1968 823
27–3 Race Riots, 1965–1968 826
28–1 Movement from Rustbelt to Sunbelt 843
28–2 The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) 851
28–3 Native American Population, 1980 855
xxvi
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Maps xxvii
29–1 The Growth of Evangelical Christianity 875

29–3 The Reagan Doctrine in Central America and the Caribbean 882
29–4 Abortion in the 1980s 889
30–1 Aging in America 911
30–2 The Persian Gulf War 929
E–1 Percentage Change in Minority Population by County: 2000 to 2010 948
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Features
AMERICAN PORTRAIT
John Dennett Visits a Freedmen’s Bureau Court (Chapter 15)
Rosa Cassettari (Chapter 16)
Anthony Comstock’s Crusade Against Vice (Chapter 17)
Luna Kellie and the Farmers’ Alliance (Chapter 18)
J. P. Morgan (Chapter 19)
Alice Hamilton (Chapter 20)
Walter Lippmann (Chapter 21)
“America’s Sweetheart” (Chapter 22)
Dorothea Lange (Chapter 23)
A. Philip Randolph (Chapter 24)
Matt Cvetic (Chapter 25)
The Ricardos (Chapter 26)
The A&T Four (Chapter 27)
“Fighting Shirley Chisholm” (Chapter 28)
Linda Chavez (Chapter 29)
James Sharlow (Chapter 30)
Lt. Craig Mullaney (Epilogue)
AMERICAN LANDSCAPE
Mining Camps in the West (Chapter 16)
Galveston, Texas, 1900 (Chapter 19)
The Hetch Hetchy Valley (Chapter 20)
“Flaming Youth” on Campus (Chapter 22)
The Nevada Test Site (Chapter 25)
Eisenhower’s Interstate Highway System (Chapter 26)
Silicon Valley (Chapter 29)
Seattle (Chapter 30)
xxviii
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Features xxix
AMERICA AND THE WORLD

Reconstructing America’s Foreign Policy (Chapter 15)
The Global Migration of Labor (Chapter 16)
World’s Fairs (Chapter 17)
Foreign Policy: The Limited Significance of Commercial Expansion (Chapter 18)
The Influenza Pandemic of 1918 (Chapter 21)
“Jazz-band partout!” (Chapter 22)
The Global Depression (Chapter 23)
Carrier (Chapter 24)
Consumerism and the Cold War (Chapter 26)
International Student Protest, 1968 (Chapter 27)
Carl Gerstacker’s Dream (Chapter 28)
Japanese Management, American Workers (Chapter 29)
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY

An Incident at Coushatta, August 1874 (Chapter 15)
Within the Reach of All (Chapter 16)
“The Chinese Must Go” (Chapter 17)
The “Crusade” Against Alcohol (Chapter 18)
The Wilmington Race Riot (Chapter 19)
Public Response to The Jungle (Chapter 20)
Eugene Debs Speaks Out Against the War (Chapter 21)
Flappers and Feminists (Chapter 22)
The Civilian Conservation Corps and a New Brand of Environmentalism (Chapter 23)
Manzanar (Chapter 24)
The Hollywood Ten (Chapter 25)
“The Fantastic, Real-Life, Dream-Come-True Adventure of the Barstow Family
of Wethersfield, Connecticut” (Chapter 26)
“The Long Cool Summer” of Greenville, Mississippi (Chapter 27)
“ROAR”! (Chapter 28)
Reagan at the Berlin Wall (Chapter 29)
“Temporarily Closed,” 1995–1996 (Chapter 30)
“Gitmo” (Epilogue)
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Preface
W e are grateful that the first and second editions of Of the People have been welcomed
by instructors and students as a useful instructional aid. Enhanced with even
greater emphasis on American democracy and diversity, the third edition includes a new
democracy feature and a version of the text is available with end-of-chapter primary source
documents, both textual and visual, which help students draw connections among topics
and think critically. In preparing the third edition, our primary goal has been to maintain
the text’s overarching focus on the evolution of American democracy, people, and power;
its strong portrayal of political and social history; and its clear, compelling narrative voice.
To that end, the broad representation of Native Americans, African Americans, and other
minority groups in this text shows the full diversity of the American people. One of the
text’s strengths is its critical-thinking pedagogy because the study of history entails careful
analysis, not mere memorization of names and dates.
History continues, and the writing of history is never finished. For the third edition,
we have updated the following elements based on the most recent scholarship:
• Chapters 10 and 11 integrate content on slavery and national development, as well

as the politics of slavery and the abolition movement.
• Chapters 13 through 15 were restructured and now include increased coverage of
westward expansion, the growth of railroads and what this meant in terms of eco-
nomic growth for the North and South (as well as the political economy of the
Civil War), the emergence of the Republican Party, and a revised explanation for
Reconstruction’s demise.
• Chapter 30 now covers the span of years between 1989 and 2001 and includes in-
creased coverage of domestic terrorism, an expanded discussion of African
Americans in the post–civil rights era, as well as gay and lesbian rights.
• The Epilogue covers the onset of the war on terror, from September 11, 2001, to the
present and provides an account of the Obama administration through 2014, the
nation’s continuing response to challenging economic circumstances, including
income inequality, and national security issues such as the controversy surround-
ing government surveillance and the emergence of ISIS.
At Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, on November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln

dedicated a memorial to the more than 3,000 Union soldiers who had died turning back
a Confederate invasion in the first days of July. There were at least a few ways that the
president could have justified the sad loss of life in the third year of a brutal war dividing
North and South. He could have said it was necessary to destroy the Confederacy’s cher-
ished institution of slavery, to punish Southerners for seceding from the United States, or
to preserve the nation intact. Instead, at this crucial moment in American history,
Lincoln gave a short, stunning speech about democracy. The president did not use the
word, but he offered its essence. To honor the dead of Gettysburg, he called on Northern-
ers to ensure “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not
perish from the earth.”
xxx
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Preface xxxi
With these words, Lincoln put democracy at the center of the Civil War and at the
center of American history. The authors of this book share his belief in the centrality of
democracy; his words, “of the people,” give our book its title and its main theme. We see
American history as a story “of the people,” of their struggles to shape their lives and
their land.
Our choice of theme does not mean we believe that America has always been a
democracy. Clearly, it has not. As Lincoln gave the Gettysburg Address, most African
Americans still lived in slavery. American women, North and South, lacked rights
that many men enjoyed; for all their disagreements, white southerners and northern-
ers viewed Native Americans as enemies. Neither do we believe that there is only a
single definition of democracy, either in the narrow sense of a particular form of
government or in the larger one of a society whose members participate equally in its
creation. A lthough Lincoln defined the Northern cause as a struggle for democracy,
Southerners believed it was anything but democratic to force them to remain in the
Union at gunpoint. As bloody draft riots in New York City in July 1863 made clear,
many Northern men thought it was anything but democratic to force them to fight in
Lincoln’s armies. Such disagreements have been typical of American history. For
more than 500 years, people have struggled over whose vision of life in the New World
would prevail.
It is precisely such struggles that offer the best angle of vision for seeing and under-
standing the most important developments in the nation’s history. In particular, the
democratic theme concentrates attention on the most fundamental concerns of history:
people and power.
Lincoln’s words serve as a reminder of the basic truth that history is about people.
Across the 30 chapters of this book, we write extensively about complex events. But we
also write in the awareness that these developments are only abstractions unless they are
grounded in the lives of people. The test of a historical narrative, we believe, is whether
its characters are fully rounded, believable human beings.
The choice of Lincoln’s words also reflects our belief that history is about power. To
ask whether America was democratic at some point in the past is to ask how much power
various groups of people had to make their lives and their nation. Such questions of
power necessarily take us to political processes, to the ways in which people work sepa-
rately and collectively to enforce their will. We define politics quite broadly in this book.
With the feminists of the 1960s, we believe that “the personal is the political,” that power
relations shape people’s lives in private as well as in public. Of the People looks for de-
mocracy in the living room as well as the legislature, and in the bedroom as well as the
business office.
Focusing on democracy, on people and power, we have necessarily written as wide-
ranging a history as possible. In the features and in the main text, Of the People conveys
both the unity and the great diversity of the American people across time and place. We
chronicle the racial and ethnic groups who have shaped America, differences of religious
and regional identity, the changing nature of social classes, and the different ways that
gender identities have been constructed over the centuries.
While treating different groups in their distinctiveness, we have integrated them
into the broader narrative as much as possible. A true history “of the people” means not
only acknowledging their individuality and diversity but also showing their interrela-
tionships and their roles in the larger narrative. More integrated coverage of Native
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xxxii Preface
Americans, African Americans, Latinos, and other minority groups appears throughout
the third edition.
Of the People also offers comprehensive coverage of the different spheres of human
life—cultural as well as governmental, social as well as economic, environmental as well
as military. This commitment to comprehensiveness is a reflection of our belief that all
aspects of human existence are the stuff of history. It is also an expression of the funda-
mental theme of the book: the focus on democracy leads naturally to the study of peo-
ple’s struggles for power in every dimension of their lives. Moreover, the democratic
approach emphasizes the interconnections between the different aspects of Americans’
lives; we cannot understand politics and government without tracing their connection to
economics, religion, culture, art, sexuality, and so on.
The economic connection is especially important. Of the People devotes much
attention to economic life, to the ways in which Americans have worked and saved
and spent. Economic power, the authors believe, is basic to democracy. Americans’
power to shape their lives and their country has been greatly affected by whether
they were farmers or hunters, plantation owners or slaves, wage workers or capital-
ists, domestic servants or bureaucrats. The authors do not see economics as an im-
personal, all-conquering force; instead, we try to show how the values and actions of
ordinary people, as well as the laws and regulations of government, have made
economic life.
We have also tried especially to place America in a global context. The history of
America, or any nation, cannot be adequately explained without understanding its rela-
tionship to transnational events and global developments. That is true for the first chap-
ter of the book, which shows how America began to emerge from the collision of Native
Americans, West Africans, and Europeans in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. It is
just as true for the last chapter of the book, which demonstrates how globalization and
the war on terror transformed the United States at the turn of the twenty-first century. In
the chapters in between these two, we detail how the world has changed America and
how America has changed the world. Reflecting the concerns of the rest of the book, we
focus particularly on the movement of people, the evolution of power, and the attempt to
spread democracy abroad.
Abraham Lincoln wanted to sell a war, of course. But he also truly believed that his
audience would see democracy as quintessentially American. Whether he was right is
the burden of this book.
New to the Third Edition

“Struggles for Democracy” Feature
This feature focuses on moments of debate and public conversation surrounding events
that have contributed to the changing ideas of democracy, as well as the sometimes
constricting but overall gradually widening opportunities that evolved for the American
people as a result. It appears in each chapter.
Number of Chapters
The book has been condensed from 31 to 30 chapters: content from former Chapter 12,
Slavery and the Nation, 1790–1860, has been distributed throughout Chapters 10 and 11
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Preface xxxiii
in order to improve the chronological sequence of Volume I. Chapter 30, The Globalized
Nation, has been revised to cover the span of years from 1989 to 2000.
Epilogue
We have made the addition of an Epilogue, “A Nation Transformed,” which covers the
span of years from 2001 to 2014 and includes a limited number of features.
New Additions to “American Portrait,” “American Landscape,” and

“America and the World” Features
These popular boxed features from the second edition have been updated with five new
“American Portraits” and six new “American Landscapes.” “America and the World”
remains as a feature in select chapters.
Photos
Approximately 10 percent of the photos have been revised throughout the chapters.
Primary Sources
A version of the text is available with end-of-chapter primary source documents, both
textual and visual, designed to reinforce students’ understanding of the material.
Hallmark Features
• Each chapter opens with an “American Portrait” feature, a story of someone
whose life in one way or another embodies the basic theme of the pages to follow.
• Select chapters include an “American Landscape” feature, a particular place in
time where issues of power appeared in especially sharp relief.
• To underscore the fundamental importance of global relationships, select chapters
include a feature on “America and the World.”
• Focus questions at chapter openings
• Time Lines in every chapter
• “Who, What”: This list of chapter-ending key terms helps students recall the im-
portant people and events of that chapter.
• Critical-thinking pedagogy: All chapters end with both Review Questions, which
test students’ memory and understanding of chapter content, and Critical-
Thinking Questions, which ask students to analyze and interpret chapter content.
Supplements
For Students
Oxford University Press offers a complete and authoritative package of supplementary
material for students, including print and new media resources designed for chapter
review, primary source reading, essay writing, test preparation, and further research.
Student Companion Website at www.oup.com/us/oakes
The open-access Online Study Center designed for Of the People: A History of the United
States, Third Edition helps students to review what they have learned from the textbook
as well as explore other resources online. Note-taking guides help students focus their
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xxxiv Preface
attention in class, whereas interactive practice quizzes allow them to assess their
knowledge of a topic before a test.
• Online Study Guide, including
• Note-taking outlines
• Multiple-choice and identification quizzes (two quizzes per chapter, 30-question
quizzes—different from those found in the Instructor’s Manual/Test Bank)
• Primary Source Companion and Research Guide, a brief online Research
Primer, with a library of annotated links to primary and secondary sources in US
history.
• Interactive Flashcards, using key terms and people listed at the end of each chap-
ter; these multimedia cards help students remember who’s who and what’s what.
Oxford First Source
Oxford First Source is an online database—with custom print capability—of primary
source documents for the US History Survey Course.
These documents cover a broad variety of political, economic, social, and cultural
topics and represent a broad cross section of American voices. Special effort was made to
include as many previously disenfranchised voices as possible. The documents in this
collection are indexed by date, author, title, and subject, allowing instructors to identify
and select documents best suited for their courses. Short documents (one or two pages)
are presented in their entirety while longer documents have been carefully edited to
highlight significant content.
Each document is introduced with a short explanatory paragraph and accompanied
with study questions. The collection includes an Introduction to Reading and Interpreting
Primary Documents, which introduces students to the concept of primary documents
and explains several methods for reading, interpreting, and understanding them. It also
explains how to set documents into their historical context and how to incorporate pri-
mary documents into papers, exams, and other assignments.
For Instructors
For decades American history professors have turned to Oxford University Press as the
leading source for high-quality readings and reference materials. Now, when you adopt
Oakes’s Of the People: A History of the United States, Third Edition, the Press will partner
with you and make available its best supplemental materials and resources for your
classroom. Listed here are several resources of high interest, but you will want to talk
with your sales representative to learn more about what can be made available and about
what would suit your course best.
Ancillary Resource Center (ARC) at www.oup-arc.com
This convenient, instructor-focused website provides access to all of the up-to-date teaching
resources for this text—at any time—while guaranteeing the security of grade-significant
resources. In addition, it allows Oxford University Press to keep instructors informed
when new content becomes available. The following items are available on the ARC:
• Digital copy of Instructor’s Manual
• Computerized Test Bank including:
• Quizzes (two per chapter, one per half of the chapter, content divided some-
what evenly down the middle of the chapter: 30 multiple-choice questions each)
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Preface xxxv
• Tests (two per chapter, each covering the entire chapter contents, offering 10
identification/matching; 10 multiple choice; five short answer; two essay)
• Chapter-by-chapter PowerPoint Presentations with images and videos to illus-
trate important points
• Sample Syllabi
• Chapter Outlines
• In-Class Discussion Questions
• Lecture Ideas
• Oxford’s Further Reading List
Dashboard
Online homework made easy! Tired of learning management systems that promise the
world but are too difficult to use? Oxford offers you Dashboard, a simple, nationally
hosted, online learning course—including study, review, interactive, and assessment
materials—in an easy-to-use system that requires less than 15 minutes to master.
Assignment and assessment results flow into a straightforward, color-coded grade book,
allowing you a clear view into your students’ progress. The system works on every major
platform and device, including mobile devices.
Available for sale on its own or as a package. Contact your local Oxford University
Press representative to order Of the People, Third Edition + the Access Code Card for
Dashboard. Please use the following package ISBNs to order.
Of the People, Third Edition, Volume 1 without sources: 978-0-19-049833-7
Of the People, Third Edition, Volume 2 without sources: 978-0-19-049834-4
Of the People, Third Edition, Volume 1 with sources: 978-0-19-049824-5
Of the People, Third Edition, Volume 2 with sources: 978-0-19-049825-2
A complete Course Management cartridge is also available to qualified adopters.
Instructor’s resources are also available for download directly to your computer through
a secure connection via the instructor’s side of the companion website. Contact your
Oxford University Press sales representative for more information.
Other Oxford Titles of Interest for the US History Classroom

Oxford University Press publishes a vast array of titles in American history. The following
list is just a small selection of books that pair particularly well with Oakes’s Of the People:
A History of the United States, Third Edition. Any of these books can be packaged with
Of the People at a significant discount to students. Please contact your Oxford University
Press sales representative for specific pricing information or for additional packaging
suggestions. Please visit www.oup.com/us for a full listing of Oxford titles.
Writing History: A Guide for Students, Fourth Edition,

by William Kelleher Storey, Professor of History
at Millsaps College
Bringing together practical methods from both history and composition, Writing History
provides a wealth of tips and advice to help students research and write essays for history
classes. The book covers all aspects of writing about history, including finding topics
and researching them, interpreting source materials, drawing inferences from
sources, and constructing arguments. It concludes with three chapters that discuss
writing effective sentences, using precise wording, and revising. Using numerous
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xxxvi Preface
examples from the works of cultural, political, and social historians, Writing History
serves as an ideal supplement to history courses that require students to conduct research.
The third edition includes expanded sections on peer editing and topic selection, as well
as new sections on searching and using the Internet. Writing History can be packaged
with Oakes’s Of the People: A History of the United States, Third Edition. Contact your
Oxford University Press sales representative for more information.
The Information-Literate Historian: A Guide to Research

for History Students, Second Edition, by Jenny Presnell,
Information Services Library and History, American
Studies, and Women’s Studies Bibliographer, Miami
University of Ohio
This is the only book specifically designed to teach today’s history student how to most
successfully select and use sources—primary, secondary, and electronic—to carry out
and present their research. Written by a college librarian, The Information-Literate
Historian is an indispensable reference for historians, students, and other readers doing
history research. The Information-Literate Historian can be packaged with Oakes’s Of the
People: A History of the United States, Third Edition. Contact your Oxford University
Press sales representative for more information.
Acknowledgments
We are grateful to our families, friends, and colleagues who encouraged us during the
planning and writing of this book. We would like once again to thank Bruce Nichols for
helping launch this book years ago. We are grateful to the editors and staff at Oxford
University Press, especially our acquisitions editor, Brian Wheel, and our development
editor, Maegan Sherlock. Brian’s commitment made this text possible and Maegan deftly
guided the development of the third edition. Thanks also to our talented production
team, Barbara Mathieu, senior production editor, and Michele Laseau, art director, who
helped to fulfill the book’s vision. And special thanks go to Linda Sykes and Danniel
Schoonebeek, who managed the photo research; to Leslie Anglin, our copyeditor; to
Gina Bocchetta, Brian Wheel’s editorial assistant; and to the many other people behind
the scenes at Oxford for helping this complex project happen.
The authors and editors would also like to thank the following people, whose time
and insights have contributed to the first, second, and third editions.
Supplement Authors
Diane Boucher Volker Janssen
Fitchburg State University Fullerton University
Dashboard PowerPoint Slides and Test Bank
Daniel Covino Andre McMichael
Graduate Student, Harvard Graduate Western Kentucky University
School of Education Student Companion Website
Dashboard
Laura Graves
South Plains College
Instructor’s Manual
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Preface xxxvii
Expert Reviewers of the Third Edition

Greg Hall Judith Ridner
Western Illinois University Mississippi State University
Ross A. Kennedy Robert A. Smith
Illinois State University Pittsburg State University
Randall M. Miller Timothy B. Smith
Saint Joseph’s University University of Tennessee at Martin
David W. Morris Linda D. Tomlinson
Santa Barbara City College Fayetteville State University
Adam Pratt Gerald Wilson
University of Scranton Eastern Washington University
Expert Reviewers of the Second Edition

Marjorie Berman Brian Maxson
Red Rocks Community College–Lakewood Eastern Tennessee State University
Will Carter Matthew Oyos
South Texas Community College Radford University
Jonathan Chu John Pinheiro
University of Massachusetts, Boston Aquinas College
Sara Combs James Pula
Virginia Highlands Community College Purdue University–North Central
Mark Elliott John Rosinbum
University of North Carolina–Greensboro Arizona State University
David Hamilton Christopher Thrasher
University of Kentucky Texas Tech University
James Harvey Jeffrey Trask
Houston Community College University of Massachusetts–Amherst
Courtney Joiner Michael Ward
East Georgia College California State University–Northridge
Timothy Mahoney Bridgette Williams-Searle
University of Nebraska–Lincoln The College of Saint Rose
Abigail Markwyn
Carroll University
Expert Reviewers of the First Edition

Thomas L. Altherr Susan Roth Breitzer
Metropolitan State College of Denver Fayetteville State University
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University of California–San Diego Brevard College
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Melissa Estes Blair Gregory Bush
University of Georgia University of Miami
Lawrence Bowdish Brian Casserly
Ohio State University University of Washington
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xxxviii Preface
Ann Chirhart Joseph M. Hawes

Indiana State University University of Memphis
Bradley R. Clampitt Melissa Hovsepian
East Central University University of Houston–Downtown
William W. Cobb Jr. Jorge Iber
Utah Valley University Texas Tech University
Cheryll Ann Cody David K. Johnson
Houston Community College University of South Florida
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College of Southern Nevada Campbell University
Thomas H. Cox Catherine O’Donnell Kaplan
Sam Houston State University Arizona State University
Carl Creasman Rebecca M. Kluchin
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Michigan State University Northwestern University
Brian J. Daugherity Louis M. Kyriakoudes
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University of North Carolina–Greensboro Butler University
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Texas A&M University St. Louis Community College
Michael Faubion Charlie Levine
University of Texas–Pan American Mesa Community College
John Fea Denise Lynn
Messiah College University of Southern Indiana
Anne L. Foster Lillian Marrujo-Duck
Indiana State University City College of San Francisco
Matthew Garrett Michael McCoy
Arizona State University Orange County Community College
Tim Garvin Noeleen McIlvenna
California State University–Long Beach Wright State University
Suzanne Cooper Guasco Elizabeth Brand Monroe
Queens University of Charlotte Indiana University–Purdue
Lloyd Ray Gunn University Indianapolis
University of Utah Kevin C. Motl
Richard Hall Ouachita Baptist University
Columbus State University Todd Moye
Marsha Hamilton University of North Texas
University of South Alabama Charlotte Negrete
Mark Hanna Mt. San Antonio College
University of California–San Diego Julie Nicoletta
University of Washington–Tacoma
00-Oakes-fm.indd 38 26/10/15 7:08 PM

Preface xxxix
David M. Parker Herbert Sloan

California State University–Northridge Barnard College, Columbia University
Jason Parker Vincent L. Toscano
Texas A&M University Nova Southeastern University
Burton W. Peretti William E. Weeks
Western Connecticut State University San Diego State University
Jim Piecuch Timothy L. Wood
Kennesaw State University Southwest Baptist University
John Putman Jason Young
San Diego State University SUNY–Buffalo
R. J. Rockefeller
Loyola College of Maryland
Expert Reviewers of the Concise Second Edition

Hedrick Alixopulos Daniel K. Lewis
Santa Rosa Junior College California State Polytechnic University
Guy Alain Aronoff Scott P. Marler
Humboldt State University University of Memphis
Melissa Estes Blair Laura McCall
Warren Wilson College Metropolitan State College of Denver
Amanda Bruce Stephen P. McGrath
Nassau Community College Central Connecticut State University
Jonathan Chu Vincent P. Mikkelsen
University of Massachusetts–Boston Florida State University
Paul G. E. Clemens Julie Nicoletta
Rutgers University University of Washington Tacoma
Martha Anne Fielder Caitlin Stewart
Cedar Valley College Eastern Connecticut State University
Tim Hacsi Thomas Summerhill
University of Massachusetts–Boston Michigan State University
Matthew Isham David Tegeder
Pennsylvania State University Santa Fe College
Ross A. Kennedy Eric H. Walther
Illinois State University University of Houston
Eve Kornfeld William E. Weeks
San Diego State University University of San Diego
Peggy Lambert Kenneth B. White
Lone Star College-Kingwood Modesto Junior College
Shelly L. Lemons Julie Winch
St. Louis Community College University of Massachusetts–Boston
Carolyn Herbst Lewis Mary Montgomery Wolf
Louisiana State University University of Georgia
Catherine M. Lewis Kyle F. Zelner
Kennesaw State University University of Southern Mississippi
00-Oakes-fm.indd 39 26/10/15 7:08 PM

xl Preface
Expert Reviewers of the Concise First Edition

Hedrick Alixopulos Daniel K. Lewis
Santa Rosa Junior College California State Polytechnic University
Guy Alain Aronoff Scott P. Marler
Humboldt State University University of Memphis
Melissa Estes Blair Laura McCall
Warren Wilson College Metropolitan State College of Denver
Amanda Bruce Stephen P. McGrath
Nassau Community College Central Connecticut State University
Jonathan Chu Vincent P. Mikkelsen
University of Massachusetts–Boston Florida State University
Paul G. E. Clemens Julie Nicoletta
Rutgers University University of Washington Tacoma
Martha Anne Fielder Caitlin Stewart
Cedar Valley College Eastern Connecticut State University
Tim Hacsi Thomas Summerhill
University of Massachusetts–Boston Michigan State University
Matthew Isham David Tegeder
Pennsylvania State University Santa Fe College
Ross A. Kennedy Eric H. Walther
Illinois State University University of Houston
Eve Kornfeld William E. Weeks
San Diego State University University of San Diego
Peggy Lambert Kenneth B. White
Lone Star College–Kingwood Modesto Junior College
Shelly L. Lemons Julie Winch
St. Louis Community College University of Massachusetts–Boston
Carolyn Herbst Lewis Mary Montgomery Wolf
Louisiana State University University of Georgia
Catherine M. Lewis Kyle F. Zelner
Kennesaw State University University of Southern Mississippi
00-Oakes-fm.indd 40 26/10/15 7:08 PM

About the Authors
James Oakes has published several books and numerous articles on slavery and antislavery
in the nineteenth century, including The Radical and the Republican: Frederick Douglass,
Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery Politics (2007), winner of the Lincoln
Prize in 2008. Professor Oakes is Distinguished Professor of History and Graduate School
Humanities Professor at the City University of New York Graduate Center. In 2008 he was
a fellow at the Cullman Center at the New York Public Library. His new book is Freedom
National: The Destruction of Slavery in the United States (February 2013).
Michael McGerr is the Paul V. McNutt Professor of History at Indiana University–

Bloomington. He is the author of The Decline of Popular Politics: The American North,
1865–1928 (1986) and A Fierce Discontent: The Rise and Fall of the Progressive Movement,
1870–1920 (2003), both from Oxford University Press. He is writing “The Public Be
Damned”: The Kingdom and the Dream of the Vanderbilts. The recipient of a fellowship
from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Professor McGerr has won numer-
ous teaching awards at Indiana, where his courses include the US Survey; War in Modern
American History; Rock, Hip Hop, and Revolution; Big Business; The Sixties; and
American Pleasure. He has previously taught at Yale University and the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology. He received his BA, MA, and PhD from Yale.
Jan Ellen Lewis is Professor of History and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences,
Rutgers University, Newark. She also teaches in the history PhD program at Rutgers,
New Brunswick, and was a visiting professor of history at Princeton. A specialist in co-
lonial and early national history, she is the author of The Pursuit of Happiness: Family
and Values in Jefferson’s Virginia (1983) as well as numerous articles and reviews. She has
coedited An Emotional History of the United States (1998), Sally Hemings and Thomas
Jefferson: History, Memory, and Civic Culture (1999), and The Revolution of 1800: Democ-
racy, Race, and the New Republic (2002). She has served on the editorial board of the
American Historical Review and as chair of the New Jersey Historical Commission. She
is an elected member of the Society of American Historians and the American Antiquar-
ian Society. She received her AB from Bryn Mawr College and MAs and PhD from the
University of Michigan.
Nick Cullather is a historian of US foreign relations at Indiana University–Bloomington.

He is author of three books on nation building: The Hungry World (2010), a story of
foreign aid, development, and science; Illusions of Influence (1994), on US–Philippines
relations; and Secret History (1999 and 2006), a history of the CIA’s overthrow of the
Guatemalan government in 1954. He received his PhD from the University of Virginia.
Jeanne Boydston was Robinson-Edwards Professor of American History at the Univer-

sity of Wisconsin–Madison. A specialist in the histories of gender and labor, she was the
author of Home and Work: Housework, Wages, and the Ideology of Labor in the Early
American Republic (1990); coauthor of The Limits of Sisterhood: The Beecher Sisters on
xli
00-Oakes-fm.indd 41 26/10/15 7:08 PM

xlii About the Authors
Women’s Rights and Woman’s Sphere (1988), and coeditor of Root of Bitterness: Docu-
ments in the Social History of American Women, second edition (1996). Her most recent
article is “Gender as a Category of Historical Analysis,” Gender History (2008). She
taught courses in women’s and gender history, the histories of the early republic and the
antebellum United States, and global and comparative history, and she was the recipient
of numerous awards for teaching and mentoring. Her BA and MA were from the
University of Tennessee, and her PhD was from Yale University.
Mark Summers is the Thomas D. Clark Professor of History at the University of

Kentucky–Lexington. In addition to various articles, he has written Railroads, Recon-
struction, and the Gospel of Prosperity (1984), The Plundering Generation (1988), The Era
of Good Stealings (1993), The Press Gang (1994), The Gilded Age; or, The Hazard of New
Functions (1997), Rum, Romanism and Rebellion (2000), Party Games (2004), and A
Dangerous Stir (2009). At present, he has just completed a book about a Tammany politi-
cian, Big Tim and the Tiger. He is now writing a survey of Reconstruction and a book
about 1868. He teaches the American history survey (both halves), the Gilded Age, the
Progressive Era, the Age of Jackson, Civil War and Reconstruction, the British Empire
(both halves), the Old West (both halves), a history of political cartooning, and various
graduate courses. He earned his BA from Yale and his PhD from the University of
California–Berkeley.
Camilla Townsend is Professor of History at Rutgers University–New Brunswick. She is

the author of four books, among them Malintzin’s Choices: An Indian Woman in the
Conquest of Mexico (2006) and Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma (2004), and is the
editor of American Indian History: A Documentary Reader (2010). The recipient of
fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the John Simon
Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, she has also won awards at Rutgers and at Colgate,
where she used to teach. Her courses cover the colonial history of the Americas, as well
as Native American history, early and modern. She received her BA from Bryn Mawr
and her PhD from Rutgers.
Karen M. Dunak is Assistant Professor of History at Muskingum University in New

Concord, Ohio. She is the author of As Long as We Both Shall Love: The White Wedding
in Postwar America (2013), published by New York University Press. She currently is
working on a project that investigates the process by which the ideals of Second Wave
feminism became mainstream. Her courses include the US Survey, Gender and Sexual-
ity in US History, 1950s America, and various other topics related to modern US history.
She earned her BA from American University and her PhD from Indiana University.
00-Oakes-fm.indd 42 26/10/15 7:08 PM

Of the People
T E
CA
L LI
I A P
E R U
T D
A OR
M E
H T T
I G IBU
Y R R
P S T
O D I
C T
U P O
O N
DO
00-Oakes-fm.indd 449 26/10/15 7:08 PM

15
CHAPTER
T E
CA
L LI
I A P
E R U
T D
A OR
M E
H T T
I G IBU
Y R R
P S T
O D I
C T
U P O
O N
DO
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Reconstructing a Nation
1865–1877
COMMON THREADS OUTLINE

In what ways did emancipa-
T E AMERICAN PORTRAIT: John Dennett Visits a

Freedmen’s Bureau Court
A
tion and wartime Recon-
struction overlap? Wartime Reconstruction
L I C The Meaning of Freedom
L
When did Reconstruction Experiments with Free Labor
begin?
I A P Lincoln’s Ten Percent Plan Versus the Wade-Davis Bill
R U
Presidential Reconstruction, 1865–1867
Did Reconstruction change
E
The Political Economy of Contract Labor
T D
the South? If so, how? If not, Resistance to Presidential Reconstruction
A OR
why not? Congress Clashes with the President
Origins of the Fourteenth Amendment
M E
What brought Reconstruc- Congressional Reconstruction
T T
tion to an end? The South Remade
The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson
H
G IBU
Radical Reconstruction in the South
I
Achievements and Failures of Radical Government
The Political Economy of Sharecropping
Y R R The Gospel of Prosperity
T
AMERICA AND THE WORLD: Reconstructing America’s
OP IS
Foreign Policy
The Retreat from Republican Radicalism
C T D Republicans Become the Party of Moderation

Reconstructing the North
U P O The Fifteenth Amendment and Nationwide African

American Suffrage
O N Women and Suffrage

The Rise and Fall of the National Labor Union
DO
The End of Reconstruction
Corruption Is the Fashion
STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: An Incident at
Coushatta, August 1874
Liberal Republicans Revolt
“Redeeming” the South
The Twice-Stolen Election of 1876
Conclusion
451

452 Chapter 15: Reconstructing a Nation
A M E R ICA N P ORT R A I T
John Dennett Visits a Freedmen’s

Bureau Court
J ohn Richard Dennett arrived in Liberty, Virginia, on August 17, 1865, on a tour of the
South reporting for the magazine The Nation. The editors wanted accurate weekly ac-
counts of conditions in the recently defeated Confederate states, and
Dennett was the kind of man they could trust: a Harvard graduate,
a firm believer in the sanctity of the Union, and a member of the
E
class of elite Yankees who thought of themselves as the
T
A
“best men” the country had to offer.
At Liberty, Dennett was accompanied by a Freedmen’s
L I C Bureau agent. The Freedmen’s Bureau was a branch of the
I A PL US Army established by Congress to assist the freed

people. Dennett and the agent went to the courthouse
E R U because one of the Freedmen’s Bureau’s functions was to
T D adjudicate disputes between the freed people and south-
A OR
ern whites.
The first case was that of an old white farmer who com-
M E plained that two blacks who worked on his farm were “roamin’
H T T about and refusin’ to work.” He wanted the agent to help find the
men and bring them back. Both men had wives and children living on
I G IBU
his farm and eating his corn, the old man complained. “Have you been paying any wages?”
R R
the Freedmen’s Bureau agent asked. “Well, they get what the other niggers get,” the farmer
Y
answered. “I a’n’t payin’ great wages this year.” There was not much the agent could do, but
P T
one of his soldiers volunteered to go and tell the blacks that “they ought to be at home sup-
S
I
porting their wives and children.”
O
C T D
A well-to-do planter came in to see if he could fire the blacks who had been working
on his plantation since the beginning of the year. The planter complained the workers were
U P O
unmanageable now that he could no longer punish them. The sergeant warned the planter
not to beat his workers as if they were still slaves. In that case, the planter responded, “Will
O N
the Government take them off our hands?” The agent suspected that the planter was look-
DO
ing for a way to discharge his laborers at the end of the growing season but before they had
been paid. “If they’ve worked on your crops all the year so far,” the agent told the planter, “I
guess they’ve got a claim on you to keep them a while longer.”
Next came a “good-looking mulatto man” representing a number of African Ameri-
cans worried that they would be forced to sign fi ve-year contracts with their employers.
“No, it a’n’t true,” the agent said. They also wanted to know if they could rent or buy land to
work for themselves. “Yes, rent or buy,” the agent said. But with no horses, mules, or
ploughs, the former slaves wanted to know “if the Government would help us out after we
get the land.” The agent had no help to offer, except for a note from the bureau authorizing
them to rent or buy their own farms.
The last case involved a field hand who came to complain that his master was beating
him with a stick. The agent told the field hand to go back to work. “Don’t be sassy, don’t be
lazy when you’ve got work to do; and I guess he won’t trouble you.” The field hand left but

came back a minute later and asked for a letter to his master “enjoining him to keep the
peace, as he feared the man would shoot him, he having on two or three occasions threat-
ened to do so.”
Most of the cases Dennett witnessed centered on labor relations, which often spilled
over into other matters, including the family lives of former slaves, their civil rights, and
their ability to buy land. The freed people preferred to work their own land but lacked the
resources to rent or buy farms. Black workers and white owners who negotiated wage con-
tracts had trouble figuring out each other’s rights and responsibilities. The former masters
clung to all their old authority that they could. Freed people wanted as much autonomy as
possible.
The Freedmen’s Bureau was in the middle of these conflicts. Most agents tried to
T E
ensure that freed people were paid for their labor and were not brutalized as they had been
as slaves. Southern whites resented this intrusion, and their resentment reached sympa-
A
thetic politicians in Washington, DC. The Freedmen’s Bureau became a lightning rod for the
C
L I
political conflicts of the Reconstruction period.
A PL
Conditions in the South elicited sharply different responses from lawmakers in
I
Washington. At one extreme was President Andrew Johnson, who believed in small gov-
R U
ernment and a speedy readmission of the southern states and looked on the Freedmen’s
E D
Bureau with suspicion. At the other extreme were radical Republicans, who believed that
T
A OR
the federal government should redistribute confiscated land to the former slaves, guar-
antee their civil rights, give African American men the vote, and take it away from those
M E
whites not loyal to the United States during the war. In between were moderate Republi-
T T
cans who at first tried to work with the president. But as reports of violence and the
H
abusive treatment of the freed people reached Washington, Republicans shifted in more
G IBU
radical directions.
R RI
It went back and forth this way: policy makers in Washington responded to events in
the South, and events in the South were shaped in turn by policies from Washington. What
P Y T
John Dennett saw in Liberty, Virginia, was a good example of this. The Freedmen’s Bureau
O IS
agent listened to the requests of former masters and slaves, his responses shaped by the
D
policies established in Washington. But those policies were, in turn, affected by reports on
C T Southern conditions sent back by agents like him and by journalists like Dennett. From this
P O
interaction the politics of Reconstruction, and with it a “New South,” slowly emerged.
OU N
O
DWartime Reconstruction
Even as emancipation began, the US government began experimenting with recon-
structing the Union. The two goals merged: by creating new, loyal southern states and
making their abolition of slavery a condition for reunion, Lincoln could enact emancipa-
tion there without court challenge. Through a generous policy of pardons, he could en-
courage Confederates to make their peace with the Union, speeding the war’s end.
Despite the chorus of cries for hanging Jefferson Davis from a sour-apple tree, few
northerners wanted to pursue bloody punishments for the million Confederate soldiers
who were technically guilty of treason. In the end, Confederate generals went home

unharmed to become lawyers, businessmen, and planters; General Robert E. Lee became
a college president. No civil leader was hanged for treason, not even Jefferson Davis. Two
years after his arrest, he walked out of prison, bailed out by northerners like editor
Horace Greeley. In later years, former Confederates became senators, governors, and
federal judges. Months before the war ended, northerners were raising money to rebuild
the southern economy and feed its destitute people. What the North wanted was not
vengeance, but guarantees of lasting loyalty and a meaningful freedom. Questions arose
with no easy answers: What did it take to reunite America? Should it be restored, or re-
constructed, and if the latter, how drastically? How far could yesterday’s enemies be
trusted? What did freedom mean, and what rights should the “freed people” enjoy? In
reconstructing society, how far did the government’s power go?
The Meaning of Freedom

T E
CA
“We was glad to be set free,” a former slave remembered years afterward. “I didn’t know
L I
what it would be like. It was just like opening the door and lettin’ the bird fly out. He
L
I A P
might starve, or freeze, or be killed pretty soon but he just felt good because he was free.”
R U
Blacks’ departure came as a terrible shock to masters lulled into believing that their “ser-
E
vants” appreciated their treatment. Some former slave owners persuaded themselves that
T D
they were the real gainers of slavery’s abolition. “I was glad and t hankful—on my own
A OR
account—when slavery ended and I ceased to belong, body and soul, to my negroes,” a
M E
Virginia woman later insisted. Forced to do their own cooking or washing, other mis-
tresses fumed at blacks’ ingratitude. In fact, many African Americans left, not out of
T T
unkindness, but simply to prove that they could get along on their own. White fears that
H
G IBU
blacks, once free, would murder their masters proved groundless.
I
Leaving the plantation was the first step in a long journey for African Americans.
R R
Many took to the roads, some of them returning to their old homes near the coasts, from
Y
which masters had evacuated as Union armies approached. Others went searching for
P T
family members, separated from them during slavery. For twenty years, black newspa-
S
O I
pers carried advertisements, appealing for news of a husband or wife long since lost.
D
C T
Those who had not been separated went out of their way to have their marriages secured
by law. That way, their children could be made legitimate and their vows made perma-
U P O
nent. Once married, men sought sharecropping contracts that allowed their families to
live with them on plantations. Because black women across the South had become what
O N
the law called “domestic dependents,” husbands could refuse employers their wives’ ser-
DO
vices and keep them home. In fact, freedwomen were likelier to work outside the home
than white women. They tended the family garden, raised children, hired out as domes-
tics, and, as cotton prices fell, shared the work of hoeing and picking in the fields just so
the family could make ends meet.
The end of slavery meant many things to freed people. It meant that they could move
about their neighborhoods without passes, and that they did not have to step aside to let
whites pass them on the street. They could own dogs or carry canes, which had always
been the master’s exclusive privilege. They could dress as they pleased or choose their
own names, including, for the first time, a surname.
Freedom liberated African Americans from the white minister’s take on Christian-
ity. No longer were large portions of the Bible closed off to them. Most southern blacks
withdrew from white churches and established their own congregations, particularly in

the Methodist and Baptist faith. In time, the church emerged as a central institution
in the southern black community, the meeting place, social center, and source of comfort
that larger society denied them. A dozen years after the war, South Carolina had a thou-
sand ministers of the African Methodist Episcopal Church alone.
To read the Gospel, however, freed people needed schooling. One former slave re-
membered his master’s parting words on this matter: “Charles, you is a free man they say,
but Ah tells you now, you is still a slave and if you lives to be a hundred you’ll STILL be a
slave, ’cause you got no education, and education is what makes a man free!” Even before
the war ended, northern teachers poured into the South to set up schools. When the
fighting stopped, the US Army helped recruit and organize thousands of northern
women as teachers, but they could never send enough. Old and young spared what time
T E
they had from work, paying teachers in eggs or produce when coin was scarce. Black
classes met wherever they could: in mule stables and cotton houses, even the slave pen in
A
New Orleans, where the old auction block became a globe stand. Due to a lack of school-
C
L I
books, they read dictionaries and almanacs. On meager resources, hundreds of thou-
A PL
sands of southern blacks learned to read and write over the course of the next generation.
I
The first black colleges would be founded in the postwar years, including Hampton In-
R U
stitute in Virginia and Howard University in Washington, DC. The American Mission-
E D
ary Association established seven, among them Atlanta and Fisk Universities.
T
A OR
Finally, freedom allowed freed people to congregate, to celebrate the Fourth of July
or Emancipation Day, or to petition for equal rights before the law. Memorial Day may
M E
have begun with blacks’ gathering to honor the Union dead whose sacrifices had helped
T T
make them free.
H
G IBU
Experiments with Free Labor
I
R R
Many whites insisted that blacks would never work in freedom and foresaw a South
Y
ruined forever. Freed people proved just the opposite though. When Union troops landed
P T
on the Sea Islands off South Carolina in November, 1861, the slaveholders fled, leaving
S
O I
behind between 5,000 and 10,000 slaves. Within months the abandoned plantations of
D
C T
the Sea Islands were being reorganized. Eventually black families were given small plots
of their own land to cultivate, and in return for their labor they received a “share” of the
U P O year’s crop. When the masters returned after the war to reclaim their lands, the labor
system had already proven itself. Much modified, it would form the basis for the arrange-
O N ment known as “sharecropping.”
DO
The sugar and cotton plantations around New Orleans provided another opportu-
nity to shape the future of free labor. When the Union army came to occupy New Or-
leans in 1862, the tens of thousands of field hands on these plantations were no longer
slaves, but the landowners still held possession of the land. Unlike the Sea Islands, these
plantations could not be broken up. And sugar plantations could not be effectively orga-
nized into small sharecropping units.
Hoping to stem the flow of black refugees to Union lines and cut the loss of black
lives in the contraband camps, Union general Nathaniel Banks issued stringent regula-
tions to put the freed people back to work quickly in Louisiana. At the time, Banks was
the commander of the Department of the Gulf during the occupation of New Orleans
and his policy, known as the Banks Plan, required freed people to sign yearlong contracts
to work on their former plantations. Workers would be paid either 5 percent of the

proceeds of the crop or three dollars per month. The former masters would provide food
and shelter, and African American workers were forbidden to leave the plantations with-
out permission. Established planters welcomed the plan, but many critics protested that
Banks had simply replaced one form of slavery with another; however, most freed people
knew the difference and accepted the work conditions. The Banks Plan became the
model for plantations throughout the lower Mississippi Valley.
Understandably, freed people wanted land of their own. Only then could they avoid
working for their old masters on any terms. “The labor of these people had for two hun-
dred years cleared away the forests and produced crops that brought millions of dollars
annually,” H. C. Bruce explained. “It does seem to me that a Christian Nation would, at
least, have given them one year’s support, 40 acres of land and a mule each.” As the war
T E
ended, many African Americans expected the government’s help in becoming landown-
ers. Union general William Tecumseh Sherman heard an appeal from freed people on
A
the Sea Islands. “The way we can best take care of ourselves is to have land,” they argued,
C
L I
“and turn it out and till it by our own labor.” Convinced, Sherman issued Special Field
A PL
Order No. 15 granting captured land to the freed people. By June, 400,000 acres had been
I
distributed to 40,000 former slaves.
E R U
T D
Lincoln’s Ten Percent Plan Versus the Wade-Davis Bill
A OR
Lincoln moved to shape a postwar South based on free labor and to replace military
M E
control, Banks’s included, with new civil governments. However, wartime Reconstruc-
T T
tion had to take Confederate resistance into account. Any terms the President set would
H
need to attract as much white southern support as it could and hold out an inducement
G IBU
to those at war with the United States to return to their old loyalties. In December 1863
I
Lincoln issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, offering a full pardon
R R
and the restoration of civil rights to all those who swore loyalty to the Union, excluding
Y T
only a few high-ranking Confederate military and political leaders. When the number of
P S
loyal whites in a former Confederate state reached 10 percent of the 1860 voting popula-
O I
tion, they could organize a new state constitution and government. But Lincoln’s “Ten
D
C T
Per Cent Plan” also required that the state abolish slavery, just as Congress had de-
P O
manded before admitting West Virginia to the Union earlier in the year. Attempts to
U
establish a loyal government foundered, but circumstances in Louisiana proved more
O N
promising. Under General Banks’s guidance, Free State whites met in New Orleans in
1864 and produced a new state constitution abolishing slavery.
DO
By that time, however, radical Unionists were expecting more. Propertied and well
educated, the free black community in New Orleans pleaded that without equal rights to
education and the vote, mere freedom would not be enough. Impressed by their argu-
ment, Lincoln hinted to Louisiana authorities that he would welcome steps opening the
vote for at least some blacks. The hints were ignored.
Black spokesmen found a friendlier audience among radical Republicans in Congress,
among them Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania and Charles Sumner of Massachusetts.
Believing that justice required giving at least some blacks the vote and setting a more rig-
orous standard of loyalty for white southerners than Lincoln’s plan offered, they shared a
much wider concern that any new government must rest on statutory law, not presidential
proclamations and military commanders’ decrees. They were not at all prepared to treat
Lincoln’s “loyal” states as fit to return to C
ongress—not when so much of Louisiana and

Arkansas remained in Confederate hands and was excluded from the new constitution-
making—not when a speckling of enclaves pretended to speak for the state of Virginia.
As doubts grew about Louisiana’s Reconstruction, Congress edged away from Lin-
coln’s program. In m id-1864, Senator Benjamin F. Wade of Ohio and Congressman
Henry Winter Davis of Maryland proposed a different plan, requiring a majority of a
state’s white voters to swear allegiance to the Union before reconstruction could begin.
Slavery must also be abolished and full equality before the law must be granted to Afri-
can Americans. Lincoln pocket-vetoed the Wade-Davis bill to protect the governments
that were already under way toward reform. However, he could not make Congress admit
a single one of his newly reconstructed states.
Congress did not leave matters there. In March 1865, the Republicans established
T E
the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, commonly known as the
Freedmen’s Bureau. In the area of labor relations, the Bureau sometimes sided with land-
A
owners against the interests of the freed people. But it also provided immediate relief for
C
L I
thousands of people of both races. Indeed, of more than 18 million rations distributed
A P L
over three years, more than 5 million went to whites in need. The Bureau joined with
I
northern religious groups in creating some 4,000 black schools. It ran charity hospitals
R U
and provided medical services. Freed people came to Bureau agents for justice when
E D
white-dominated courts denied it and took counsel when labor contracts were to be ne-
T
A OR
gotiated. Some agents sided instinctively with the former masters. Most courted white
hostility by protecting freed people from violence, settling their complaints, advising
M E
them on labor contracts, and seeing that employers paid as promised.
H T T
The Freedmen’s Bureau also became involved in the politics of land redistribution
and controlled the disposition of 850,000 acres of confiscated and abandoned Confeder-
G IBU
ate lands. In July 1865, General Oliver Otis Howard, the head of the Bureau, directed his
I
agents to rent the land to the freed people in 4 0-acre plots that they could eventually
R R
purchase. Many agents believed that to reeducate them in the values of thrift and hard
Y T
work, the freed people should be encouraged to save money and buy land for themselves.
P
O IS
A Freedman’s Savings Bank helped many do just that.
D
Moderate and radical Republicans alike were determined to press for more than a
C T nominal freedom for blacks. Equally important, Congress made it clear that it would
U P insist on being consulted in any Reconstruction policy.
O Reconstruction, 1865–1867
O N
Presidential
DO
Andrew Johnson took office in April 1865 as a great unknown. Born in a log cabin and
too poor to attend school, he began his career on a tailor’s bench where he had shown grit
and enterprise. In time he had risen to moderate wealth in the eastern Tennessee hill
country, enough to own slaves, but he never forgot his humble beginnings. Before the
war, he had defended slavery and the common man, called for taxpayer-supported public
schools, and free homesteads. A courageous Union Democrat in wartime, he had run
roughshod over Tennessee Confederates as military governor. He hated treason and the
rich planters that he blamed for the war. Johnson deserved much of the credit for Ten-
nessee abolishing slavery; however, he alarmed some radicals along the way who found
more pardons than penalties in his policies. Convinced that a lasting reunion of the
states could only come by earning white southerners’ good will and determined to see
the Thirteenth Amendment ratified quickly, the president started Reconstruction six

months before Congress convened and left it entirely in white hands. In doing so, he of-
fended not only the radicals favoring a c olor-blind suffrage but also the moderates who
believed that Reconstruction must be done by law and not executive order.
The Political Economy of Contract Labor

Presidential Reconstruction began in late May 1865, when President Johnson offered
amnesty and the restoration of property to white southerners who swore an oath of loy-
alty to the Union, excluding only h igh-ranking Confederate military and political lead-
ers and very rich planters. He named provisional governors in seven seceded states and
told them to organize constitutional conventions. For readmission to the Union and res-
E
toration of their full privileges, conventions must adopt the Thirteenth Amendment,
T
void their secession ordinances, and repudiate their Confederate war debt. Most of the
A
constitutional conventions met the president’s conditions, though with some grumbling
C
and a lot of legal quibbling. Many made it clear that they still thought the South had been
L I
right all along. They only bowed to military force. “We have for breakfast s alt-fish, fried
L
I A P
potatoes, and treason,” a lodger at a Virginia boarding house wrote. “Fried potatoes,
R U
treason, and salt-fish for dinner. At supper the fare is slightly varied, and we have trea-
E
son, salt-fish, fried potatoes, and a little more treason.”
T D
Elections under these new constitutions would then choose civil governments to
A OR
replace provisional authority. Only white men covered by the amnesty proclamation or
M E
subsequent pardons could vote, but by September Johnson was signing pardons whole-
sale. Secessionists flocked to the elections that followed the conventions. Freshly par-
T T
doned Confederates won some of the most prominent offices, former Confederate vice
H
G IBU
president Alexander Stephens among them.
I
White southerners welcomed Johnson’s leniency. Once pardoned, they petitioned
R R
for restoration of their confiscated or abandoned properties. In September 1865 Johnson
Y
ordered the Freedmen’s Bureau to return the lands to their former owners. By late 1865
P T
former slaves were being forced off the 4 0-acre plots that the government agency had
S
O I
given them.
D
C T
No sooner did conservative legislatures meet than they fashioned “Black Codes”
defining, or rather confining, blacks’ new freedom. Some states ordered different pun-
U P O
ishments: fines for whites and whipping or sale for black offenders. Elsewhere, lawmak-
ers forbade freed people from renting land, owning guns, or buying liquor. Vagrancy
O N
laws gave police wide discretion to collar any black and subject him or her to forced
DO
labor, sometimes for an old master. Apprenticeship statutes let the courts take away any
black child without parents’ consent and bind him or her out to years of unpaid labor.
Blacks were allowed to testify only in certain cases. They were taxed to pay for white
schools, but the Johnsonian state governments provided them with none of their own.
Landowners gave their black employees as little as they could. With the legal ma-
chinery backing them up, they forced them into labor contracts that stipulated what they
could do with their private time. One planter required his black workers to “go by his
direction the same as in slavery time.” Others landowners denied them the right to leave
the plantation without their “master’s” consent. Some arrangements allotted as little as a
tenth of the crop in wages and many employers found an excuse to turn their field hands
off unpaid as soon as the crop was in. It was no wonder that contract labor seemed to
many freedmen slavery under a new name, or that thousands refused to sign any terms
at the year’s end.

Freedman’s Labor Contract Many freed blacks were

forced into labor contracts like this one in the early years
of Reconstruction. Harsh working conditions and re-
ports of white landowners refusing to pay agreed-upon
wages prompted many to argue that contract labor was
little different from slavery.
Resistance to Presidential
Reconstruction
An undercurrent of violence underlay conser-
T E
vative control. In North Carolina, a resident
wrote, the Negro was “sneered at by all and in-
A
formed daily yes hourly that he is incompetent
C
to care for h
L I
imself—t hat his race is now doomed
L
A P
to perish from off the face of the Earth—t hat he
I
will not work—t hat he is a thief by nature[,] that
R U
he lies more easily and naturally than an honest
T E D
man breathes.” Blacks were assaulted for not
A OR
showing proper deference to whites, for disput-
ing the terms of labor contracts, or for failing to
M E
meet the standards that white employers de-
H T T
manded. Black churches were burnt, rebuilt, and burnt again. A Freedmen’s Bureau
agent in Kentucky classified the incidents in just a few counties: twenty-t hree “cases of
I G IBU
severe and inhuman beating and whipping of men; four of beating and shooting; two of
R R
robbing and shooting; three of robbing; five men shot and killed; two shot and wounded;
Y
four beaten to death; one beaten and roasted; three women assaulted and ravished; four
P T
women beaten, two women tied up and whipped until insensible; two men and their
S
I
families beaten and driven from their homes, and their property destroyed; two in-
O
C T D
stances of burning of dwellings and one of the inmates shot.” White witnesses refused to
acknowledge what they knew to be true, white judges dismissed cases involving black
U P O defendants, and white juries invariably acquitted the offenders. If Johnson expressed
content with the speedy restoration of loyalty in the South, a growing chorus of com-
O N plaints from freed people and Unionists down South told a different story.
DO
Congress Clashes with the President
Troubled by presidential Reconstruction’s failings, a Republican Congress refused to read-
mit former Confederate states without investigation. A Joint Committee on Reconstruc-
tion was formed to examine their loyalty and the safety of white and black Unionists’
rights. At the same time, moderate Republicans also wanted to establish a program for re-
admission that Johnson would support. By expanding the power of the Freedmen’s Bureau
and proposing a Civil Rights bill, they thought they had the makings of a compromise.
The first extended the Bureau’s life, strengthened its powers, and permitted it to set
up courts that allowed black testimony. The second overturned the Dred Scott decision
by granting United States citizenship to American men regardless of race. This marked
the first time that the federal government intervened in states’ rights to guarantee due
process and basic civil rights.

T E
CA
L LI
I A P
E R U
T D
A OR
M E
H T T
G IBU
Freedmen’s Bureau Poster Led by President Andrew Johnson, attacks on the Freedmen’s Bureau
I
became more and more openly racist in late 1865 and 1866. This Democratic Party broadside was circu-
R R
lated during the 1866 election.
P Y T
S
To Republicans’ amazement, Johnson vetoed both bills and in terms that made no
O I
compromise possible. Hinting that Congress had no right to reconstruct until the south-
D
C T
ern states were readmitted and doubting blacks’ fitness to enjoy the same civil rights as
P O
whites, the president declared reconstruction completed. Unable to override the Freed-
men’s Bureau bill veto, Congress did pass the Civil Rights bill, which served as the foun-
OU N
dation for section one of the Fourteenth Amendment, and later that summer a new
Freedmen’s Bureau bill.
DOOrigins of the Fourteenth Amendment

During the spring of 1866, the Joint Committee on Reconstruction proposed a Four-
teenth Amendment to the Constitution, outlining the conditions that Republicans
thought were essential for a just and lasting peace. Provisions guaranteed payment of the
national debt and prevented payment of the Confederate one. Confederates who had
held public office before the war were barred from office until Congress removed their
disabilities. Replacing the Constitution’s t hree-fifths clause, which allowed slaves to be
counted as t hree-fifths of a human being for the purpose of taxation and representation,
representation in Congress would now be based on a state’s voting population. If freed
blacks entitled southern states to additional House seats, that representation entitled
blacks to the right to vote (see Table 15-1). “Happy will our disappointment be if this dry

Table 15–1 Reconstruction Amendments, 1865–1870

Congressional
Passage (t wo- Ratification Process (three-
thirds majority quarters of all states
in each house including ex-Confederate
Amendment Main Provisions required) states required)
13 Slavery prohibited in United January 1865 December 1865 (27 states,

States including 8 southern states)
14 1. National citizenship for all June 1866 Rejected by 12 southern and
men and women born in the border states, February 1867
United States
T E
2. State representation in Radicals make readmission of
A
Congress reduced southern states hinge on
proportionally to number of ratification
L I C
voters disenfranchised
A PL
3. Former high-r anking Ratified July 1868
I
Confederates denied right to
R U
hold office
E D
4. Confederate debt
T
repudiated
A OR
15 Denial of franchise because February 1869 Ratification required for
M E
of race, color, or past readmission of Virginia, Texas,
servitude explicitly Mississippi, Georgia. Ratified
T T
prohibited March 1870
H
G IBU
I
stalk shall bud and blossom into Impartial Suffrage,” one radical wrote, doubtfully. Even
R R
if it did not, the South would return to Congress weaker in strength than it had left. But
P Y T
the crucial provision wrote civil rights guarantees into fundamental law, guaranteeing
O IS
citizenship to all males born in the United States.
D
Deserted by the party that had elected him, Johnson fought on. He launched the
C T National Union movement, a bipartisan coalition of conservatives whose goal was to
U P O defeat Republicans at the midterm elections. A railroad tour from Chicago and back to
Washington allowed him to make his case to the American people. However, the Na-
O N tional Union movement fizzled; hardly any Republican thought the proposed Amend-
DO
ment presented unfair terms for a defeated South. Johnson’s “Swing Around the Circle”
tour ended in crowds trading insults with the president.
Two incidents confirmed northern fears that presidential Reconstruction had left
southern Unionists defenseless. On May 1, 1866, after two drivers—one black, one
white—had a traffic accident, Memphis police arrested the black driver. A group of black
veterans tried to prevent the arrest and, as a result, a white crowd gathered and began
rioting in the streets. Over the next three days, white mobs burned hundreds of homes,
destroyed churches, and attacked black schools. Five black women were raped, and
nearly fifty people, all but two of them black, were killed.
Three months later, violence of an explicitly political dimension broke out in New
Orleans. Alarmed at former Confederates’ return to power in Louisiana, “Free Staters”
sought to recall the state’s 1864 constitutional convention. They may have meant to open
voting rights to some blacks or cut “rebels” out, but they never got the chance. On July 30,

1866, when a few dozen delegates assembled at Mechanics Institute, white mobs set on
the convention’s supporters, who were mostly black. Led by police and firemen, many of
them Confederate veterans, rioters opened fire on a black parade and broke into the
convention hall. “The floor was covered with blood,” one victim remembered, “and in
walking downstairs the blood splashed under the soles of my boots.” Blacks trying to
surrender were gunned down. By the time the attackers dispersed, 34 blacks and 3 white
supporters had been killed, and another 100 had been injured.
Congressional Reconstruction
The elections of 1866 became a referendum on whether Johnson’s policies had gone far
T E
enough to assure the permanent safety of the Union. But they also posed competing vi-
sions of what American democracy should mean. For President Johnson, “democracy”
A
meant government by local majorities, which often meant white supremacy. For African
C
L I
Americans and a growing number of Republicans in Congress, genuine democracy de-
A PL
manded a firm foundation of equal civil and political rights. The sweep that followed
I
brought in an even more solidly Republican Congress than before and doomed presiden-
R U
tial Reconstruction. Congressional Reconstruction would be far different. It was an ex-
E D
traordinary series of events, second only to emancipation in its impact on the history of
T
A OR
the United States.
M E
The South Remade
T T
Republicans had agreed on the Fourteenth Amendment’s provisions as a final settlement
H
G IBU
of the war’s issues. Southern states that ratified it would be readmitted, whether they
I
enfranchised blacks or not. Tennessee ratified the amendment and was readmitted to
R R
Congress immediately. But in the remaining southern states, conservatives rejected the
Y
amendment by wide margins, and with the president’s encouragement. As unpunished
P T
assaults on Unionists and freed people continued, Congress lost patience. In the short
S
O I
run, the army could keep order, but a long-term solution was needed. Moderate Repub-
D
C T
licans came to agree with radicals: only by putting loyal men, regardless of race, in charge
could a loyal, just South come into being. The only other alternative would be an
U P O
open-ended national commitment to rule the South by force.
Although they were far from what radical Republicans had hoped for, in March
O N
1867, Congress passed two Reconstruction Acts. Leaving the Johnsonian state gov-
DO
ernments in office, the acts declared them provisional and their officeholders subject to
removal if they hamstrung the Reconstruction process. Ten ex-Confederate states were
divided into five military districts and placed under army supervision (see
Map 15–1). The army would register voters, both white and black, except for the com-
paratively small number disqualified by the n ot-yet-ratified Fourteenth Amendment. To
regain congressional representation, each state must call a constitutional convention and
draw up a new constitution providing for equal civil and political rights. Voters then
must ratify it, and the newly elected governments must adopt the Fourteenth Amend-
ment. Military oversight would end as civil authority replaced it. Thus, most white
southern men had a say in constructing the new political order, and when those states
were readmitted, they were granted the same rights as others. For all the laws’ limits,
remaking state governments and requiring a broader male suffrage promised a Radical
Reconstruction indeed.

T E
CA
L LI
I A P
E R U
T D
A ORMap 15–1 Reconstruction and Redemption By 1870 Congress had
M E readmitted every southern state to the Union. In most cases the Repub-
T T
lican Party retained control of the “reconstructed” state governments
H
for only a few years.
I G IBU
The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson
Y R R
Johnson could not stop Congressional Reconstruction. But he could temper it. Battling
P S T
now to protect the executive’s powers, Johnson shared Democrats’ fears that Congress
I
had veered far from the Constitution, placing military authority above civil authority
O
C T D
and overturning what he saw as the natural order of society, where blacks were kept in
subordination.
P O
In vain, radical Republicans called for Johnson’s impeachment. Instead, Congress
U
tried to restrain him by law. The Tenure of Office Act kept the president from removing
O N officials who had been appointed in his administration with Senate confirmation. An-
DO
other law required that every presidential order to the military pass through General
Ulysses S. Grant. Johnson could still dismiss district commanders (and did when they
interpreted their powers differently than he did), but as long as Grant headed the army
and Edwin M. Stanton the War Department, Republicans felt that they had safeguarded
the Reconstruction Acts against a potential coup.
Provoked by these challenges to his authority, Johnson issued interpretations of the
Reconstruction Acts to permit wider conservative registration, forcing Congress into
special session to revise the law with a Third Reconstruction Act. He issued broader am-
nesty proclamations for former Confederates, forced the dismissal of Republican offi-
cers, and, abiding by the Tenure of Office Act, suspended Stanton in August 1867. When
the Senate reinstated him the following winter, Johnson ordered him ejected. “What
good did your moderation do you?” radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens taunted mod-
erates. “If you don’t kill the beast, he will kill you.” With the law seemingly broken, the
House impeached Johnson.

The expected removal never happened. Rejecting Stevens’s argument that presiden-
tial obstruction was enough for conviction, senators required an intentional violation of
law. The Tenure of Office Act’s wording was so unclear that it may not have applied to
Stanton. When the president promised to restrain himself and selected a successor to
Stanton that moderates trusted, the impeachment process lost momentum. In May, the
Senate fell a single vote short of the t wo-t hirds needed to convict. Within a month, Con-
gress had readmitted seven southern states, thus limiting Johnson’s power to thwart Re-
construction in those states.
Radical Reconstruction in the South
E
With the help of Union Leagues, auxiliaries of the Republican Party whose goal was to
T
mobilize and educate black voters, and with military protection against conservative
A
violence in place, Radical Reconstruction transformed the cotton South dramatically.
C
Within six months, 735,000 blacks and 635,000 whites had registered to vote. Blacks
L LI
formed electoral majorities in South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, and Loui-
I A P
siana and in most states they found white support in the so-called scalawags, white
R U
Southerners who supported Reconstruction and Republican policies. Wartime Union-
E D
ists, hill farmers neglected by planter-dominated governments, debtors seeking relief,
T
development-minded businessmen seeking a new, more diversified South, and even
A OR
some Confederate leaders and planters all welcomed Radical Reconstruction. Carpet-
M E
baggers, northerners who had come south to farm, invest, preach, or teach, were few in
numbers, but they took a front rank among the leaders in black-majority states.
T T
Starting in the fall of 1867, ten states called constitutional conventions, heavily Re-
H
G IBU
publican and predominantly, but not exclusively, white. The results of these conventions,
I
so-called Black and Tan constitutions, guaranteed a color-blind right to suffrage, man-
R R
dated public school systems, and overhauled the tax structure. They also included a right
Y
to bear arms in their bills of rights. Only a few states shut any Confederates out of the
P T
vote, and most of those that did removed the electoral disabilities before a year was out.
S
O D I
C T
Achievements and Failures of Radical Government
P O
Later caricatured as a dire era of “bayonet” and “negro rule,” Radical Reconstruction was
U
neither. The Republican governments won in fairer elections and with greater turnouts
O N
than any that the South had known up until that time. Republican leadership remained
overwhelmingly white and, for the most part, southern born. While some 700 blacks
DO
served in state legislatures, only in South Carolina and possibly Louisiana did they ever
outnumber whites. No state elected a black governor, while only sixteen blacks served in
Congress, two of whom were senators. Still, the contrast between what had been and
what would follow as a result of Reconstruction was revolutionary. These Reconstruction
legislatures were more representative of their constituents than most legislatures in
nineteenth-century America (see Figure 15–1). While some African American office-
holders were indeed illiterate, former slaves who did not own land, a disproportionate
number came from the tiny prewar free African American elite of ministers, teachers,
and small business owners. Freed people also filled hundreds of county offices. They
served as sheriffs, bailiffs, judges, and jurors, offering the promise, at least, of a fair hear-
ing in court for black defendants and litigants. Sharing power locally meant a greater
chance for black communities to share in the benefits of public expenditures.

9%
13% 34%
19%
24%
Professional, white collar Business

Artisans and skilled workers Labor, service, misc.
E
Agriculture
A T
Figure 15–1 Occupations of African American
C
Officeholders During Reconstruction Although
L I
former slaves were underrepresented among black Radical Members One of the greatest achieve-
A PL
officeholders, the Reconstruction governments were ments of congressional Reconstruction was the
I
among the most broadly representative legislatures election of a significant number of African
R U
in US history. Americans to public office.
T E D
Republican rule delivered on its promises. The whipping post and debtor’s prison
A OR
vanished. The new governments funded insane asylums, roads, and prisons. Homestead
M E
exemptions protected debtors’ real estate, and lien laws gave tenant farmers more control
T T
over the crops they grew and awarded artisans a first right to their employer’s assets. The
H
right of married women to hold property in their own name was expanded. Across the
G IBU
Deep South, laws took on racial discrimination on streetcars and railroad lines, mandat-
I
ing equal treatment. Most important, most Reconstruction governments built or extended
R R
access to the free public school system to African Americans. Underfunded and segre-
P Y T
gated, those schools nonetheless boosted literacy rates, especially among freed people.
O IS
The Political Economy of Sharecropping
C T D
Radical Reconstruction made it easier for the former slaves to negotiate the terms of their
P O
labor contracts. Workers with grievances had a better chance of securing justice, as
U
southern Republicans became sheriffs, justices of the peace, and county clerks, and as
O N southern courts allowed blacks to serve as witnesses and sit on juries.
DO
The strongest card in the hands of the freed people was a shortage of agricultural
workers in the South. After emancipation, thousands of blacks sought opportunities
in towns and cities or in the North. And even though most blacks remained in the
South as farmers, they reduced their working hours in several ways. Black women still
worked the fields, but they spent more time nursing their infants and caring for
their children. And the children went to school when they were able. The resulting
labor shortage forced white landlords to renegotiate their labor arrangements with the
freed people.
The contract labor system that had developed during the war and under presidential
Reconstruction was replaced with a variety of regional arrangements. On the Louisiana
sugar plantations, the freed people became wage laborers. But in tobacco and cotton re-
gions, where most freed people lived, a new system of labor called sharecropping devel-
oped. Under this system, an agricultural worker and his family typically agreed to work

for one year on a particular plot of land, with the landowner providing the tools, seed,
and work animals. At the end of the year, the crop was split, perhaps o ne-t hird going to
the sharecropper and two-t hirds to the owner.
Sharecropping shaped the economy of the postwar South by transforming the pro-
duction and marketing of cash crops. Landowners broke up their plantations into
family-sized plots, worked by sharecroppers in family units with no direct supervision.
Each sharecropping family established its own relationship with local merchants to sell
crops and buy supplies. Merchants became crucial to the southern credit system, because
most southern banks could not meet the banking standards established by Congress
during the Civil War. Storekeepers, usually the only people who could extend credit to
sharecroppers, provided sharecroppers with food, fertilizer, animal feed, and other pro-
T E
visions during the year until the crop was harvested.
These developments had important consequences for white small farmers. More
A
merchants fanned out into up-country areas inhabited mostly by ordinary whites, areas
C
L I
now served by railroads sponsored by the Reconstruction legislatures. With merchants
A PL
offering credit and railroads offering transportation, small farmers started to produce
I
cash crops. Thus, Reconstruction accelerated the process by which southern yeomen
R U
abandoned s elf-sufficient farming in favor of cash crops.
E D
Sharecropping spread quickly among black farmers in the cotton South. By 1880,
T
A OR
80 percent of cotton farms had fewer than 50 acres, and the majority of those farms were
operated by sharecroppers (see Maps 15–2 and 15–3). Sharecropping had several
M E
H T T
I G IBU
Y R R
P S T
O D I
C T
U P O
O N
DO
Map 15–2 Sharecropping By 1880 the sharecropping system had spread across the South. It was most
common in the inland areas, where primarily cotton and tobacco plantations existed before the Civil War.

1860 1881
Sabrina
Dalton
Lizzie Dalton
er
er
Little Riv
Little Riv
Frank Maxey
Joe Bug Jim Reid
W W Nancy Pope
rig
rig
t's Church Gus Barrow t's Cane Pope
h
h
Br Br
a School a
h Willis h
nc
nc
Bryant
Lem Bryant Gin House
E
Gin House Lewis Watson
Tom Wright
T
Reuben Barrow
Ben Thomas "Granny"
Omy Barrow
A
House Peter Tom “House”
“Quarter” Barrow Thomas
C
Handy Barrow
I
Milly Barrow
L
Old Isaac reek
k C
ree ch
L
hC Tom Tang Calvin ran
Branc Parker B
I A P
E R U
D
ork ork
l's F l's F
Syl Syl
T
Beckton Barrow
A OR
Lem
Douglas
M E
T T
Map 15–3 The Effect of Sharecropping in the South: The Barrow Plantation in Oglethorpe County,
H
G IBU
Georgia Sharecropping cut large estates into small landholdings worked by sharecroppers and tenants,
I
changing the landscape of the South.
Y R R
T
advantages for landlords. It reduced their risk when cotton prices were low and encour-
OP IS
aged workers to increase production without costly supervision. Further, if sharecrop-
D
pers changed jobs before the crop was harvested, they lost a whole year’s pay. But there
C T were also advantages for the workers. For freed people with no hope of owning their own
P O
farms, sharecropping at least rewarded their hard work. The bigger the crop, the more
U
they earned. It gave them more independence than contract labor.
O N Sharecropping also allowed the freed people to work in families rather than in
DO
gangs. Freedom alone had rearranged the powers of men, women, and children within
the families of former slaves. Parents gained new control over their children. They could
send sons and daughters to school or put them to work. Successful parents could give
their children an important head start in life. Similarly, African American husbands
gained new powers.
The marriage laws of the m id-nineteenth century that defined the husband as the
head of the household were irrelevant to slaves, because their marriages had no legal
standing. With emancipation, these patriarchal assumptions of American family law
shaped the lives of freed men and women. Once married, women often found that their
property belonged to their husbands. The sharecropping system further assumed that as
head of the household the husband made the economic decisions for the entire family.
Men signed most labor contracts, and most contracts assumed that the husband would
take his family to work with him.

Sharecropping shaped the social system of the postwar South. It influenced the bal-
ance of power between men and women. It established the balance of power between
landowners and sharecroppers. It tied the southern economy to agriculture, in particu-
lar to cotton production, impeding the region’s overall economic development.
The Gospel of Prosperity

Only a diversified economy could break the planters’ hold over a black labor force; railroads
could lower farmers’ shipping costs and tap the South’s coal and iron resources. Economic
development might even give the South an independence worth having: it was no longer
required to look north for its investment capital or finished goods. A program that made all
E
classes prosper seemed ready-made to recruit more whites for a party and push racial issues
T
into the background. Republicans preached a “gospel of prosperity” that would use govern-
A
ment aid to build a richer South and benefit ordinary white southerners. Reconstruction
C
governments committed the states’ credit and funds to building its industrial base.
L I
The strategy had big drawbacks. Diverting scarce resources to railroads and corpora-
L
I A P
tions left less for black constituencies’ needs, especially school systems. Investors hesitated
R U
to invest in bonds issued by governments at risk of violent overthrow. Hungry corpora-
E
tions hounded the legislature for favors and made bribery their clinching argument.
T D
State-owned railroads were sold to private firms for a song—and a payoff. States already
A OR
spending heavily to repair the damage of the war and to build new state services on a
M E
much-reduced tax base obligated themselves for millions more. As taxes soared, white
farmers became increasingly receptive to Democratic claims that they were being robbed,
T T
their money wasted by swag-grabbing outsiders and ignorant black upstarts in office. The
H
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passage of civil rights bills, ending discrimination in public transportation, only alienated
I
former scalawags further and stirred conservatives to bring the stay-at-homes to the polls.
R R
Everywhere, Republicans were split over how far to trust former Confederates. That divi-
Y
sion lost Virginia and Tennessee to the “Redeemers,” conservative white Democrats, in
P T
1869. In Arkansas, two Republicans claimed the governorship in 1872, and two years later
S
O I
they raised armies to fight it out. The “Brooks-Baxter war” ended with the Democrat-backed
D
C T
contestant winning and a new constitution that put both Republicans out for good.
Republicans’ policy failures alone did not destroy them. Terrorism and economic
U P O
pressure did. Everywhere planters used their power to keep black tenants from voting.
White radicals found themselves shunned by society. They were denied credit or employ-
O N
ment unless they left politics. As early as 1867, secret organizations were arising, bent on
DO
Reconstruction’s overthrow and the restoration of white dominance, which, effectively,
meant bringing Democrats into power by threats, beatings, and killings. From the Caro-
linas to Texas, the Ku Klux Klan and similar organizations shot Republican lawmakers
and burned black schools and churches. Teachers, party organizers, and white wartime
Unionists all fell victim. Politically active blacks were threatened, driven from their
homes, whipped, or shot. Their wives were raped and their homes plundered while Dem-
ocratic newspapers defamed the victims. Intimidated juries dared not convict, and sher-
iffs dared not arrest. In Arkansas, Texas, and Tennessee, Republican governors mustered
a white militia and broke the terrorist movement. Elsewhere they found themselves pow-
erless or outgunned. Terrorism carried North Carolina, Alabama, and Georgia for the
Democrats in 1870, crippling Reconstruction in the first state and effectively ending it in
the other two. By 1872, Redeemers had regained control of the whole upper and border
South. After that, they rigged the election laws to curb the black vote and put any Repub-
lican comeback out of reach.

The Retreat from Republican Radicalism 469
AMERICA AND THE WORLD
Reconstructing America’s Foreign Policy
A s the Civil War approached, slavery’s

expansionists tainted Manifest Des-
tiny for everyone but Democrats. Republi-
months later, however, the Senate rejected
a treaty buying the Virgin Islands from Den-
mark and held off on leasing a naval base in
cans had no intention of spreading an Santo Domingo. A treaty with Colombia
E
empire of the unfree. Spreading the repub- giving the United States exclusive rights to
A T
lic’s bounds would only spread liberty. It
could overthrow the puppet state that the
build a canal across the Isthmus of Panama
came to nothing. Canadians showed no in-
I C
French emperor Napoleon III had installed
L
terest in joining the Union, and instead
L
in Mexico. It might even give black south- forged a union of their own separate
I A P
erners a place free of race prejudice where provinces.
R U
they could fulfill their potential. Secretary Not all the wealth of the West Indies
E D
of State William Seward dreamed of all
T
North America, perhaps even most of the
could carry the United States beyond trade
to the taking of territory. Slavery’s end
A OR
Caribbean, as one vast federation; Senator killed most of the zest for annexing Cuba.
M E
Charles Sumner suggested that the United When a rebellion broke out there in 1868,
T T
States ease Canada into the Union. Congress did nothing about it. Similar inhi-
H
Nothing of the kind happened. The bitions led the Senate to reject Grant’s an-
G IBU
Johnson administration helped force France nexation treaty with Santo Domingo in
I
to withdraw its troops from Mexico, but un-
R R
backed, Maximilian’s regime collapsed.
1870.Sumner’s opposition doomed the
treaty, and ironically, himself: as a result,
Y T
Seward’s biggest success came in 1867, in
P
Grant and Fish forced the Senate to depose
S
purchasing Alaska from Russia. A few him from his chairmanship.
O D I
C T
U P O Reconstruction had not been meant to work that way. Instead of being able to defend
O N themselves, Reconstruction governments found themselves desperately dependent on
DO
national support. But that support had been dissipating ever since the passage of the
Reconstruction Acts.
The Retreat from Republican Radicalism

A series of makeshift laws and improvisations, Congressional Reconstruction had stirred
misgivings among moderate Republicans who were fearful of stretching the Constitu-
tion too far and uneasy with using the expanded authority that war had given them in
peacetime. New steps, such as confiscating planters’ property, say, or a nationally funded
school system, were out of the question. Even the Freedmen’s Bureau was cut back and,
except for education, closed down completely when reconstructed states were readmit-
ted to Congress. Public backlash against radicalism gave Democrats heavy gains in the
1867 elections. In order to survive, Reconstruction had to consolidate its gains and leave
the new state governments to fulfill its promises.

Republicans Become the Party of Moderation

By then, the 1868 presidential campaign was under way. Running the war hero General
Ulysses S. Grant for president, Republicans could offer a candidate who was above poli-
tics. His slogan, “Let Us Have Peace,” emphasized that the party meant to restore the
Union, rather than advance radicalism. The platform endorsed Congressional Recon-
struction and defended black voting in the South, but insisted that states not covered by
Reconstruction should decide the issue of suffrage for themselves. Positioning them-
selves as protectors of the war’s accomplishments came all the more easily after Demo-
crats nominated former New York governor Horatio Seymour on a platform declaring
the Reconstruction Acts as illegal, null and void. Their fiercest spokesmen swore that if
E
Democrats won, they would overturn the newly elected southern governments and in-
T
stall white conservative ones. Voiding those governments would invalidate the Four-
A
teenth Amendment, ratified by southern legislatures; some partisans even argued that
C
every measure passed since southern congressmen walked out in 1861 had no legal force.
L LI
Bondholders, fearful that Democrats would turn their national securities into waste
I A P
paper or pay them in depreciated “greenbacks,” thought Grant the safer choice, even
R U
without Republicans’ shouting that Seymour’s election would reward traitors and bring
E D
on civil war again.
T
Northern voters got a taste of what Democratic rule would mean in an epidemic of
A OR
violence across the South. Riots and massacres in Louisiana and Georgia kept Republi-
M E
cans from voting and carried both states for Seymour. In the North, the outrages may
T T
have been decisive in electing Grant. Carrying the electoral college by a huge margin, he
won the popular vote more narrowly with just 53 percent, and then only because of a
H U
heavy black turnout in his favor.
G
I I
ReconstructingRthe NorthB
Y T R
O P IS
Although Reconstruction was aimed primarily at the South, the North was affected as
well, especially by the struggle over the black vote. The transformation of the North was
C TD
an important chapter in the history of Reconstruction.
U P O
The Fifteenth Amendment and Nationwide
O N
African American Suffrage
DO
Segregated into separate facilities or excluded entirely, denied the right to vote in nearly
every state outside of New England, blacks in wartime fought to end discrimination in the
North. Biracial efforts chipped away at many states’ discriminatory “Black Laws” and the
Fourteenth Amendment eliminated the rest nationwide. Streetcar lines in some cities
stopped running separate cars, black testimony was admitted on the same terms as white,
and in a few northern communities, black children began attending white schools. Ending
the color bar on voting and jury service proved to be more difficult: when impartial suf-
frage went on the ballot, most northern states voted against it (though most Republicans
favored it and Congress mandated it in the territories and the District of Columbia).
The shocking electoral violence of 1868 persuaded Republicans that equal suffrage
in the South needed permanent protection. In 1869 Congress added a Fifteenth Amend-
ment to the Constitution forbidding the use of “race, color, or previous condition of
servitude” as a bar to suffrage in the North as well as the South. For those states not yet

Reconstructing the North 471
readmitted to the Union (Virginia, Mississippi, and Texas), it made ratification of the
amendment an additional condition. On March 30, 1870, the Fifteenth Amendment
became part of the Constitution.
As terrorism mounted, Congress legislated to protect a free, fair vote. The most im-
portant, the 1871 “Ku Klux” Act, gave the US government the power to suppress the Klan,
even suspending the writ of habeas corpus. Grant moved cautiously, however, because
the newly created Justice Department lacked both funds and personnel. Still, thousands
of arrests and hundreds of convictions ended the Klan, restoring peace in time for the
1872 presidential elections.
Revolutionary as it was, the Fifteenth Amendment had serious limitations that
would weaken its impact later. As the Supreme Court would note, it did not confer a right
T E
to vote on anybody. It simply limited the grounds on which it could be denied. States
could impose property or taxpaying qualifications or a literacy test if they pleased, as
A
long as the restrictions made no distinction on the basis of race. They could set up resi-
C
L I
dency requirements or limit the vote to naturalized citizens, or to men.
I
Women and Suffrage
A PL
E R U
The issue of black voting added to tensions among northern radicals. Feminists and abo-
T D
litionists had worked together in the struggle for emancipation, but signs of trouble ap-
A OR
peared as early as May 1863 at the convention of the Woman’s National Loyal League in
M E
New York City. The League had been organized to assist in defeating the slave South. One
of the convention’s resolutions declared that “there never can be a true peace in this Re-
T T
public until the civil and political rights of all citizens of African descent and all women
H
G IBU
are practically established.” For some delegates, this went too far. They argued that it was
I
inappropriate to inject the issue of women’s rights into the struggle to restore the Union.
R R
With the war’s end, the radical crusade for black suffrage intensified debate among
Y
reformers. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and others pointed out the injustice of letting “Pat-
P T
rick and Sambo and Hans and Yung Tung” vote while propertied, educated women were
S
O I
denied suffrage. The Fourteenth Amendment, by privileging male inhabitants’ right to
D
C T
vote explicitly, appalled Stanton, and the Fifteenth Amendment’s failure to address
gender discrimination at the polls only confirmed her suspicion that what one abolition-
U P O ist called “the Negro’s hour” would never give way to one for women. Friendly to wom-
en’s suffrage though they were, abolitionists like Frederick Douglass and suffragists like
O N Lucy Stone argued that the critical issue was the protection of the freed people. “When
DO
women, because they are women, are dragged from their homes and hung upon
lamp-posts,” Douglass reminded an audience, “when their children are torn from their
arms and their brains dashed to the pavement; when they are the objects of insult and
outrage at every turn; when they are in danger of having their homes burnt down over
their heads; when their children are not allowed to enter schools; then they will have an
urgency to obtain the ballot.” In 1869, radical and abolitionist allies parted ways. The
women’s suffrage movement divided into rival organizations, Stanton’s National Woman
Suffrage Association and Stone’s American Woman Suffrage Association.
Some radicals, Charles Sumner among them, favored women’s suffrage, but most
Republicans did not. The territories of Wyoming and Utah enfranchised women. Else-
where, lawmakers let women participate in s chool-board elections, but voting reform
went no further. Most states refused even to put the issue on the ballot. When they did
so, it was voted down. Denying women’s appeal that as citizens they were entitled to vote,

the Supreme Court declared that the Fourteenth Amendment’s right of citizenship did
not carry that right with it.
The Rise and Fall of the National Labor Union

Inspired by the radicalism of the Civil War and Reconstruction, industrial workers
across the North organized dozens of craft unions, Eight-Hour Leagues, and working-
men’s associations, all designed to protect northern workers who were overworked and
underpaid. They called strikes, initiated consumer boycotts, and formed consumer co-
operatives. In 1867 and 1868, workers in New York and Massachusetts campaigned to
enact laws restricting the workday to eight hours. Soon, workers began electing their
E
own candidates to state legislatures.
T
Founded in 1866, the National Labor Union (NLU) was the first significant postwar
A
effort to organize all “working people” into a national union. William Sylvis, an iron
C
molder, founded the NLU and became its president in 1868. He denied any “harmony of
L I
interests” between workers and capitalists. On the contrary, every wage earner was at war
L
I A P
with every capitalist, whose “profits” robbed working people of the fruits of their labor.
R U
Under Sylvis’s direction, the NLU advocated a wide range of political reforms, not
E
just b
read-and-butter issues. Sylvis believed that through organization American work-
T D
ers could take the “first step toward competence and independence.” He argued for a
A OR
doubling of the average worker’s wages. He supported voting rights for blacks and
M E
women. Nevertheless, after a miserable showing in the elections of 1872, the NLU fell
apart. By then, Reconstruction in the South was facing serious challenges.
H T T
G IBU
The End of Reconstruction
I
R R
Events outside the South helped speed Reconstruction’s collapse. Reform-oriented Re-
Y
publicans felt alarm at the spread of political corruption after the war. Convinced, too,
P T
that full reconciliation must come, now that the war’s goals had been met, they broke
S
O I
with the party and abandoned their support for federal intervention in southern affairs.
D
C T
Additionally, a depression took voters’ minds off Reconstruction issues. By 1876 “Re-
demption” had carried white Democrats to power in all but a few southern states. Yet a
U P O
hotly disputed presidential election and divided power would doom even those.
O N
Corruption Is the Fashion
DO
Never before had corruption loomed so large in the United States. With more money to
spend, more favors to give, and more functions to perform, both state and federal govern-
ments found themselves besieged by supplicants, and officeholders found opportunities to
turn a dishonest penny where none had existed before. In New York City, infamous state
senator William M. Tweed used the Tammany Hall political machine to steal tens of mil-
lions of dollars. Senators bought their seats in Kansas and South Carolina, while Tennessee
congressmen sold appointments to West Point. The Standard Oil C ompany allegedly con-
trolled Pennsylvania’s legislature. As Henry Clay Warmoth, the governor of Louisiana put
it, corruption was “the fashion.” He, incidentally, was very fashionable himself.
With an honest but credulous chief executive, Grant’s administration became noto-
riously corrupt. Customs collectors shook down merchants and used their employees to
manage party conventions. With help from Administration insiders, the notorious

STRUG GL E S FOR DE MOCRACY
An Incident at Coushatta, August 1874
I f biracial democracy had a chance any-

where in Reconstruction Louisiana, it
was upstate in Red River parish. With Afri-
White League, which acted as the military
arm of the Democratic Party. Unlike the
KuKlux Klan, it operated in the open and
can Americans outnumbering whites more without disguises. By mid-1874, death
E
than two to one, majority rule meant Re- threats against Republican officials were
A T
publican government. As in so many other
black counties, whites held the choicest of-
being posted on the streets of Coushatta.
“Your fate is sealed,” one letter warned
I C
fices: sheriff, tax collector, and mayor of the
L
judges. “Nothing but your blood will ap-
L
parish seat in Coushatta. A V ermont-born pease us.” Alarmed, the police jury resigned
I A P
Union veteran, Marshall Harvey Twitchell, and white Republicans left the parish.
R U
represented Red River in the state senate. That August, White Leaguers pretended
E D
Most of the wealth and nearly all the prop- to have uncovered a black plot to slaughter
T
erty stayed in native white hands, just as it
A OR
had before the war. Blacks continued to
white residents. On that excuse, they ar-
rested several dozen black Republican
M E
raise and harvest the cotton on other peo- leaders and all the white parish officers. To
T T
ple’s land. save their lives, the officials resigned. The
H
Nevertheless, Reconstruction made a vigilantes promised them an armed escort
G IBU
difference for African Americans. They out of the parish, but instead, it led them
I
elected members of their own race to the
R R
police jury that did most of the parish’s
into an ambush. Mounted gunmen from
the neighboring parish killed six prisoners.
P Y T
day-to-day governing. Several justices of Later they rode into Coushatta and hanged
S
the peace who handled minor civil cases two of the captured blacks as well. Absent
O D I
were black. Farmers, field hands, and day on political business, Twitchell alone sur-
C T
laborers performed jury duty. What freed vived. When he returned in 1876, an un-
P O
people wanted most, however, was what known gunman shot him, costing him both
U
white conservatives had long denied them, arms. From then on, Republican majorities
O N
a functioning public school system. Twitch- counted for nothing. Democrats did the
ell saw that they got one, with separate voting and governing and thus radical Re-
DO
schools for whites and blacks. So prosper- construction’s gains melted away.
ous was Red River under “Negro rule,” Coushatta’s fate was Louisiana’s. White
Twitchell bragged, that it was evident to Leaguers overthrew the governor in Sep-
“the most perfect stranger.” tember 1874. Federal intervention restored
Having the most votes was not enough, him, but it could not save local Republican
however. All the influential newspapers governments like Red River’s. “The State
and nearly all the property and firepower government has no power outside of the
in Red River parish remained with the United States Army . . . no power at all,” an
Democrats. When hard times hit, Republi- officer confessed. “The White League is the
cans’ enemies organized rifle clubs and a only power in the State.”

William M. Tweed The boss of New

York’s notoriously corrupt “Tweed
Ring” was parodied by the great car-
toonist Thomas Nast. His portrayal of
the bloated public official became
an enduring symbol of governmen-
tal corruption.
speculators Jay Gould and Jim

Fisk tried to corner the na-
T E tion’s gold supply and brought

on a brief, ruinous panic on
CA Wall Street. Grant’s private
L I
secretary was even exposed as
I A PL a member of the “Whiskey

Ring,” a group of distillers and
E R U revenue agents who cheated
T D the government out of mil-
A OR
lions of dollars in taxes.
Charges of making money
M E swindling the Indians forced
H T T the Secretary of Interior out of

office. Months later, the Secre-
G IBU
tary of War quit when investi-
I
R R
gators traced kickbacks to his
wife. Having overcharged the
P Y T government for supplies while
IS
building the Union Pacific Railroad, the fraudulent Credit Mobilier contracting firm
O D
shared mammoth profits with nearly a dozen top congressmen. The Republican plat-
C T
form, one critic snarled, was just a conjugation of the verb “to steal.”
U P O Southern corruption reflected national patterns. In the worst states, both parties
stole, bribed, and profited. But in the South, Democrats blamed such action on ignorant
O N
black voters and n
on-landowning white Republicans. Shifting the issue from equal rights
DO
to honest government, they insisted that clean, cheap government, run by society’s natu-
ral leaders (white and w ell-heeled), would benefit all races. Every scandal discredited
Republican rule further, including the many upright and talented leaders, both black
and white, that fought against corruption. This helped galvanize the opposition, destroy-
ing Republican hopes of attracting white voters and weakening support for Reconstruc-
tion. By 1875, northerners assumed the worst of any carpetbagger, even one fighting to
cut taxes and block cheats.
Liberal Republicans Revolt

Voicing widely held concerns, a small, influential group of northern Republican intel-
lectuals, editors, and activists challenged a political system that, in their view, rested on
greed, selfishness, partisanship, and politicians’ keeping war hatreds alive. Known as
“liberal Republicans,” they viewed bosses and political machines, which were out to loot

the treasury, and special interests as detrimental to good government. They were weary
of railroads receiving land grants, of steamship lines receiving subsidies, and govern-
ment clerkships that were given to cronies. Decrying corruption and disenchanted with
Reconstruction, they called for reform: a lower tariff, a stable currency system based on
gold, a m erit-based civil service system for appointments to office, and full, universal
amnesty for former Confederates.
When Democrats announced a “New Departure,” accepting the three constitutional
amendments, liberal Republicans took them at their word. Despairing of preventing
Grant’s renomination, they nominated the eccentric, reform-minded editor Horace
Greeley for president in 1872. The platform promised to end all political disabilities and
reconcile North and South, in essence by ending all federal intervention on black south-
T E
erners’ behalf. Desperate to win, Democrats endorsed the editor, their lifelong enemy,
but thousands stayed home on election day rather than vote for him. Having cut the
A
tariff and restored the office-holding rights of all but a handful of ex-Confederates, Re-
C
L I
publicans won many reformers back. Greeley lost in a landslide and died in a sanitarium
A PL
less than a month later.
I
Grant’s reelection bought Reconstruction time, but it could not do more than that.
R U
Northerners, even Republican ones, became increasingly alarmed every time the na-
E D
tional government used its power to act on behalf of Reconstruction governments and
T
A OR
deal with issues that should be handled by local authorities. As a result, the president
found it increasingly hard to justify intervening on the behalf of black voters.
M E
T T
“Redeeming” the South
H
G IBU
In September 1873, America’s premier financial institution, Jay Cooke & Company, went
I
bankrupt after overextending itself on investments in the Northern Pacific Railroad.
R R
Within weeks, hundreds of banks and thousands of businesses failed. The country sank
Y
into a depression that lasted five years. Unemployment rose to 14 percent as corporations
P T
slashed wages. Bitter strikes in textile plants, coal fields, and on the railroad lines ended
S
O I
in failure and violence. As America turned its attention to issues of corruption, labor
D
C T
unrest, and economic depression, Reconstruction took a backseat.
Between the corruption scandals buffeting the Grant administration and the eco-
U P O nomic crisis, northern voters’ interest in Reconstruction plummeted. Those who had
N
favored government intervention to keep “Rebels” from coming to power no longer saw
O the need. Former Confederates stood by the flag as earnestly as Unionists. In the 1874
DO
elections, Democrats made a dramatic comeback. For the first time since 1859, they car-
ried the House, guaranteeing a deadlocked Congress. Outgoing Republicans made one
last advance, passing Charles Sumner’s civil rights bill, which outlawed discrimination
in public places. The law left segregated schools and cemeteries alone, and most southern
establishments ignored even those provisions that did pass. But with Congress’s ad-
journment in March 1875, Republicans no longer had any chance of bolstering Recon-
struction with legislation, or even funding an army big enough to protect a fair vote at
the polls.
Supreme Court rulings made implementing Reconstruction legislation harder still.
In the 1873 Slaughterhouse cases, a majority decided that the Fourteenth Amendment’s
protection of equal rights under the law covered only those rights associated with na-
tional citizenship. Rights affiliated with state citizenship—for example, the right to
butcher cattle when a Louisiana state law gave a monopoly to one particular firm—could

only be upheld by the state. In 1876, the justices whittled down the national government’s
power to protect black voters from intimidation and violence or even their right to bear
arms and hold public meetings. In Hall v. DeCuir (1878), the Supreme Court invalidated
a Louisiana law prohibiting racial segregation on public transportation. In the Civil
Rights Cases of 1883, the Supreme Court declared that the Fourteenth Amendment did
not cover discriminatory practices by private persons.
Even before the 1874 elections, southern Reconstruction was collapsing. As the
number of white Republicans fell, the number of black Republicans holding office in the
South increased. But the persistence of black officeholders only reinforced the Demo-
crats’ determination to “redeem” their states from Republican rule. Blaming hard times
on “carpetbagger” corruption and high taxes, conservatives mobilized voters across the
T E
South. They formed taxpayers’ leagues and armed themselves in White Leagues, para-
military groups whose goal was to remove Republicans from office and prevent freed-
A
men from voting. Even without much killing, crude appeals to white supremacy and
C
L I
harsh economic pressure forced most scalawags to drop out of politics, making it easier
A PL
to draw a sharp color line. Paramilitaries were then able to apply violence and intimida-
I
tion to keep blacks from the polls. By the fall of 1874, they were overthrowing local gov-
R U
ernments in Mississippi and Louisiana. In 1874, White Leagues took over the streets in
E D
New Orleans and briefly ousted the governor. Terrorism helped “redeem” Alabama that
T
A OR
November, among other places.
That left two securely Republican states, both with considerable black majorities:
M E
South Carolina and Mississippi. In 1875, Democrats “redeemed” the latter in the most
H T T
blatant show of force yet. Governor Adelbert Ames begged for help from Grant and was
told to look to his own resources first. The election that followed was as quiet as White
G IBU
League shotguns could make it. In the end, enough blacks were kept from the polls and
I
enough scalawags voted their racial prejudices to hand power to the Democrats. Within
R R
months they forced Ames’s resignation. In 1876, South Carolina whites adopted what
Y T
became known as the “Mississippi Plan” with an even more open commitment to violent
P IS
overthrow of the Republican majority. Mounted, armed men broke up Republican
O
C
Time Line T
D
U P O
O N
DO
▼1863 Johnson creates provisional New Orleans and Memphis
Lincoln’s Proclamation of governments in the South; massacres
Amnesty and Reconstruction new civil governments begin Republicans sweep midterm
Joint Committee on elections
▼1864 Reconstruction established
Wade-Davis Bill by Congress ▼1867
First, Second, and Third
▼1865 ▼1866 Reconstruction Acts passed
Thirteenth Amendment Congress renews Freedmen’s Tenure of Office Act
adopted and ratified Bureau; Johnson vetoes it
Freedmen’s Bureau established Civil Rights Act vetoed by ▼1868
Confederate armies surrender Johnson; Congress overrides Johnson fires Secretary of War
veto Stanton
Lincoln assassinated; Andrew
Johnson becomes president Congress passes Fourteenth House of Representatives
Amendment impeaches Johnson

rallies. In Hamburg, white paramilitaries put the local black militia under siege and,
after their surrender, killed seven of them. “We write to tell you that our people are being
shot down like dogs, and no matter what democrats may say,” one South Carolinian
wrote the president, “unless you help us our folks will not dare go to the polls.” In Loui-
siana, Redeemer violence may have been worse still.
The Twice-Stolen Election of 1876

Amidst a serious economic depression, and with an electorate tired of Reconstruction,
the Democrats stood a good chance of winning the presidency in 1876. The Democratic
candidate, New York governor Samuel J. Tilden, had won a reputation for fighting thieves
T E
in his own party. On election night, Tilden won 250,000 more votes than his Republican
opponent, Ohio governor Rutherford B. Hayes (see Map 15–4). But Republican “return-
A
ing boards” in three southern states—Florida, South Carolina, and Louisiana—counted
C
L I
Hayes in and gave him a o ne-electoral vote victory.
A PL
Democrats swore that they had been cheated out of the presidency, though even
I
without white violence and manipulation, Hayes probably would have won not just in
R U
the three disputed states but elsewhere in the South. Both houses of Congress dead-
E D
locked on counting the electoral votes. Cries of “Tilden or Blood” rang through the air.
T
A OR
In the end, both sides compromised by choosing a special electoral commission to settle
the matter. In an eight-to-seven vote, it awarded Hayes every disputed state. House Dem-
M E
ocrats could not stop “His Fraudulency” from being sworn in, but their southern mem-
H T T
bers, cutting the best deal they could, agreed to drop their obstruction in return for
assurances that Hayes would not aid in the survival of the last two Reconstruction gov-
G IBU
ernments. A month after taking office, Hayes withdrew the regiments guarding Repub-
I
lican statehouses in South Carolina and Louisiana; by that time Redeemer Democrats
R R
had full control of the states anyway. This order marked Reconstruction’s symbolic end.
P Y T
Hereafter, the president would emphasize goodwill between the North and South and
O IS
trust Redeemers’ promises to protect black rights—a trust that was speedily betrayed.
C T D
U P O
O N
DO
Senate trial of Johnson ends in ▼1872 ▼1876
acquittal “Liberal Republican” revolt Disputed presidential election
Fourteenth Amendment ratified Grant reelected of Rutherford B. Hayes and
Waves of Klan violence sweep Samuel J. Tilden
cotton south ▼1873
Ulysses S. Grant elected Financial “panic” sets off ▼1877
president depression Electoral commission names
Rutherford B. Hayes
▼1869 ▼1875 president
Congress passes Fifteenth “Mississippi Plan” succeeds Last Reconstruction
Amendment Civil Rights Act enacted governments collapse
▼1870
Fifteenth Amendment ratified

T E
CA
L LI
I A P
E R U
T D
A OR
Map 15–4 The Presidential Election, 1876 In 1876 the Democratic
M E
presidential candidate, Samuel Tilden, won the popular vote but was
denied the presidency because the Republicans who controlled Con-
H T T
gress chose to interpret voting irregularities in Louisiana, South Caro-
lina, Oregon, and Florida in a way that gave their candidate, Rutherford
G IBU
B. Hayes, all of the disputed electoral votes.
Conclusion R
I
Y T R
P IS
Inspired by a vision of society based on equal rights and free labor, Republicans expected
O
C TD
emancipation to transform the South. Freed from the shackles of the slave power, the
region might yet become a shining example of democracy and prosperity. Twenty years
U P O
later, events seemed to mock that promise. The South was scarcely more industrial than
before the war and, as far as former slaves were concerned, far from completely free.
O N
Cotton, sugar, rice, and tobacco still defined the South’s economy far more than the
DO
hoped-for mines and mills. Only a small fraction of freed people had become landown-
ers, and most of them would never escape poverty and dependence on propertied whites.
After the Panic of 1873, sharecropping eliminated most blacks’ hope of real economic
independence. As fears of a new rebellion dimmed, Republicans lost their zeal for federal
intervention in the South. Republican state authorities could not save themselves, much
less their black constituents. Chastened by Reconstruction’s defects, Americans began to
turn their attention to the new problems of urban, industrial America.
Even so, the achievements of Reconstruction were monumental. Across the South,
African Americans carved out a space in which their families could live more freely than
before. Black and white men elected to office some of the most democratic state legisla-
tures of the nineteenth century. Thousands of black workers had escaped a stifling
contract-labor system for the comparatively wider autonomy of sharecropping. Hun-
dreds of thousands of former slaves learned to read and write and were able to worship

Conclusion 479
in churches of their own making. Most important, Reconstruction added three impor-
tant amendments to the Constitution that transformed civil rights and electoral laws
throughout the nation. For the first time, the protections in the Bill of Rights would
apply not just against national encroachment but that of the states as well. As a result of
those changes in fundamental law, Reconstruction, then, was not so much a promise
broken as one waiting to be fulfilled.
Who, What
Nathaniel Banks 455 Fifteenth Amendment 470
E
John Dennett 452 Fourteenth Amendment 460
Ulysses S. Grant 463
Horace Greeley 454
A T Freedmen’s Bureau 452
“Liberal Republicans” 474
Oliver Otis Howard 457
L I C National Labor Union 472
Andrew Johnson 453
I A PL Redemption 472
E R U
Elizabeth Cady Stanton 471 Sharecropping 454
William Sylvis 472
T D Ten Percent Plan 456
Black Codes 458
A OR Tenure of Office Act 463
M E
Review Questions
H T T
G IBU
1. What made congressional Reconstruction “radical”?
I
2. How did conditions for the readmission of states into the Union change over time?
R R
Y
3. How did Reconstruction change the South?
P S T
4. How did Reconstruction change the North?
O D I
5. What were the major factors that brought Reconstruction to an end?
C TThinking Questions
U P O
C ritical-
O N 1. Compare and contrast wartime Reconstruction, presidential Reconstruction, and
DO
congressional (radical) Reconstruction. What were the key differences between the
three phases?
2. How critical was the failure of land redistribution for blacks? Was sharecropping an
acceptable substitute for achieving economic freedom? Why or why not?
3. In what ways did the tactics of white supremacists in this period end up hurting
their own cause?
For further review materials and resource information,

please visit www.oup.com/us/oakes

S15-2 Chapter 15: Reconstructing a Nation
C h a p t e r 15: R e c on st ruct i ng
a Nat i o n , 18 6 5 –18 7 7
Primary Sources
15.1 Petroleum V. Nasby

[DAVID ROSS LOCKE], a Platform
for Northern Democrats (1865)
David Ross Locke, the editor of the Toledo Blade, made his fortune under another name:
T E
Petroleum V. Nasby, a fictional postmaster and sometimes pastor, whose letters gave
a Republican spoof of what Copperhead Democrats believed. Bad spelling was a common
A
way of signaling to readers that a piece was meant to be humorous, though Locke also
C
L I
meant to show that Nasby’s ideas were not only vicious and absurd but founded on
L
A P
a virtually illiterate ignorance.
I
R U
E D
Saint’s Rest (wich is in the Stait uv Noo Jersey), June the 23d, 1865
T
These is the dark days uv the dimokrasy. The misforchoons that befell our armies in front
A OR
uv Richmond, the fall uv our capital, follered by the surrender uv our armies to Grant and
Sherman, hez hurt us. Our leaders are either pinin in loathsome dunguns, incarseratid by the
M E
hevin-defyin, man-destroyin, tyrannical edix uv our late lamented President, or are baskin in
H T T
the free air uv Italy and Canady. We hev no way uv keepin our voters together. Opposin the war
won’t do no good, for before the next elecshun the heft uv our voters will hev diskiverd that the
G IBU
war is over. The fear uv drafts may do suthin in some parts uv Pennsylvany and suthern Illinoy,
I
for sum time yuit, but that can’t be depended on.
R R But we hev wun resource for a ishoo—ther will alluz be a dimokrasy so long as ther’s a nigger.
P Y T
Ther is a uncompromising dislike to the nigger in the mind uv a ginooine dimekrat. The
S
Spanish bullfighter, when he wants to inflame the bull to extra cavortin, waves a red flag afore
O I
him. When yoo desire a dimekrat to froth at the mouth, yoo will find a black face will anser the
D
C T
purpose. Therefore, the nigger is, today, our best and only holt. Let us use him.
For the guidance uv the faithful, I shel lay down a few plain rools to be observed, in order
U P O to make the most uv the capital we hev:
O N 1. Alluz assert that the nigger will never be able to take care uv hisself, but will alluz be a
DO
public burden. He may, possibly, give us the lie by goin to work. In sich a emergency, the
dooty uv every dimekrat is plane. He must not be allowed to work. Associashens must
be organized, pledged to neither give him employment, to work with him, to work for
anyone who will give him work, or patronize any wun who duz. (I wood sejest that sich
uv us ez hev bin forchoonit enuff to git credit, pay a trifle on account, so ez to make our
patronage worth suthin.) This course, rigidly and persistently follered, will drive the
best uv em to stealin, and the balance to the poorhouses, provin wat we hev alluz
claimed, that they are a idle and vishus race. Think, my brethren, wat a inspirin effeck
our poorhouses and jails full uv niggers wood hev on the people! My sole expands ez I
contemplate the deliteful vision.
15-Oakes-ch15_sc.indd 2 26/10/15 5:03 PM

Primary Sources S15-3
2. Likewise assert that the nigger will come North, and take all the good places, throwin
all our skilled mechanics out uv work by underbiddin uv em. This mite be open to two
objecshuns, to-wit: It crosses slitely rool the 1, and white men mite say, ef there’s jist
enuff labor for wat’s here, why not perhibit furriners from comin? I anser: It’s the biznis
uv the voter to reconcile the contraicshun—he may believe either or both. Ez to the
second objeckshun, wher is the Dimekrat who coodent be underbid, and stand it even to
starvashen, ef the underbiddin wux dun by a man uv the proud Caukashen race? And
wher is the Dimekrat so lost to manhjood ez not to drink blood, ef the same underbid-
din is dun by a nigger? The starving for work ain’t the question—it’s the color uv the
cause uv the starvashen that makes the difference.
Nigger equality may be worked agin to advantage. All men, without distincshun uv sex,
T E
are fond uv flatrin theirselves that somebody’s lower down in the scale uv humanity than they
is. Ef ’twan’t for niggers, what wood the dimokrasy do for sumbody to look down upon? It’s
A
also shoor to enlist wun style uv wimmen on our sides. In times gone by, I’ve notist gushin
C
I
virgins uv forty-five, full sixteen hands high and tough ez wire, holdin aloft banners onto
L L
which wuz inscribd – “Save us from Nigger Equality.” Yoo see it soothed em to hev a chase uv
A P
I
advertising, 1st, That they wuz frail, helplis critters; and, 2d, That, anshent and tough ez they
R U
wuz, some wun wuz still goin for em.
E D
Ef ther ain’t no niggers, central commities must furnish em. A half dozen will do for a
T
ordinary county, ef they’re hustled along with energy. Ef they won’t steal, the central commi-
A OR
ties must do it theirselves. Show yer niggers in a township in the morning, an the same nite rob
the clothes-lines and hen-roosts. Ever willin to sacrifice myself for the cause, I volunteer to do
M E
this latter dooty in six populous counties.
T T
These ijees, ef follered, will, no doubt, keep us together until our enemies split, when we
H
will reap the reward uv our constancy and fidelity. May the Lord hasten the day.
G IBU
Petroleum V. Nasby
I
R R
Lait Paster uv the Church uv the Noo Dispensashun
Source: David Ross Locke/Petroleum V. Nasby, A Platform for Northern Democrats, from Locke, The Struggles, Social,
P Y T
Financial and Political of Petroleum V. Nasby (Boston, 1888), quoted in William Benton, publ., The Annals of
America. Volume 9, 1858–1865: The Crisis of the Union (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1968), pp. 597–598.
O S
I Black Code (1865)
C T D
15.2 Mississippi
U P O Faced with the speedy emancipation of nearly half of Mississippi’s population, the first
O N
all-white postwar legislature set out to define what rights blacks should enjoy in freedom.
Some of the most basic were guaranteed, including the right to marry and hold property,
DO
and to testify under certain limited circumstances. Others were denied, among them the
right to vote, sit on juries, hold office, or intermarry with whites. Most controversially,
the Apprentice and Vagrancy Laws created a structure, color-blind in its outward work-
ings, that effectively allowed white authorities to commandeer blacks and force them
into involuntary labor or even to sell their labor to white bidders at auction.
Apprentice Law
Section 1. Be it enacted by the legislature of the state of Mississippi, that it shall be the duty of all
sheriffs, justices of the peace, and other civil officers of the several counties in this state to
report to the Probate courts of their respective counties semiannually, at the January and July

terms of said courts, all freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes under the age of eighteen
within their respective counties, beats, or districts who are orphans, or whose parent or par-
ents have not the means, or who refuse to provide for and support said minors; and thereupon
it shall be the duty of said Probate Court to order the clerk of said court to apprentice said
minors to some competent and suitable person, on such terms as the court my direct, having a
particular care to the interest of said minors:
Provided, that the former owner of said minors shall have the preference when, in the
opinion of the court, he or she shall be a suitable person for that purpose.
Section 2. Be it further enacted, that the said court shall be fully satisfied that the person or
persons to whom said minor shall be apprenticed shall be a suitable person to have the charge
and care of said minor and fully to protect the interest of said minor. The said court shall
T E
require the said master or mistress to execute bond and security, payable to the state of Missis-
sippi, conditioned that he or she shall furnish said minor with sufficient food and clothing; to
A
treat said minor humanely; furnish medical attention in case of sickness; teach or cause to be
C
I
taught him or her to read and write, if under fifteen years old; and will conform to any law that
L L
may be hereafter passed for the regulation of the duties and relation of master and apprentice:
A P
I
Provided, that said apprentice shall be bound by indenture, in case of males until they are
R U
twenty-one years old, and in case of females until they are eighteen years old.
T E D
Section 3. Be it further enacted, that in the management and control of said apprentices, said
A OR
master or mistress shall have power to inflict such moderate corporeal chastisement as a father
or guardian is allowed to inflict on his or her child or ward in common law:
M E
Provided, that in no case shall cruel or inhuman punishment be inflicted.
H T T
Section 4. Be it further enacted, that if any apprentice shall leave the employment of his or her
G IBU
master or mistress without his or her consent, said master or mistress may pursue and recap-
I
ture said apprentice and bring him or her before any justice of the peace of the county, whose
R R
duty it shall be to remand said apprentice to the service of his or her master or mistress; and in
P Y T
the event of a refusal on the part of said apprentice so to return, then said justice shall commit
said apprentice to the jail of said county, on failure to give bond, until the next term of the
O IS
country court; and it shall be the duty of said court, at the first term thereafter, to investigate
C T D
said case; and if the court shall be of opinion that said apprentice left the employment of his or
her master or mistress without good cause, to order him or her to be punished, as provided for
U P O the punishment of hired freedmen, as may be from time to time provided for by law, for deser-
tion, until he or she shall agree to return to his or her master or mistress:
O N Provided, that the court may grant continuances, as in other cases; and provided, further,
DO
that if the court shall believe that said apprentice had good cause to quit his said master or
mistress, the court shall discharge said apprentice from said indenture and also enter a judg-
ment against the master or mistress for not more than $100, for the use and benefit of said
apprentice, to be collected on execution, as in other cases.
Section 5. Be it further enacted, that if any person entice away any apprentice from his or her
master or mistress, or shall knowingly employ an apprentice, or furnish him or her food or
clothing, without the written consent of his or her master or mistress, or shall sell or give said
apprentice ardent spirits, without such consent, said person so offending shall be deemed
guilty of a high misdemeanor, and shall, on conviction thereof before the county court, be
punished as provided for the punishment of persons enticing from their employer hired freed-
men, free Negroes, or mulattoes.

Section 6. Be it further enacted, that it shall be the duty of all civil officers of their respective
counties to report any minors within their respective counties to said Probate Court who are
subject to be apprenticed under the provisions of this act, from time to time, as the facts may
come to their knowledge; and it shall be the duty of said court, from time to time, as said
minors shall be reported to them or otherwise come to their knowledge, to apprentice said
minors as hereinbefore provided.
Section 7. Be it further enacted, that in case the master or mistress of any apprentice shall
desire, he or she shall have the privilege to summon his or her said apprentice to the Probate
Court, and thereupon, with the approval of the court, he or she shall be released from all liabil-
ity as master of said apprentice, and his said bond shall be canceled, and it shall be the duty of
the court forthwith to reapprentice said minor; and in the event any master of an apprentice
T E
shall die before the close of the term of service of said apprentice, it shall be the duty of the
court to give the preference in reapprenticing said minor to the widow, or other member of
said master’s family:
CA
I
Provided, that said widow or other member of said family shall be a suitable person for
that purpose.
L
A PL
I
R U
Section 8. Be it further enacted, that in case any master or mistress of any apprentice, bound to
E D
him or her under this act shall be about to remove or shall have removed to any other state of
T
the United States by the laws of which such apprentice may be an inhabitant thereof, the Pro-
A OR
bate Court of the proper county may authorize the removal of such apprentice to such state
upon the said master or mistress entering into bond, with security, in a penalty to be fixed by
M E
the judge, conditioned that said master or mistress will, upon such removal, comply with the
T T
laws of such state in such cases:
H
Provided, that said master shall be cited to attend the court at which such order is pro-
G IBU
posed to be made and shall have a right to resist the same by next friend, or otherwise.
I
R R
Section 9. Be it further enacted, that it shall be lawful for any freedman, free Negro, or mulatto,
P Y T
having a minor child or children to apprentice the said minor child or children, as provided for
by this act.
O IS
C T D
Section 10. Be it further enacted, that in all cases where the age of the freedman, free Negro,
or mulatto cannot be ascertained by record testimony, the judge of the county court shall fix
U P O the age.
N Law
O Vagrancy
DO
Section 1. Be it enacted by the legislature of the state of Mississippi, that all rogues and vaga-
bonds, idle and dissipated persons, beggars, jugglers, or persons practising unlawful games
or plays, runaways, common drunkards, common nightwalkers, pilferers, lewd, wanton, or
lascivious persons, in speech or behavior, common railers and brawlers, persons who neglect
their calling or employment, misspend what they earn, or do not provide for the support of
themselves or their families or dependents, and all other idle and disorderly persons, includ-
ing all who neglect all lawful business, or habitually misspend their time by frequenting
houses of ill-fame, gaming houses, or tippling shops, shall be deemed and considered va-
grants under the provisions of this act; and, on conviction thereof shall be fined not exceed-
ing $100, with all accruing costs, and be imprisoned at the discretion of the court not
exceeding ten days.

Section 2. Be it further enacted, that all freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes in this state
over the age of eighteen years found on the second Monday in January 1966, or thereafter, with
no lawful employment or business, or found unlawfully assembling themselves together either
in the day or nighttime, and all white persons so assembling with freedmen, free Negroes, or
mulattoes, or usually associating with freedmen, free Negroes, or mulattoes on terms of equal-
ity, or living in adultery or fornication with a freedwoman, free Negro, or mulatto, shall be
deemed vagrants; and, on conviction thereof, shall be fined in the sum of not exceeding, in the
case of a freedman, free Negro, or mulatto, $50, and a white man, $200, and imprisoned at
the discretion of the court, the free Negro not exceeding ten days, and the white man not ex-
ceeding six months.
Section 3. Be it further enacted, that all justices of the peace, mayors, and aldermen of incorpo-
T E
rated towns and cities of the several counties in this state shall have jurisdiction to try all ques-
tions of vagrancy in their respective towns, counties, and cities; and it is hereby made their
A
duty, whenever they shall ascertain that any person or persons in their respective towns, coun-
C
I
ties, and cities are violating any of the provisions of this act, to have said party or parties
L L
arrested and brought before them and immediately investigate said charge; and, on conviction,
A P
I
punish said party or parties as provided for herein. And it is hereby made the duty of all sher-
R U
iffs, constables, town constables, city marshals, and all like officers to report to some officer
E D
having jurisdiction all violations of any of the provisions of this act; and it shall be the duty of
T
the county courts to inquire if any officers have neglected any of the duties required by this act;
A OR
and in case any officer shall fail or neglect any duty herein, it shall be the duty of the county
court to fine said officer, upon conviction, not exceeding $100, to be paid into the county trea-
M E
sury for county purposes.
H T T
Section 4. Be it further enacted, that keepers of gaming houses, houses of prostitution, all pros-
G IBU
titutes, public or private, and all persons who derive their chief support in employments that
I
militate against good morals or against laws shall be deemed and held to be vagrants.
R R
P Y T
Section 5. Be it further enacted, that all fines and forfeitures collected under the provisions of
this act shall be paid into the county treasury for general county purposes; and in case any
O IS
freedman, free Negro, or mulatto shall fail for five days after the imposition of any fine or for-
C T D
feiture upon him or her for violation of any of the provisions of this act to pay the same, that it
shall be, and is hereby made, the duty of the sheriff of the proper county to hire out said freed-
U P O man, free Negro, or mulatto to any person who will, for the shortest period of service, pay said
fine or forfeiture and all costs:
O N Provided, a preference shall be given to the employer, if there be one, in which case the
DO
employer shall be entitled to deduct and retain the amount so paid from the wages of such
freedman, free Negro, or mulatto then due or to become due; and in case such freedman, free
Negro, or mulatto cannot be hired out he or she may be dealt with as a pauper.
Section 6. Be it further enacted, that the same duties and liabilities existing among white per-
sons of this state shall attach to freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes to support their indi-
gent families and all colored paupers; and that, in order to secure a support for such indigent
freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes, it shall be lawful, and it is hereby made the duty of the
boards of county police of each county in this state, to levy a poll or capitation tax on each and
every freedman, free Negro, or mulatto, between the ages of eighteen and sixty years, not to
exceed the sum of $1 annually, to each person so taxed, which tax, when collected, shall be paid
into the county treasurer's hands and constitute a fund to be called the Freedman's Pauper
Fund, which shall be applied by the commissioners of the poor for the maintenance of the poor

of the freedmen, free Negroes and mulattoes of this state, under such regulations as may be
established by the boards of county police, in the respective counties of this state.
Section 7. Be it further enacted, that if any freedman, free Negro, or mulatto shall fail or refuse
to pay any tax levied according to the provisions of the 6th Section of this act, it shall be prima
facie evidence of vagrancy, and it shall be the duty of the sheriff to arrest such freedman, free
Negro, or mulatto, or such person refusing or neglecting to pay such tax, and proceed at once
to hire, for the shortest time, such delinquent taxpayer to anyone who will pay the said tax,
with accruing costs, giving preference to the employer, if there be one.
Section 8. Be it further enacted, that any person feeling himself or herself aggrieved by the
judgment of any justice of the peace, mayor, or alderman in cases arising under this act may,
T E
within five days, appeal to the next term of the county court of the proper county, upon giving
bond and security in a sum not less than $25 nor more than $150, conditioned to appear and
A
prosecute said appeal, and abide by the judgment of the county court, and said appeal shall be
C
I
tried de novo in the county court, and the decision of said court shall be final.
L
A PL
Source: Mississippi Black Code, 1865, from Laws of the State of Mississippi, Passed at a Regular Session of the Mississippi
I
Legislature (Jackson, 1866), pp. 82–93, 165–167, quoted in William Benton, publ., The Annals of America. Volume 9,
R U
1858–1865: The Crisis of the Union (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1968), pp. 628–634.
T E D
A O R
15.3 Sharecropping Contract
M E
BETWEEN ALONZO T. MIAL AND
T T
FENNER POWELL (1886)
H
G IBU
For Republicans, the essence of “free labor” was the contract, the notion that either a gov-
I
erning figure and his people, or a wealthy man and those who labored for him, both had
R R
to subscribe voluntarily to an explicit agreement outlining their mutual responsibilities
Y
in order for their relationship to be binding. Unfortunately, after the war, southern blacks
P T
freed from slavery but without land sometimes had little choice but to sign stringent labor
S
O I
contracts with landlords, who were often former slave owners. A system emerged known
D
C T
as sharecropping. The tenant, or “cropper,” would sign an annual contract to work a plot
of land in return for a share of the crop. The following is a sharecropping contract from
U P O 1886, between a landlord named A. T. Mial and a sharecropper named Fenner Powell.
O N This contract made and entered into between A. T. Mial of one part and Fenner Powell of the
DO
other part both of the County of Wake and state of North Carolina—
Witnesseth—That the Said Fenner Powell hath barganed and agreed with the Said Mial to
work as a cropper for the year 1886 on Said Mial’s land on the land now occupied by Said
Powell on the west Side of Poplar Creek and a point on the east Side of Said Creek and both
South and North of the Mial road, leading to Raleigh, That the said Fenner Powell agrees to
work faithfully and diligently without any unnecessary loss of time, to do all manner of work
on Said farm as may be directed by Said Mial, And to be respectful in manners and deport-
ment to Said Mial. And the Said Mial agrees on his part to furnish mule and feed for the same
and all plantation tools and Seed to plant the crop free of charge, and to give the said Powell
One half of all crops raised and housed by Said Powell on Said land except the cotton seed. The
Said Mial agrees to advance as provisions to Said Powell fifty pound of bacon and two sacks of
meal per month and occasionally some flour to be paid out of his the Said Powell’s part of the

crop or from any other advance that may be made to Said Powell by Said Mial. As witness our
hands and seals this the 16th day of January A.D. 1886.
Source: Contract between Alonzo T. Mial and Fenner Powell, January 1886, in Roger Ransom and Richard Sutch,
One Kind of Freedom: The Economic Consequences of Emancipation (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1977), p. 91.
15.4 JOSEPH FARLEY, AN ACCOUNT

OF Reconstruction
Joseph Farley, born in 1843 in Virginia, ran away and joined the Union army. Later he
E
was given a pension. “At that time I never thought about dying,” he remembers.
T
“I never thought about anybody shooting me; I just thought about shooting them.”
A
Interviewed in 1930 by a black student from Fisk University, he gave a rambling ac-
C
count, from which the postwar material has been excerpted. As with all distant recol-
L I
lections, Farley’s may have been affected by the lapse of time and the person conducting
L
the interview.
I A P
E R U
D
It was a long, long time before everything got quiet after the war. On Franklin Street here I saw
T
once 100 Ku Klux Klans, with long robes and faces covered. You don’t know anything of them.
A OR
They were going down here a piece to hang a man. There were about 600 of us soldiers, so we
M E
followed them to protect the man. The Klan knew this, and passed on by the house and went
on back to town and never did bother the man.
H T T
One time a colored soldier married a white woman over here at Fort Bruce. The man
belonged to my company. His name was Sergeant Cook. About twenty of the soldiers went
I G IBU
to the wedding, and they had about five or six white men who said he couldn’t marry this
woman. Old Dr. Taylor . . . came over to marry them. He stood near me and I told him to
R R
go on and marry this couple or else someone here would die. He looked around and saw
Y T
all these soldiers and he knew about us and that we meant for him to do as he had been
OP IS
told. He married them and we guarded our hack over to the war boat on the Cumberland.
They went over to Nashville and lived there. They had a daughter whose name was Mrs.
C T D
Gnatt. When they married was in 1866. Mrs. Gnatt could tell you her father was named
P O
Cyrus Cook. Guess you know you can’t do that now, no sir; you just can’t do that now. At
one time a colored man could ride anywhere he wanted to, but now he can’t do it. I am one
OU N
of the first voters of Montgomery County. They told me at one time that I was not to come
to the polls or I would be met by 600 men on horses. So about six or eight hundred of us
DO
armed and went to the polls with our bayonets. That man that had told me that did not
show up. So we voted, and voted for whom we wanted. At that time the Rebels who rebelled
against this country could not vote and they said that these Negroes shouldn’t vote but we
showed them. Of course, they came down and stood and looked at us but they didn’t
bother us. We went there armed and prepared for fighting so that if they started anything,
there would be trouble. When they mustered me out from the army, I brought my gun
from Nashville right here to Clarksville and kept it twenty-five years. Finally I let an old
soldier have it.
When I first came here we had no teachers here but white teachers. They would call the
roll same as calling the roll for soldiers. They taught school in the churches before they had
school houses. They used to go to school at night and work all day. Clarence C. White’s father,
Will White, was the first teacher or principal of the school here in Clarksville.
....

When the War was over some of the colored returned to their white folks, but I didn’t
want to be under the white folks again. I was glad to get out. Once, for fifteen years here, I run
a saloon and livery stable. One time I worked on a boat. When I was on my first boat, one time
I went to vote. A white man told me that if I voted Republican he would fire me, so I told him
to fire me then. I just told him he could fire me right now for I didn’t want to work anyway.
I went on and voted the Republican ticket, and they told me they liked my principle and I could
go on and go to work.
I still got my discharge from way back in 1866. I keeps it and I mean to keep it as long as
I live. I am proud of it.
Source: George P. Rawick, ed. The American Slave: A Composite Autobiography. Volume 18. Unwritten History of Slavery
(Fisk University) (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1972), pp. 121–128.
T E
A
15.5 EXCERPT FROM THE TESTIMONY OF
C
I
Gadsden Steel FROM PROCEEDINGS IN
L
A PL
THE KU KLUX TRIALS AT COLUMBIA, S.C.
I
IN THE UNITED STATES CIRCUIT COURT,
R U
E D
NOVEMBER TERM (1871)
T
A OR
Gadsden Steel, a black South Carolinian from York County, appeared as a witness before
the joint congressional committee investigating terrorism in the Deep South. South Car-
M E
olina’s governor had created a state militia, most of whose members were black. Among
H T T
the targets of Ku Klux Klan violence were African Americans who voted Republican
(that is, Radical), but particularly those who had enlisted. Any freed person who owned
I G IBU
firearms risked midnight attack or confiscation of his weapons. Fearing for his safety,
R R
Steel moved to North Carolina after the attack.
P Y T
S
Q. Were you a voter in York County?
O D I A. Yes, sir.
C T
Q. Vote at the last election?
P O
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Are you twenty-one years of age?
OU N
A. Twenty-six.
Q. What ticket did you vote?
DO
A. Voted the Radical ticket.
Q. Vote for Mr. Wallace?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Now, tell the jury about the Ku Klux coming to your house last March, on the night that Jim
Williams was killed; what they said and did and what you said, and all about it.
A. They came to my house on a Monday night. . . .
Q. Very well, tell what occurred.
A. They came to my house about ten o’clock, and I was in bed at that time; and I was asleep, and
my wife she heard them before I did, and she shook me and woke me up, and told me she heard
a mighty riding and walking, and said I had better get up, she thought it was Ku Klux. I jumped
up, and put on my pantaloons, and stepped to the door, and looked out, and very close to the
door I seen the men, and I stepped right back into the house; so when they knocked the door

open they couldn’t see me; and they came in and called for me to give up my gun, and I says
I has no gun; and when I spoke they all grabbed me, and taken me out into the yard.
Q. What sort of looking people were they?
A. They was all disguised, as far as I could see—they was all disguised, and struck me three
licks over the head, and jobbed the blood out of me, right forninst my eye, with a pistol; and
four of them walked around to Mr. Moore’s; and, when they started off, one touched the other,
and said let’s go around, and see this man, and then the crowd that had me taken me to
Mr. Moore’s, and asked Mr. Moore if I had a gun; and he said no, not that he knew of; and they
asked me if I had a pistol, and he said no; they asked if I belonged to that company; he said no.
Q. What company?
A. Jim Williams’ company; asked him was I a bad boy, and run about into any devilment; he
E
said no; I was a very fine boy, as far as he knew; they asked how I voted; he said I voted the Radi-
T
cal ticket; they says, “There, G—d d—n you, I’ll kill you for that”; they took me on out in the
A
lane, and says, “come out and talk to Number 6”; they locked arms with me, and one took me
by the collar, and put a gun agin me, and marched me out to Number 6; when I went out there,
L I C
he was sitting on his horse; I walked up to him; he bowed his head down to me, (illustrating
A PL
with a very low bow), and says, “How do you do,” and horned me in the breast with his horns;
I
had horns on the head about so long, (indicating about two feet;) I jumped back from him, and
R U
they punched me, and said, “Stand up to him, G—d d—n you, and talk to him.” I told them
E D
I would do so; he told me that he wanted me to tell him who had guns.
T
Q. Who said that?
A OR
A. No. 6; I told him I knew a heap that had guns, but hadn’t them now; they had done give
M E
them up; well, says he, ain’t Jim Williams got the guns? I says I heard folks say that he has
T T
them, but I do not know whether he has them or not. Then he says to me: “We want you to
go and show ups to where his house is; if you don’t show us to where his house is we will kill
H
G IBU
you;” and then one looked up to the moon and says: “Don’t tarry here too long with this
I
d—n n--; we have to get back to hell before daybreak. It won’t do to tarry here too long.”
R R
Says he, “get on.” There was a man standing to the right of me with his beast; his head was
Y
turned from me; I stepped around and got on behind him and rode on around until they
P T
turned towards the school house, about sixty yards down the road, and he asked me did
S
I
I want to go, and I told him no. Says I, the fix I am in, if you don’t do anything to me, may
O
C T
kill me. I hadn’t nothing on but a shirt, pantaloons and drawers. They started in a lope then,
D
and he hollowed to No. 6 that he could not keep up, that I was too heavy. Says he, “this God
P O
damned n—is too heavy.” No. 6 hollows back to him, “let him down,” and he rode close
U
enough to the fence so that I could get down, and I stepped off; says he, “you go home and
N
go to bed, and if you are not there when we come along, we will kill you the next time we
O call on you; we are going to kill Williams, and we are going to kill all these damned n—s
DO
that votes the Radical ticket; run, God damn you, run.” I ran into the yard, and I heard
somebody talking near the store, and I slipped up beside the palings, and it was Dr. Love
and Andy Lindsey tallying, and Love seen me, and says, “Gadsden, did they hurt you?”
“No,” says I, “not much; they punched the blood out in two places, and knocked me two or
three times about the head, but they did not hurt me very much.” Says he, “you go to bed
and I don’t think they will trouble you very much.” I went home and put on my clothes . . .
and I waked the others up, and we all went out into the old field and laid there until the
chickens crowed for day, and went back to Mr. Moore’s, near the house, and lay there till
clear daylight, and I goes into the yard there, and Mr. Moore came to me and looked over
my face and seen where they had punched the blood out of me, and says then for me to go

on to my work and make myself easy, that they should not come and bother me any more;
I never seen any more of them after that.
Q. Now, what time the next day did you learn that Jim Williams was dead?
A. It was about 8 o’clock, when I heard of it.
Q. Did you go down near him?
A. No, sir; I didn’t go. I was busy employed, and didn’t go. I didn’t quit my work to go. I was
working at the mill, and some come there to the mill very early that morning and told it. . . .
Q. Jim Williams was killed that night, was he?
A. Yes, sir. He was killed that night.
Source: Proceedings in the Ku Klux Trials at Columbia, S. C., in the United States Circuit Court, November Term, 1871
(Columbia House, 1872) quoted in Paul M. Angle, The American Reader From Columbus to Today (New York:
E
Rand McNally & Company, 1958), pp. 349–352.
A T
L I C
I A PL
E R U
T D
A OR
M E
H T T
I G IBU
Y R R
P S T
O D I
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U P O
O N
DO

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Of the People

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Jan Ellen Lewis

New York Oxford

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Oxford New York

Copyright © 2017, 2013, and 2011 by Oxford University Press

For titles covered by Section 112 of the US Higher Education

Published by Oxford University Press

Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

Printing number: 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Printed in the United States of America

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00-Oakes-fm.indd 5 26/10/15 7:08 PM

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Chapter 15 Reconstructing a Nation, 1865–1877 450

Wartime Reconstruction 453

The Retreat from Republican Radicalism 469

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STRUGGLES FOR DEMOCRACY: An Incident at Coushatta, August 1874 473

Chapter 16 The Triumph of Industrial Capitalism,

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Rosa Cassettari 482

The Political Economy of Global Capitalism 483

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AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: Mining Camps in the West 503

Chapter 17 Cultural Struggles of Industrial America,

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Anthony Comstock’s Crusade Against Vice 510

The Varieties of Urban Culture 511

The Elusive Boundaries of Male and Female 516

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Chapter 17 Primary Sources

Chapter 18 The Politics of Industrial America,

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Luna Kellie and the Farmers’ Alliance 538

Two Political Styles 539

Middle-Class Radicalism 553

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Chapter 19 Industry and Empire, 1890–1900 562

The Crisis of the 1890s 565

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Chapter 20 A United Body of Action, 1900–1916 594

Toward a New Politics 597

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Chapter 21 A Global Power, 1914–1919 624

The Challenge of Revolution 627

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Chapter 22 The Modern Nation, 1919–1928 652

A Dynamic Economy 655

The Limits of the Modern Culture 668

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22.3 Visual Document: Colgate & Co. Advertisement (1925) S22-6

Chapter 23 A Great Depression and a New Deal,

AMERICAN PORTRAIT: Dorothea Lange 684

The Great Depression 685

AMERICA AND THE WORLD: The Global Depression 705

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Chapter 24 The Second World War, 1941–1945 710

Island in a Totalitarian Sea 713

Closing with the Enemy 735

27.3 Testimony of Marian Wright, Examination of the War on Poverty; Hearings