US History #2

At Gettysburg, what action was directed by Confederate General George Pickett

A failed charge on Cemetery Hill

What was the most important gain for African Americans in the South after the Civil War

Access to education

What was the main cause of the Native American rebellions?

conflict over land The Sioux Indians attacked settlements in Minnesota to rebel against threats to their land rights. This rebellion sparked a series of attacks on other settlements and stagecoach lines as other Plains Indians also saw their way of life slipping away.

Grant Faces a Formidable Challenge

Grant made several attempts to fulfill Lincoln's goal, but it was a daunting task. The mighty Vicksburg fortress towered high above the waters of the Mississippi. Along the city's western edge, Confederate gunners could rain deadly fire on any gunboats that might approach. In May 1862, they thwarted one such assault under Union Admiral David Farragut. Grant even tried digging a canal so that Union ships could bypass the stretch of the river dominated by the Vicksburg batteries, but the attempt failed. Vicksburg's location also protected it from attack by land. A Union assault in late 1862 stalled out in the labyrinth of swamps, creeks, and woods guarding the northern approaches to the city.

What was the decisive factor in the North's success in the final years of the war

Greater resources

What was the result of the Enforcement Acts

Hundreds of Klansmen were indicted

What is true about the end of Reconstruction

It happened as northerners turned their attention to other issues

How did the railroad contribute to the cattle ranching boom in the West

It provided the means to transport cattle to eastern markets

What was one main result of the completion of the transcontinental railroad

It ties the nation together

Why did the Confederates defend Petersburg so fiercely

It was a rail link to the Confederate capital

How did President Abraham Lincoln's Reconstruction plan differ from the Wade-Davis Bill

Lincoln's plan did not guarantee African American equality

What was the result of the assault on Fort Wagner by the African American soldiers of the Union's 54th Massachusetts Regiment

The assault failed, but the regiment earned respect for its bravery in action

The End of the Indian Wars

The conditions facing Native Americans had all the ingredients for tragedy. Indians were confined to isolated and impoverished areas, which were regularly ravaged by poverty and disease. Promises made to them were eventually broken. Frustration, particularly among young warriors, turned to violence. Guns replaced treaties as the government crushed open rebellions.

How did the election of 1876 affect Reconstruction

The controversy over the election drove a compromise that ended Reconstruction

How did the Union victories in the South affect the election of 1864

The victories boosted Lincoln's popularity, helping him win reelection

Why were entrepreneurs an important part of the capitalist, or free enterprise, system

Their investments helped fund the industrial economy

Competition, Conflict, and Change

There is a sharp contrast between the picture of the West depicted in novels and movies and the reality of life on the Plains. The West was a place of rugged beauty, but it was also a place of diversity and conflict.

What was a feature of Vicksburg, Mississippi, that made it difficult for the Union army to capture

There was a massive fortress situated above the Mississippi River

What caused the low cotton prices after the war

There was an oversupply of cotton for the market

Which of the following is a political reason that the South needed a Reconstruction plan

There was no plan in place to get defeated states back in the Union

Why was it difficult to build new businesses in the South

There were not many banks to finance businesses

How did railroads change American business

They allowed businesses access to markets farther away

How did railroads change American businesses

They allowed businesses access to markets farther away

How did carpetbaggers affect southern politics

They became part of new southern governments

What effect did protective tariffs have on the American economy

They made American goods cheaper than imported goods

What was the South's response after the Battle of Gettysburg

They never again fought on Union soil

How did the Radical Republicans respond to President Andrew Johnson's veto of a bill allowing the Freedman's Bureau to continue its work

They passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866

How did the Republicans in Congress amend the Constitution to further their Reconstruction program

They passed the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to guarantee equality under the law and the right to vote

How did some formerly African Americans in the South respond to advancing Union forces

They served as scouts and spied for the Union

What role did railroads play in the southern economy

They shipped materials to northern markets

How did African Americans on southern plantations help the Union cause

They sometimes grew food for the Union army

What happened to Crazy Horse and his followers in the months after the Battle of Little Big Horn

They surrendered

How were African Americans treated while serving in the Union military

They were assigned the most dangerous tasks

How were African American prisoners treated in Confederate prison camps

They were usually killed

Who were the scalawags

They were white southerners who had been excluded from politics before the war

Why was sharecropping so common among the poor

This system required no cash investment

Ten Percent Plan Offers Leniency

Throughout the war, Lincoln had felt some sympathy for the South and hoped that southern states might easily rejoin the Union after the war. To this end, in 1863 he issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, known as the "Ten Percent Plan." According to its terms, as soon as ten percent of a state's voters took a loyalty oath to the Union, the state could set up a new government. If the state's constitution abolished slavery and provided education for African Americans, the state would regain representation in Congress. Lincoln was generous in other ways to white southerners. He was willing to grant pardons to former Confederates, and he considered compensating them for lost property. In addition, Lincoln did not require a guarantee of social or political equality for African Americans. He recognized pro-Union governments in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Tennessee even though they denied African Americans the right to vote. Lincoln took the position that the Union was unbreakable and therefore the southern states had never really left the Union. In his Second Inaugural Address, delivered a month before the war ended, Lincoln promised forgiveness: "With malice toward none, and charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds . . . to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." —Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, March 1865

Which of the following was a goal of the Dawes General Allotment Act

To assimilate Indians into white culture

Why did John Wilkes Booth assassinate Abraham Lincoln

To cause panic in the North

Why did the Union government introduce an income tax and begin selling government bonds

To raise money for the war effort

What was the purpose of the Enforcement Acts

To reduce violence against Americans who tried to vote

Why did Native Americans wave the American flag when the militia attacks at the Sand Creek Massacre

To show the attacking militia that they were friends of the whites

What was the successful Union strategy for taking Vicksburg

To surround and bombard the city, cutting off supplies

What were some of the lasting effects of the Civil War?

industrial boom, migration of African Americans, unity, and federal authority An industrial boom in the North established the United States as a global economic power. African Americans migrated west and north. And, as the federal government asserted its authority, the country's regions experienced greater unity.

Union Forces Capture New Orleans

While Shiloh shocked the public, it did not slow the course of the war. Just days later, Union ships under the command of David Farragut sailed through the Gulf of Mexico and seized the vital southern port of New Orleans at the mouth of the Mississippi. Emboldened by his success, Farragut continued to sail north, hoping to capture the Confederate stronghold of Vicksburg, Mississippi. The Confederates, however, stopped Farragut's fleet more than 50 miles from his goal. Meanwhile, pushing southward from Tennessee, Grant's land forces were also checked in their advance on Vicksburg. Complete Union control of the Mississippi would have to wait.

Stalemate Develops in the East

While Union and Confederate forces squared off in the Mississippi Valley and farther west, major fighting in the East focused on the state of Virginia. As elsewhere, the outcomes did not prove decisive for either side.

In what two ways did Congress help fund the building of the transcontinental railroad?

loans and land grants Congress supported construction of the transcontinental railroad by providing money in the form of loans and giving builders wide stretches of land.

What were the greatest dangers faced by wounded and captured soldiers during the Civil War?

amputation, disease, lack of sanitation, and malnutrition Doctors lacked modern knowledge about infection, so even minor wounds could prove deadly. In addition, on both sides, prisoners of war faced overcrowding, filth, and lack of food.

What do you call a person who invests money in a product or enterprise for profit?

an entrepreneur Entrepreneurs helped expand industry by investing in factories, railroads, mines, and other industrial businesses.

What laws were implemented by Confederate states to limit the rights of African Americans?

black codes Southern states tried to reestablish prewar conditions by instituting black codes, limiting the vote to white males, and launching a campaign of terror against African Americans.

What strategy did Grant and Sherman follow as commanders of Union forces?

total war Both Grant and Sherman followed the strategy of total war, which involves striking civilian as well as military targets. The purpose of total war is to weaken an enemy's armies, the economy that supports them, and the overall will of the people to fight.

What limited natural resource created conflicts between miners, ranchers, sheepherders, and farmers?

water Water usage remained largely unregulated, which led to violence and acts of sabotage.

Which was a craft union

American Federation of Labor

What resources were targeted in Ulysses S. Grant's strategy of total war

Civilian as well as military targets

What did Grant say the Confederate rebels had become following Lee's surrender

Countrymen

What discovery led to George B. McClellan's victory over Robert E. Lee at Antietam

General McClellan found General Lee's battle plan

What orders did Union General William Tecumseh Sherman give his troops on their "March to the Sea"?

Get supplies by looting, then destroy anything else of value

How did mining change in the West

Individuals mined gold near the surface, then large companies took over

What factor drew farm families to Northern cities in the late 1800s

Job opportunities

What is one benefit of investing in a corporation

Losses are limited to the original investment

What factors helped the North to produce more arms and supplies than the South

Mechanized factories and a steady supply of immigrants seeking work

Who were the Copperheads

Northerners who opposed the war

Successes and Failures Result

On the other hand, the Republican Party did not support women's suffrage, arguing that they could not rally national support behind the essential goal of black suffrage if they tried to include women too. Even so, the Reconstruction South offered northern women—white and black—opportunities that they could not pursue at home. In medical facilities, orphanages, and other relief agencies, single women carved out new roles and envisioned new horizons. They also participated in what was the most enduring development of the new South—the shaping of a public school system. Mandated by Reconstruction state constitutions, public schools grew slowly, drawing in only about half of southern children by the end of the 1870s. Establishing a new school system was expensive. This was especially so since southerners opted for segregation, or separation of the races. Operating two school systems—one white, one black—severely strained the southern economy. A few of the most radical white Republicans suggested integration—combining the schools—but the idea was unpopular with most Republicans. Nevertheless, the beginning of a tax-supported public school system was a major Reconstruction success. Despite these successes, the South still faced many challenges. Many southerners remained illiterate. The quality of medical care, housing, and economic production lagged far behind the North and, in some cases, behind the newly settled West. Legal protection for African Americans was limited, and racial violence remained a problem until well into the twentieth century. A new reality was sweeping the country. Political offices, which were once an honor bestowed upon a community's successful business people, were becoming a route to wealth and power rather than a result of these attributes. However, conditions in the South were not unlike the rest of the country in that respect. Ambitious people everywhere were willing to bribe politicians in order to gain access to attractive loans or contracts. Some of the most attractive arenas for corruption involved the developing railroads. Republicans were the party of African American freedom, but they were also the party of aggressive economic development. Building railroads had two big advantages. First, the construction of tracks and rail cars created jobs. Second, the rail lines would provide the means to carry produce and industrial goods to expanded markets. Hence, in many states across the nation, legislatures gave public land or lent taxpayers' money to railroad speculators. In some cases, the speculators delivered on their promises and repaid the loans. But southern leaders, who had fewer resources and less financial expertise than their northern peers, found that a good number of their loans were stolen or mismanaged. Though northern white speculators defaulted, too, many Americans used these examples to argue that southern black politicians were dishonest or incompetent.

Whose Reconstruction plan was toughest on the South

Radical Republicans

The Farmers' Alliance asked the government for help in dealing with what industries

Railroad and banking

Which farming arrangement took advantage of poor farmers the most

Sharecropping

Why did President Lincoln want the Union army to control Vicksburg, Mississippi

So the Union could control the Mississippi River

How did the Bessemer process make suspension bridges possible

The Bessemer process produced the lightweight steel needed to build a suspension bridge

Why did President Andrew Johnson veto the Civil Rights Act of 1866

The Civil Rights Act overturned black codes

Which of the following contributed to ending Reconstruction

The North focused on other political and economic issues

Why was the South vulnerable to a blockade by the North

The North had a well-organized navy, while the South had no navy and few good ports

Abraham Lincoln's words "with malice toward none" conveyed what position toward the South near the close of the war

The North would welcome the South back into the United States

How would the passage of the Wade-Davis Bill have slowed the Reconstruction effort

The Wade-Davis Bill required that a majority of southern prewar voters swear loyalty to the Union

Which act is an example of total war

Vandalizing the enemy's private homes

Why was taking Vicksburg such a daunting task for the Union

Vicksburg had many geographical advantages

How did the new mining towns enforce laws and keep the peace

Vigilantes punished lawbreakers

What was one cause of the Red River War

White buffalo hunters hunting on Indian lands

What was the Anaconda Plan

A northern plan to blockade southern seaports and then take control of the Mississippi River

What is the constitutional right of habeas corpus

A person cannot be jailed unless charged with a specific crime

Who chipped away at African American freedoms in the 1870s

Supreme Court

Which group thought the Emancipation Proclamation was too drastic a step

Congressional Democrats

In the North, which group was most likely to face conscription into the military

Men with low-paying jobs

What group developed the riding and roping skills cowboys used to herd livestock

Mexican vaqueros

How did protective tariffs encourage the growth of American businesses in the late 1800s

Tariffs increased the cost of foreign goods

Why did President Lincoln want General U.S. Grant commanding the Union army after the Battle of Gettysburg

He knew Grant would do anything to win the war

How long was the workday for most factory workers in the late 1800s

12 hours

Reformers Criticize Government

A few outspoken critics defended the Indians' way of life. In A Century of Dishonor, Helen Hunt Jackson decried the government's treatment of Native Americans: "There is not among these three hundred bands of Indians one which has not suffered cruelly at the hands either of the Government or of white settlers. The poorer, the more insignificant, the more helpless the band, the more certain the cruelty and outrage to which they have been subjected. . . . It makes little difference where one opens the record of the history of the Indians; every page and every year has its dark stain. . . ." —Helen Hunt Jackson, 1881 Susette La Flesche, the granddaughter of a French trader and an Omaha Indian woman, also used her writing and lecturing talents to fight for recognition of the Indians and Indian rights in the courts. Born on the Omaha reservation in Nebraska, she studied in the East and returned to the reservation to teach.

Who were the "Exodusters"?

A group of African Americans who founded all-black towns in Kansas and Oklahoma

Railroads Link Cities and Towns

A key component of industrialization is transportation. To meet this need, southern rail lines expanded, joining rural areas with urban hubs such as Mobile and Montgomery in Alabama and the bustling ports of New Orleans, Louisiana, and Charleston, South Carolina. Yet, by the 1880s, only two rail lines—from Texas to Chicago and from Tennessee to Washington, D.C.—linked southern freight to northern markets. To combat economic isolation, southerners lobbied the federal government for economic help and used prison labor to keep railroad construction costs down. Gradually, rail connections supported the expansion of small hubs such as Meridian, Mississippi, and Americus, Georgia. The new cities of Atlanta, Dallas, and Nashville developed and began rivaling the old.

Which is the best description of an entrepreneur

A person who invests in a business

What tactic did Ulysses S. Grant use successfully against the Confederates at Petersburg

A siege

What did the Dawes General Allotment Act grant the Indians

A specific area of farmland

What was "wage slavery" in company towns

A system for holding workers to their jobs until debts were repaid

What is horizontal integration

A system of consolidating many firms in the same business

Union victory came at a cost to African American volunteers. About how many of the Union's 180,000 African American volunteers lost their lives during the war

About 70,000 volunteers died

As Lincoln focused on uniting the nation, what was the focus of the reconstruction plans of Radical Republicans?

African American rights Because Lincoln made national unity a priority of Reconstruction, his policies were more conciliatory than those of the Radical Republicans, who were focused on establishing equal rights for freedmen.

Why did the Ku Klux Klan attack African American teachers and ministers

African American teachers and ministers encouraged blacks to vote

Which group did the Ku Klux Klan primarily target

African Americans

How did Reconstruction benefit African Americans

African Americans had better economic opportunities

The Workforce Grows

After the Civil War, large numbers of Europeans, and some Asians, immigrated to the United States. They were pushed from their homelands by factors such as political upheaval, religious discrimination, and crop failures. In 1881 alone, nearly three quarters of a million immigrants arrived in America. That number climbed steadily, reaching almost one million per year by 1905. Immigrants were willing to work for low wages because competition for jobs was fierce. And they were prepared to move frequently in pursuit of economic opportunity. All of these factors meant that industries had a huge, and willing, workforce to fuel growth. The potential workforce grew even larger in the 1890s, when droughts and competition from foreign farmers drove American farmers in large numbers to seek jobs in the cities.

Effects on the Economy

After the fighting ended, social and political disillusionment on both sides fed economic greed. The era following the war came to be labeled the Gilded Age—a term that suggested a superficial glitter and beauty covering up an underlying decay. Nevertheless, in the North, the industrial boom that was fueled by the war continued. In 1862, Congress passed both the Land Grant College Act and legislation authorizing a protective tariff. The Land Grant College Act gave money from the sale of public lands to states for the establishment of universities that taught "agriculture and mechanical arts." The tariff protected northern industry from foreign competition and raised much-needed revenue for the Union war effort. It also led to a surge in manufacturing that lasted far beyond the end of the war. After 1865, northern factories, banks, and cities underwent sweeping industrialization, helping the United States emerge as a global economic power. In contrast, rebuilding the South was slow and tortured. Southern cities, such as Richmond and Atlanta, lay in ruins, as did many of the region's factories and railroads. The South struggled to regain its economic footing after the war, often relying on northern investment and seeking ways to enter the modern cash economy. For many decades, agriculture would remain at the center of southern economy. Northerners, forgetting Sherman's destruction of southern assets, would often blame the slow recovery on southerners' own shortcomings.

What was one reason the Republicans gained control of southern state governments during Reconstruction

All southern African American men could vote

African Americans Use Political Power

Almost 1,500 black men—some born free, some recently released from slavery—helped usher the Republican Party into the South. These new black citizens served the South as school superintendents, sheriffs, mayors, coroners, police chiefs, and representatives in state legislatures. Six served as lieutenant governors. Two state legislatures—in Mississippi and South Carolina—had black Speakers of the House. Between 1870 and 1877, two African American senators and fourteen African American congressmen served in the United States Congress. Most importantly, millions of southern African American men were now voters. Since the Radical Republicans required a loyalty oath, many white southerners were not eligible to vote, or chose to stay away from the constitutional conventions and from the elections that followed. Black men, however, quickly signed up to use their new right of suffrage. Thus, by 1868, many southern states had both African American elected officials and a strong Republican Party. Ironically, South Carolina—the state that had ignited the Civil War—became the one state where a black majority ruled the legislature, although only for a short time.

The Effects on State and National Politics

American politics were irrevocably shaped by the Civil War and Reconstruction. The Republican Party, born out of the controversy over slavery, continued to be seen by many as "the party of Lincoln, that freed the slaves." White southerners therefore shunned it, while African Americans—in both the North and South—embraced it. Consequently, the Democratic Party came to dominate the white South. Following Reconstruction, the national Republicans became the party of big business—a reputation that continues to the present. The national Democratic Party, which identified with industrial laborers, differed from the southern Democrats and had to maintain a delicate balance with the southern faction on this issue as well as on the question of race.

How were the lives of Americans affected after the war ended

Americans became increasingly connected economically, politically, and socially

Evaluating Reconstruction's Effects

Among the enduring changes to the South were the introduction of a tax-supported school system and an infusion of federal money to modernize railroads and ports. In addition, the economy expanded from one crop—cotton—to a range of agricultural and industrial products. There was a gradual transition to a wage economy from a barter-and-credit system. But some historians say that these changes might have happened anyway, since southern planters were concerned about their debt-ridden society even before the war. Reconstruction failed to heal the bitterness between North and South or to provide lasting protection for freed people. However, it did raise African Americans' expectations of their right to citizenship, and it placed before Americans the meaning and value of the right to vote.

Members of which group were tried for murder following the Haymarket Riot

Anarchists

Where did Lee formally surrender to Grant

Appomattox Court House

The Election of 1864

As 1864 drew to a close, Lincoln had much to celebrate. While his military commanders were winning victories on the battlefield, he had won reelection in November. The campaign had been difficult. Lincoln had lost some support even in his own party. Some Republicans criticized the President for grasping too much authority; others charged that he was not fully committed to ending slavery. Democrats, fractured into several factions, finally nominated George McClellan, the popular former Union commander. Lincoln's presidency had seemed in jeopardy. However, Union victories boosted his popularity. Many Union soldiers, loyal to Lincoln, were allowed to go home to vote. When the ballots were in, McClellan won 45 percent of the popular vote, but Lincoln received 212 of the 233 electoral votes. The reelection of Abraham Lincoln destroyed any last Confederate hopes that the North would cave in and negotiate a peace.

Why did the number of corporation grow dramatically after 1870

Corporations had access to money and new technology

Lee Is Defeated and Forced to Retreat

As July 2 dawned, Lee's men prepared to assault both ends of the Union line. Lee ordered one force to move against the northern part of Meade's defenses while General Longstreet attacked the southern end of Cemetery Ridge. Late in the afternoon, Longstreet's troops charged against a large body of Union soldiers that had mistakenly abandoned Little Round Top and moved westward off Cemetery Ridge. The two sides hammered at each other for several hours in some of the fiercest fighting of the war. The rebels, however, failed to breach the Union line. Meanwhile, Union troops had noticed the undefended position on Little Round Top. They hurried forward just in time to meet the gray tide of Confederates rushing uphill. Anchoring the Union defense of the hilltop was a Maine unit under Colonel Joshua L. Chamberlain. Chamberlain's men stood firm against numerous Confederate attacks, but their numbers and ammunition eventually dwindled. Chamberlain responded by ordering a bayonet charge that shocked and scattered his exhausted enemy. Hundreds of Confederates surrendered and the fighting drew to a close. Night fell and the Union still held the high ground. Lee was not discouraged. Despite opposition from Longstreet—and believing that victory was still within reach—the Confederate commander attacked one more time. The result was disastrous. In the early afternoon of July 3, Lee commenced an artillery barrage aimed at the center of the Union line. He had hoped his cannon would break up the Union defenses in advance of an infantry attack on Cemetery Ridge. When Lee's men, including a division under General George Pickett, marched toward the ridge, thousands of Confederates were mowed down by Union rifle and cannon fire. After the failure of Pickett's Charge, Lee ordered the general to reposition his division. "General Lee," replied Pickett, "I have no division now." The Battle of Gettysburg was over. On the battlefield lay over 50,000 dead and wounded. About half of these were Confederates—nearly a third of Lee's fighting force. Lee abandoned his invasion of the North and led his limping army back into Virginia. The South had suffered a crushing defeat. It would never again attempt to fight on Union soil.

Effects on Society

As a result of the war, the southern landscape was in shambles. Many Confederate soldiers returned to find their homes and farms destroyed. Millions of dislocated white southerners drifted aimlessly about the South in late 1865. Defeat had shaken them to the very core of their beliefs. Some felt that they were suffering a divine punishment, with one southerner mourning, "Oh, our God! What sins we must have been guilty of that we should be so humiliated by Thee now!" Others, however, came to view the Civil War as a lost, but noble, cause. These white southerners kept the memory of the struggle alive and believed that, eventually, the South would be redeemed. African Americans of the South were equally disoriented. But they also had a new sense of hope. Freedom promised them a new life with new opportunities, including a chance to own land and to control their own lives. Some headed west to take advantage of the Homestead Act. Black southerners eagerly joined the migration that would mark American society for many years. However, as Reconstruction began, most African Americans in the South found that freedom was a promise not fully delivered.

Early Labor Protests

As early as the 1820s, factory workers tried to gain more power against employers by using the technique of collective bargaining, or negotiating as a group for higher wages or better working conditions. One form of collective bargaining was the strike, in which workers agreed to cease work until certain demands were met. Some strikes were local, but often they involved workers in a whole industry across a state, a region, or the country. The first national labor union was founded in 1834 as the National Trades Union, open to workers from all trades. It lasted only a few years, and no new unions formed in the wake of the depressions of the late 1830s. However, local strikes succeeded in reducing the factory workday in some regions. The 10-hour workday became the standard in most New England factories. Gradually, national unions began to reappear.

Grant Places Petersburg Under Siege

As he had at Vicksburg, Grant turned to siege tactics. Throughout the summer and fall and into the winter, his forces tightened their grip around Petersburg. Both sides dug trenches and threw up fortifications to guard against attack. By March 1865, the two opposing lines of defense stretched for more than 30 miles around Petersburg. Fighting was fierce. Union troops suffered more than 40,000 casualties. The Confederates lost 28,000 men. However, unlike Grant, Lee had no replacement troops in reserve. As the siege of Petersburg wore on, Union strength grew in comparison to the Confederate defenders.

Families in the Workforce

As industrialization advanced, more jobs opened up for women. They worked as laundresses, telegraph operators, and typists. But most women—and their families—worked in the factories. Since low wages meant that both parents needed jobs, bringing children to work kept them off the streets and close to their parents. It also meant that the children could earn a wage, which helped the family to survive. By the end of the 1800s, nearly one in five children between the ages of 10 and 16 worked rather than attending school. Conditions were especially harsh for these children. Many suffered stunted physical and mental growth. By the 1890s, social workers began to lobby to get children out of factories and into child care or schools. Eventually, their efforts prompted states to pass legislation to stop child labor.

Railroaders Open the West

As industry in the West grew, the need for a railroad to transport goods increased as well. The idea of a transcontinental railroad, a rail link between the East and the West, was not new. Arguments over the route it should take, however, had delayed implementation. While the Civil War kept the South out of the running, Congress finally took action.

Technology and Transportation

As railroads expanded, they made use of new technologies and also encouraged innovation. George Westinghouse patented air brakes for trains in 1869, while Granville Woods patented a telegraph system for trains in 1887. Meatpacker Gustavus Swift developed refrigerated cars for transporting food. By 1883, there were three transcontinental railroad lines in the United States. The expanding transportation network caused some problems. Throughout most of the 1800s, most towns set their clocks independently. When trains started regular passenger service between towns, time differences made it hard to set schedules. In 1884, delegates from 27 countries divided the globe into 24 time zones, one for each hour of the day. The railroads adopted this system, which is still used today. Technology affected how Americans traveled and where they lived. Electric streetcars, commuter trains, and subways appeared in major cities. As a result, Americans living in neighborhoods outside the city could commute to work. Factory production of automobiles with gas-powered engines began in 1902. The first successful airplane flight in 1903 by brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright, two bicycle manufacturers, marked the birth of a new industry.

New Industries Spread Through the South

Before the Civil War, the South had shipped its raw materials—including cotton, wood, and iron ore—abroad or to the North for processing into finished goods. In the 1880s, northern money backed textile factories in western North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, as well as cigar and lumber production, especially in North Carolina and Virginia. Investment in coal-, iron-, and steel-processing created urban centers in Nashville, Tennessee, and Birmingham, Alabama. During this time, farming also became somewhat more diversified, with an increase in grain, tobacco, and fruit crops. Even the landscape of farming changed as smaller farms replaced large plantations.

Northern Support Evaporates

As the 1860s ended, voters and politicians outside the South increasingly turned their attention to other pressing issues—reforming politics and the economy, among other things. Also, the continued cost of military operations in the South worried many. Gradually and quietly, beginning in 1871, troops were withdrawn from the South. In 1872, the Freedmen's Bureau was dissolved. The death of Radical Republican leader Charles Sumner in 1874 also symbolized an important transition. A generation of white reformers, forged by abolitionist fervor and anxious to carry that passion into the national politics of Reconstruction, had passed away. Without such leaders to temper it, northern racial prejudice reemerged.

Peace Plans Fail

As the Plains Indians renewed their efforts to hold onto what they had, the federal government announced plans to build a road through Sioux hunting grounds to connect gold-mining towns in Montana. Hostilities intensified. In 1866, the legendary warrior Red Cloud and his followers lured Captain William Fetterman and his troops into an ambush, killing them all. The human costs of the struggle drew a public outcry and called the government's Indian policy into question. As reformers and humanitarians promoted education for Indians, westerners sought strict controls over them. The government-appointed United States Indian Peace Commission concluded that lasting peace would come only if Native Americans settled on farms and adapted to the civilization of the whites. In an effort to pacify the Sioux and to gain more land, the government signed the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. The government agreed not to build the road through Sioux territory and to abandon three forts. The Sioux and others who signed the treaty agreed to live on a reservation with support from the federal government. An agent appointed by the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs was responsible for distributing land and adequate supplies to anyone willing to farm as well as for maintaining peaceful relations between the reservation and its neighbors. A school and other communal buildings were also promised by the treaty. As often happened, some Indians could not live within the imposed restrictions and many drifted away from the reservations to resume hunting. Unfortunately, many Indian agents were unscrupulous and stole funds and resources that were supposed to be distributed to the Indians. Even the most well-meaning agents often lacked support from the federal government or the military to enforce the terms of the treaties that were beneficial to Native Americans.

Where did John Wilkes Booth shoot Abraham Lincoln

At Ford's Theatre

Union General William Tecumseh Sherman burned which southern city to the ground

Atlanta, Georgia

What was the last major battle between white Americans and the Indians

Battle at Wounded Knee

Which Civil War battle decisively turned the tide of the war in favor of the Union

Battle of Gettysburg

Why did the 1890 census say that the United States no longer had a frontier

Because every square mile in the United States had white residents

Effects on African Americans

Before the Civil War, no African American in the South, and only a small number in the North, had the right to vote. Few black southerners owned land. Most worked others' land, without pay, and without hope of improving their lot. Reconstruction changed these things. By 1877, a few southern black Americans owned their own farms. That number would grow slowly through the next decades. Before the Civil War, most southern African Americans worked—involuntarily—in agriculture. Reconstruction began to give them choices. Perhaps most importantly, the Freedmen's Bureau helped reunite freed slaves with their families and promoted literacy within African American communities. Though it fell short of its ambitious goals, Reconstruction opened new vistas for black Americans, North and South. It was a major post-Reconstruction achievement that Robert Smalls, a former slave, was elected five times to the U.S. House of Representatives. The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments provided hope for full inclusion in American society, though it would take later generations to use them to gain racial equality.

Which individual led the Knights of Labor and encouraged the use of boycotts and negotiation to end the bondage of wage labor

Terence Powderly

Which example best illustrates the positive effect of railroads on settlement in the West

Between 1864 and 1896, ten western territories became states

Congress Fights Back

Both Radical and moderate Republicans were infuriated by the South's disregard of the spirit of Reconstruction. When the southern representatives arrived in Washington, D.C., Congress refused them their seats. Congress also created a committee to investigate the treatment of former slaves. Through the spring of 1866, the political situation grew worse. While the Radicals claimed that federal intervention was needed to advance African American political and civil rights, President Johnson accused them of trying "to Africanize the southern half of our country." When Congress passed a bill to allow the Freedmen's Bureau to continue its work and provide it with authority to punish state officials who failed to extend civil rights to African Americans, Johnson vetoed it. Undaunted, Congress sought to overturn the black codes by passing the Civil Rights Act of 1866. This measure created federal guarantees of civil rights and superseded any state laws that limited them. But once again, Johnson used his veto power to block the law. Johnson was now openly defying Congress.

How did a cartel control prices

Businesses agreed to limit production

Horizontal and Vertical Integration

Businessmen continued to develop ever more effective ways to increase profits and decrease costs. One way was to create a giant company with lower production costs. This system of consolidating many firms in the same business is called horizontal integration. Rockefeller was one of the first businessmen to use this method. However, Ohio state law prevented one company from owning the stock of another, meaning that Rockefeller could not buy out his competitors. His lawyer had an idea to get around this law, called a trust. In a trust, companies assign their stock to a board of trustees, who combine them into a new organization. The trustees run the organization, paying themselves dividends on profits Rockefeller, steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie, and other businessmen also increased their power by gaining control of the many different businesses that make up all phases of a product's development. This process, called vertical integration, allowed companies to reduce costs and charge higher prices to competitors..

How did laissez-faire polices help businesses grow

By allowing them to operate freely

How did vertical integration allow a business to reduce costs

By controlling the business at each phase of a product's development

How does a monopoly increase a corporation's profits

By eliminating competition to control prices

How did capitalism fuel industrialization

By encouraging entrepreneurs to establish businesses

How could Northern men avoid being drafted into military service

By paying for a replacement

What action did Congress take in response to concerns about the effects of mechanization and industrialization on the environment

Congress set aside protected land

Linking World Markets

By the 1880s, American exports of grain, steel, and textiles dominated international markets. With almost as many miles of railroad track as the rest of the world combined, the United States could easily transport goods from where they were made or grown to ports where they could be shipped around the world. Exports of food and goods greatly expanded the American economy. As the United States grew as a world economic power, it often clashed with the economic views and political policies of other countries.

Who were the carpetbaggers

Carpetbaggers were northerners who came to the South for opportunities to help African Americans

Which of the following describes an agreement among businesses making the same product to limit production and keep prices high

Cartel

The Cow Towns

Cattle drives concluded in such railroad towns as Dodge City, Kansas, where the cattle were sold and the cowboys were paid. These cow towns gave rise to stories about colorful characters such as Wild Bill Hickok, Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp, and Jesse James. They were also the site of rodeos, competitions based on the cowboys' skills of riding, roping, and wrestling cattle. Bill Pickett, an African American cowboy, is credited with inventing bulldogging, in which a cowboy leaps from his horse onto a steer's horns and wrestles the steer to the ground.

What made working conditions on the Central Pacific Railroad especially dangerous

Central Pacific workers had to blast through mountain ranges to lay track

What was the outcome of the Battle of Little Big Horn

Chief Crazy Horse and 2,000 Indians killed Colonel Custer and all of his men

Who led a group of Indians on a 1,300-mile journey to Canada?

Chief Joseph Chief Joseph led the Nez Percés on a journey to evade U.S. troops who had come to relocate the tribe. The group did not make it to Canada and were banished to a reservation in Oklahoma.

Which institution most helped African American society after the Civil War

Churches

Political and Economic Gains

Citizenship afforded black southerners the right to vote in local and federal elections, and for a few black people it provided the means to serve their country in government or in the military. Some African Americans opened urban businesses or bought farmland. In developing the Farmers' Alliances, white leaders in some places invited black farmers to join, reasoning that the alliance would be stronger if all farmers took part. In this way, the Farmers' Alliances offered a glimpse of the political possibilities of interracial cooperation. Perhaps the most important gain for southern African Americans, however, was access to education. Hundreds of basic-literacy schools and dozens of teachers' colleges, supported by the federal government or by northern philanthropists, enabled African Americans to learn to read and write.

Time zones were adopted to fix what problem

Conflicting train schedules

What significant event showed the conflict that existed between President Andrew Johnson and Congress

Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866 over the President's veto

Gaining a Competitive Edge

Corporations worked to maximize profits in several ways. They decreased the cost of producing goods or services by paying workers the lowest possible wages or paying as little as they could for raw materials. They tried to increase profits by advertising their products widely, thus increasing their potential customer base. Like J. P. Morgan, the heads of some corporations supported research laboratories where inventors could experiment with products and methods that might bring the corporations future profits. Others thought up new ways to make money. Cornelius Vanderbilt, a self-made businessman in the railroad industry, got his start in the steamboat business. He cleverly succeeded in getting his competitors to pay him to relocate because his low fares were driving them out of business. Some corporations tried to gain a monopoly, or complete control of a product or service. To do this, a corporation either bought out its competitors or drove them out of business. Once consumers had no other choices for a given product or service, the sole remaining company was free to set its own prices. Other corporations worked to eliminate competition with other businesses by forming a cartel. In this arrangement, businesses making the same product agree to limit their production and thus keep prices high. Still other corporations came up with new methods. John D. Rockefeller, an oil tycoon, made deals with railroads to increase his profits: "[Rockefeller's company] killed its rivals, in brief, by getting the great trunk lines to refuse to give them transportation. Vanderbilt is reported to have said that there was but one man—Rockefeller—who could dictate to him." —H. D. Lloyd, The Atlantic, 1881

Cotton Dominates Agriculture

Cotton remained the centerpiece of the southern agricultural economy. Although at the end of the Civil War cotton production had dropped to about one third of its prewar levels, by the late 1880s, it had rebounded. However, during the war, many European textile factories had found suppliers outside the South, and the price of cotton had fallen. Now, the South's abundance of cotton simply depressed the price further. Dependence on one major crop was extremely risky. In the case of southern cotton, it was the boll weevil that heralded disaster. The boll weevil, a beetle which could destroy an entire crop of cotton, appeared in Texas in the early 1890s. Over the next decade, the yield from cotton cultivation in some states dropped by more than 50 percent. By 1900, cotton's appeal and its problems dominated the southern economy, much as they had before the Civil War.

What mistake by Colonel George Custer led to his defeat by chiefs Sitting bull and Crazy horse at the Battle of Little Big Horn

Custer and his force arrived ahead of the main US force

How did Eugene V. Debs's conviction following the Pullman Strike affect the labor movement

Debs's conviction reinforced federal authority to halt strikes

Southern Economic Recovery Is Limited

Despite these changes, the southern economy continued to lag behind the rest of the country. While the North was able to build on its strong industrial base, the South first had to repair the damages of war. Moreover, industry rests on a three-legged stool: natural resources, labor, and capital investment. The South had plenty of the first but not enough of the second and third. Sustained economic development requires workers who are well trained and productive as well as consumers who can spend. Public education in the South was limited. In fact, the South spent less than any other part of the country on education, and it lacked the technical and engineering schools that could have trained the people needed by industry. At the same time, low wages discouraged skilled workers from coming to the South, and the lure of higher wages or better conditions elsewhere siphoned off southern workers. Additionally, very few southern banks had survived the war, and those that were functioning had fewer assets than their northern competitors. Most of the South's wealth was concentrated in the hands of a few people. Poor tenant farmers and low-paid factory workers did not have cash to deposit. With few strong banks, southern financiers were often dependent on northern banks to start or expand businesses or farms. The southern economy suffered from this lack of labor and capital.

Which problem was felt especially strongly by soldiers from border states

Divided family loyalties

Which factors contributed to the end of open-range cattle ranching in the mid-1880s

Drop in beef p`rices and the invention of barbed wire

How did economic growth in the South compare to economic growth in the rest of the country

Economic growth lagged behind because they had to repair damage from the war

What was the legacy of the Haymarket Riot among employers

Employers grew more suspicious of labor unions

Which principle best summarizes Lincoln's Gettysburg Address

Equality of all people

Which of the following caused serious conflict among different groups of people in the West

Ethnic and economic tensions

Systems For Sharing the Land

Even large land owners had no money to purchase supplies or pay workers. As a result, many southerners adopted one of three arrangements: sharecropping, share-tenancy, or tenant-farming. The first two of these systems could be carried out without cash. Under the sharecropping system, which embraced most of the South's black and white poor, a landowner dictated the crop and provided the sharecropper with a place to live, as well as seeds and tools, in return for a "share" of the harvested crop. The landowner often bought these supplies on credit, at very high interest, from a supplier. The landlord passed on these costs to the sharecropper. Hence, sharecroppers were perpetually in debt to the landowner, and the landowner was always in debt to the supplier. One problem with this system was that most landlords, remembering the huge profits from prewar cotton, chose to invest in this crop again. Dishonest landowners could lie about the cost of supplies devaluing the sharecropper's harvest that now amounted to less than the season's expenses. Thus the sharecropper could never move, because he always owed the owner the labor for next year's crop. Share-tenancy was much like sharecropping, except that the farmworker chose what crop he would plant and bought his own supplies. Then, he gave a share of the crop to the landowner. In this system, the farmworker had a bit more control over the cost of supplies. Therefore, he might be able to grow a variety of crops or use some of the land to grow food for his family. With these choices, it became more possible to save money.

Who were the Exodusters

Exodusters were African Americans who moved to the Plains from the South

Farmers Band Together

Faced with serious difficulties, Texas farmers in the 1870s began to organize and to negotiate as a group for lower prices for supplies. The idea spread. Local organizations linked together in what became known as the Farmers' Alliance. These organizations soon connected farmers not only in the South but also in the West. Farmers' Alliance members tried to convince the government to force railroads to lower freight prices so members could get their crops to markets outside the South at reduced rates. Because of regularly rising rates, the Alliances also wanted the government to regulate the interest that banks could charge for loans.

How did farming change in the South after the Civil War

Farmers diversified their crops

Government Policies Encourage Free Enterprise

Government policies encouraged the success of businesses in the late 1800s. For example, the government gave railroad builders millions of acres of land in return for their promise to quickly link the East and West coasts. To encourage the buying of American goods, Congress enacted protective tariffs, or taxes that would make imported goods cost more than those made locally. The government also encouraged laissez-faire policies, which allowed businesses to operate under minimal government regulation. Such policies, along with a strong legal system that enforced private property rights, provided the predictability and security that businesses and industries needed to encourage investment and growth.

Chief Joseph and the Nez Percés

Farther west, in Idaho, another powerful drama played out. In 1877, the federal government decided to move the Nez Percés to a smaller reservation to make room for white settlers. Many of the Nez Percés were Christians and had settled down and become successful horse and cattle breeders. They had pride in themselves and a great deal to lose. Trying to evade U.S. troops who had come to enforce their relocation, the Nez Percés's leader, Chief Joseph, led a group of refugees on a trek of more than 1,300 miles to Canada. Stopped just short of the border, Chief Joseph surrendered with deeply felt words: "I will fight no more forever." Banished with his group to a barren reservation in Oklahoma, he traveled twice to Washington, D.C., to lobby for mercy for his people.

Radical Reconstruction Begins

Feeling their strength in Congress, a coalition of Radical and moderate Republicans spent nearly a year designing a sweeping Reconstruction program. To protect freedmen's rights from presidential vetoes, southern state legislatures, and federal court decisions, Congress passed the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. It guaranteed equality under the law for all citizens. Under the amendment, any state that refused to allow black people to vote would risk losing the number of seats in the House of Representatives that were represented by its black population. The measure also counteracted the President's pardons by barring leading Confederate officials from holding federal or state offices. Congress again passed legislation over Johnson's veto with the ratification of the Military Reconstruction Act of 1867. The act divided the 10 southern states that had yet to be readmitted into the Union into five military districts governed by former Union generals. The act also delineated how each state could create their new state government and receive congressional recognition. In each state, voters were to elect delegates to write a new constitution that guaranteed suffrage for African American men. Then, once the state ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, it could reenter the Union.

The Government Imposes Regulations

Finally, in 1887, the United States Senate created the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to oversee railroad operations. This was the first federal body ever set up to monitor American business operations. The ICC could only monitor railroads that crossed state lines, and it could not make laws or control the railroads' transactions. Still, the ICC could require the railroads to send their records to Congress, so that Congress could initiate investigations of unfairness. Over the next several decades, the government would set up many other federal bodies to regulate American businesses. Similarly, the federal government slowly became involved in regulating trusts. In 1890, the Senate passed the Sherman Antitrust Act, which outlawed any trust that operated "in restraint of trade or commerce among the several states." For more than a decade, the provision was seldom enforced. In fact, the law was often used in the corporations' favor, as they argued that labor unions restrained trade. However, the ICC and the Sherman Antitrust Act began a trend toward federal limitations on corporations' power.

How did Andrew Carnegie use vertical integration to increase his power

He gained control of the business performing each phase of a product's development

Work and Family

For the first time, many African American men and women could legalize and celebrate their marriages, create homes for their families, and make choices about where they would reside (though these choices were restricted by black codes limiting what work they might do). Life presented new problems and opportunities. "I stayed on [the plantation] 'cause I didn't have no place to go. . . . Den I starts to feeling like I ain't treated right. So one night I just put that new dress in a bundle and set foot right down the big road, a-walking west!" —Mary Lindsey, age 19 Many African Americans headed for southern cities, where they could develop churches, schools, and other social institutions. They also hoped to find work. Skilled men might find work as carpenters, blacksmiths, cooks, or house servants; women took in laundry, or did child care or domestic work. However, most often, black workers had to settle for what they had had under slavery: substandard housing and poor food, in return for hard labor. The majority of African American families remained in rural areas. There, they labored in such occupations as lumbering, railroad building, or farming land for landowners—white or black—who themselves were often poor.

Schools and Churches

Freed people immediately realized the intrinsic value of learning to read and perform basic arithmetic. Only in this way could they vote wisely and protect themselves from being cheated. So the Freedmen's Bureau schools filled quickly. By 1866, there were as many as 150,000 African American students—adults and children—acquiring basic literacy. Three years later, that number had doubled. Tuition amounted to 10 percent of a laborer's wage, but attendance at Freedmen's schools represented a firm commitment to education. In addition to establishing its own schools, the Freedmen's Bureau aided black colleges. It also encouraged the many northern churches and charitable organizations that sent teachers, books, and supplies to support independent schools. Mostly these schools taught the basics of reading, writing, and math, but they also taught life skills such as health and nutrition, or how to look for a job. The black church was an important component of Reconstruction education. Under slavery, slave owners sometimes allowed their slaves to hold their own religious services. Now, with freedom, black churches were established throughout the South and often served as school sites, community centers, employment agencies, and political rallying points. By providing an arena for organizing, public speaking, and group planning, churches helped develop African American leaders. A considerable number of African American politicians began their careers as ministers.

Prejudices and Discrimination

From the 1850s onward, the West had the widest diversity of people in the nation. With fewer than 20 percent of the nation's total population, it was home to more than 80 percent of the nation's Asian, Mexican and Mexican American, and Native American residents. Chinese immigrants alone accounted for 100,000 immigrants, almost all of them in the West. Ethnic tensions often lurked beneath the surface. Many foreign-born white people sought their fortunes on the American frontier, especially in the years following the mid-century revolutions in Europe. Their multiple languages joined the mix of several dozen Native American language groups. Differences in food, religion, and cultural practices reinforced each group's fear and distrust of the others. But mostly it was in the larger cities or towns that discrimination was openly displayed. Chinese immigrants, Mexicans, and Mexican Americans were most often its targets. Conflict came in many guises. For example, ranchers often belittled homesteaders, labeling them "sodbusters" to mock their work in the soil and their modest houses. Conflict also arose because the view of the ownership of natural resources varied. For many generations, Mexicans had mined salt from the salt beds of the El Paso valley. Mexicans viewed these areas as public property, open to all. However, when Americans arrived in the 1870s, they laid claim to the salt beds and aimed to sell the salt for profit. In 1877, in what became known as the El Paso Salt War, Americans and Mexicans clashed over access to this crucial commodity. When the battles ended, the salt beds were no longer communal property. Now, users would have to buy this natural product.\

Mining Towns Spring Up

From the Sierra Nevada to the Black Hills, there was a similar pattern and tempo to the development of mining regions. First came the discovery of gold or silver. Then, as word spread, people began to pour into an area that was ill prepared for their arrival. The discovery of gold at Pikes Peak in Colorado and the Carson River valley in Nevada are classic examples. Mining camps sprang up quickly to house the thousands of people who flooded the region. They were followed by more substantial communities. Miners dreamed of finding riches quickly and easily. Others saw an opportunity to make their fortune by supplying the needs of miners for food, clothing, and supplies. The rough-and-tumble environment of these communities called out for order. To limit violence and administer justice in areas without judges or jails, miners set up rules of conduct and procedures for settling disputes. In extreme situations, self-appointed law enforcers known as vigilantes punished lawbreakers. As towns developed, they hired marshals and sheriffs, like Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson, to keep the peace. Churches set up committees to address social problems. Some mining towns—like Leadville, Colorado, and Nevada City, Montana—were "boomtowns." They thrived only as long as the gold and silver held out. Even if a town had developed churches and schools, it might become a ghost town, abandoned when the precious metal disappeared. In contrast, Denver, Colorado; Boise, Idaho; and Helena, Montana, were among the cities that diversified and grew.

Rebellion and Tragedy on the Plains

Generally ignored was the fact that Native Americans inhabited half of the area of the United States. Indians fought to retain or regain whatever they could. In 1862, while the Civil War raged in the East, a group of Sioux Indians had resisted threats to their land rights by attacking settlements in eastern Minnesota. In response, the government waged a full-scale war against the Sioux, who then were pushed west into the Dakotas. The Sioux rebellion sparked a series of attacks on settlements and stagecoach lines as other Plains Indians also saw their way of life slipping away. Each battle took its toll, raising the level of distrust on all sides. In the fall of 1864, a band of Colorado militia came upon an unarmed camp of Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians, who were under U.S. Army protection, gathered at Sand Creek. The troops opened fire, killing many men, women, and children despite the Indians' efforts to signal their friendship by raising the American flag. Praise turned to scorn for the commanding officer, John Chivington, when the facts of the encounter became known. The Sand Creek Massacre spawned another round of warfare as Plains Indians joined forces to repel white settlement. Once the Civil War ended, regiments of Union troops—both white and African American—were sent to the West to subdue the Indians. Recruitment posters for volunteer cavalry promised that soldiers could claim any "horses or other plunder" taken from the Indians. The federal government defended its decision to send troops as necessary to maintain order.

Diverse Cultures

Geography influenced the cultural diversity of Native Americans. In the Pacific Northwest, the Klamaths, Chinooks, and Shastas benefited from abundant supplies of fish and forest animals. Farther south, smaller bands of hunter-gatherers struggled to exist on diets of small game, insects, berries, acorns, and roots. In the arid lands of New Mexico and Arizona, the Pueblos irrigated the land to grow corn, beans, and squash. They built adobe homes high in the cliffs to protect themselves from aggressive neighbors. The more mobile Navajos lived in homes made of mud or in hogans that could be moved easily. The most numerous and nomadic Native Americans were the Plains Indians, including the Sioux, Blackfeet, Crows, Cheyenne, and Comanches. The Plains Indians were expert horsemen and hunters. The millions of buffalo that roamed the Plains provided a rich source for lodging, clothing, food, and tools. Indian cultures, however, shared a common thread—they saw themselves as part of nature and viewed nature as sacred. By contrast, many white people viewed the land as a resource to produce wealth. These differing views sowed the seeds of conflict.

Which Southern industries used raw materials from the South after the Civil War

Textiles and lumber

"Robber Barons" or "Captains of Industry"?

Gradually, consumers, workers, and the federal government came to feel that systems like trusts, cartels, and monopolies gave powerful businessmen an unfair advantage. Most small businesses were bought up or squeezed out of competition. Small businesses that joined trusts found that they received few profits. Consumers were harmed by the unfairly high prices that monopolies and cartels set on their products. Because of their capacity to swindle the poor, shrewd capitalists became known as "robber barons. At the same time, many people believed that business leaders served the nation positively, thus earning the nickname "captains of industry." Factories, steel mills, and railroads provided jobs for an ever-growing labor force. The development of efficient business practices and industrialists' support for developing technology benefited the nation's economy, stimulating innovation and shaping the United States into a strong international leader. Furthermore, many business leaders, like Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Vanderbilt, were important philanthropists. They established universities, museums, and libraries, believing that such institutions made it possible for the disadvantaged to rise to wealth.

How did Terence V. Powderly change the Knights of Labor

He abandoned the secretive nature of the union

Which of the following characterizes General William Tecumseh Sherman's march across Georgia

He destroyed everything in his path

For what is Confederate General George Pickett remembered at the Battle of Gettysburg

He directed a disastrous charge on a ridge defended by Union cannons

How did Mathew Brady contribute to the legacy of the Civil War

He used photography to help people see the harsh realities of war

Why did Robert E. Lee invade Pennsylvania and engage the Union army at Gettysburg

He wanted to demoralize the Union

Why did Abraham Lincoln react to the Copperheads by suspending the right of habeas corpus

He wanted to jail people who opposed his polices

What did people who followed the ideals of socialism in the 1800s believe about wealth

That all people should share equally in society's wealth

What role did the Pinkertons play in the Homestead Strike

The Pinkertons were a private police force called in to break the strike

What did Chief Joseph do for his people after they were all relocated to a reservation in Oklahoma

He went to Washington, D.C., to ask for help

How did the death of Charles Sumner affect the Reconstruction effort

His death weakened the reform effort

How were homesteaders' lives affected by the fact that the plains were largely treeless

They had to build homes with materials other than wood

Why were immigrants often hired to work in sweatshops

Immigrants would work for low wages in unsafe conditions

Revolutionizing Communications

In 1844, inventor Samuel Morse perfected telegraph technology, or the process of sending messages over wire. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone. Within a few years, 148 telephone companies had strung more than 34,000 miles of wire, and long-distance lines linked several cities in the Northeast and Midwest. By 1900, there were more than one million telephones in the United States, and more than 100,000 miles of telegraph wire linked users across the land. In 1896, Guglielmo Marconi invented the wireless telegraph. Future inventors would build on this innovation in developing the radio.

Social Darwinism Catches On

In 1859, biologist Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species, arguing that animals evolved by a process of "natural selection" and that only the fittest survived to reproduce. Yale professor William Graham Sumner soon applied this theory to the rough-and-tumble world of American capitalism, calling it Social Darwinism. He declared that wealth was a measure of one's inherent value and those who had it were the most "fit." People used Social Darwinism to justify all sorts of beliefs and conditions. Supporters of the laissez-faire economic system argued that the government should stay out of private business, because interference would disrupt natural selection. Many Social Darwinists believed that the nation would grow strong by allowing its most vigorous members to rise to the top. Therefore, they felt that it was wrong to use public funds to assist the poor. Social Darwinism was often used to fuel discrimination. Social Darwinists pointed to the poverty-stricken condition of many minorities as evidence of their unfitness.

Capitalism Encourages Entrepreneurs

In 1868, Horatio Alger published his first novel, Ragged Dick, or Street Life in New York. This wildly successful novel told the story of a poor boy who rose to wealth and fame by working hard. Alger's novels stressed the possibility that anyone could vault from poverty and obscurity to wealth and fame. In this excerpt, he describes how Ragged Dick starts his climb to success. "Ten dollars a week was to him a fortune. . . . Indeed, he would have been glad, only the day before, to get a place at three dollars a week. . . . Then he was to be advanced if he deserved it. It was indeed a bright prospect for a boy who, only a year before, could neither read nor write. . . . Dick's great ambition to "grow up 'spectable" seemed likely to be accomplished after all." —Horatio Alger, 1868 The "rags to riches" idea depended on the system of capitalism, or free enterprise, in which individuals own most businesses. The heroes of this system were entrepreneurs, or people who invest money in a product or enterprise in order to make a profit. Entrepreneurs fueled industrialization. The factories, railroads, and mines they established created jobs and also attracted foreign investment.

The Fifteenth Amendment Extends Suffrage

In 1868, the Republican candidate, former Union general Ulysses S. Grant, was elected President. Although he won the electoral vote by a huge margin and had a significant lead in the popular vote, his opponent, Horatio Seymour, a Democrat from New York, received a majority of the white vote. Republican leaders now had another reason for securing a constitutional amendment that would guarantee black suffrage throughout the nation. In 1869, Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment forbidding any state from denying suffrage on the grounds of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. Unlike previous measures, this guarantee applied to northern states as well as southern states. Both the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments were ratified by 1870, but both contained loopholes that left room for evasion. States could still impose voting restrictions based on literacy or property qualifications, which in effect would exclude most African Americans. Soon the southern states would do just that.

Founding the Knights of Labor

In 1869, Uriah Smith Stephens founded a labor union called the Knights of Labor. Stephens, a tailor who had lived and worked around the country, included all workers of any trade, skilled or unskilled, in his union. The Knights also actively recruited African Americans. Under Stephens, the union functioned largely as a secret society, devoted to broad social reform such as replacing capitalism with workers' cooperatives. The Preamble to the Knights' Constitution, written in 1878, read: "The recent alarming development and aggression of aggregated wealth, which, unless checked, will inevitably lead to the pauperization and hopeless degradation of the toiling masses, render it imperative, if we desire to enjoy the blessings of life, that a check should be placed upon its power . . . and a system adopted which will secure to the laborer the fruits of his toil. . . ." —The Preamble to the Knights' Constitution, 1878 In 1881, Terence V. Powderly took on the leadership of the Knights. The son of Irish immigrants, Powderly had worked in a menial job on the railroad before rising to become mayor of Scranton, Pennsylvania, in the 1870s. He continued to pursue ideological reforms meant to lead workers out of the bondage of wage labor. He encouraged boycotts and negotiation with employers, but he abandoned the secretive nature of the union. By 1885, the Knights had grown to include some 700,000 men and women nationwide, of every race and ethnicity. By the 1890s, however, after a series of failed strikes, the Knights had largely disappeared.

Congress Passes the Dawes Act

In 1871, Congress had passed a law stating that "no Indian nation or tribe within the United States would be recognized as an independent nation, tribe or power with whom the United States may contract by treaty." Indians were now to be treated as individuals. Partly in response to reformers like La Flesche and Jackson and partly to accelerate the process of assimilation, Congress passed the Dawes General Allotment Act (sometimes known as the Dawes Severalty Act) in 1887. The Dawes Act replaced the reservation system with an allotment system. Each Indian family was granted a 160-acre farmstead. The size of the farm was based on the eastern experience of how much land was needed to support a family. In the arid West, however, the allotment was not big enough. To protect the new Indian owners from unscrupulous speculators, the Dawes Act specified that the land could not be sold or transferred from its original family for 25 years. Congress hoped that by the end of that time, younger Indians would embrace farming and individual landownership. To further speed assimilation, missionaries and other reformers established boarding schools, to which Indian parents were encouraged to send their children. Indian children were to learn to live by the rules and culture of white America. The struggle to retain their homeland, freedom, and culture proved tragic. Although Native Americans faced their enemy with courage and determination, tens of thousands died in battle or on squalid reservations. Only a small number were left to carry on their legacy.

Electricity Transforms Life

In 1876, inventor Thomas Edison, supported by wealthy industrialists like J. P. Morgan, established a research laboratory at Menlo Park, New Jersey. Edison, a creative genius who had had only a few months of formal education, would receive more than 1,000 patents for new inventions. In 1880, for example, with the goal of developing affordable lighting for homes, Edison and his team invented the light bulb. Within a few years, they had also developed plans for central power plants to light entire sections of cities. Other inventors later improved upon Edison's work. George Westinghouse, for example, developed technology to send electricity over long distances. Electricity lit city streets and powered homes and factories, extending the number of hours in the day when Americans could work and play.

How did the Freedmen's Bureau help African Americans economically

They provided schools to educate workers

Forming the AFL

In 1886, Samuel Gompers formed the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Gompers was a poor English immigrant who had worked his way up to head the local cigarmakers' union in New York. While the Knights of Labor were made up of all workers, the AFL was a craft union, a loose organization of skilled workers from some 100 local unions devoted to specific crafts or trades. These local unions retained their individuality but gained strength in bargaining through their affiliation with the AFL. Gompers set high dues for membership in the AFL, pooling the money to create a strike and pension fund to assist workers in need. Unlike the Knights of Labor, the AFL did not aim for larger social gains for workers. Instead, it focused on very specific workers' issues such as wages, working hours, and working conditions. The AFL also pressed for workplaces in which only union members could be hired. Because of its narrow focus on workers' issues, the AFL was often called a "bread and butter" union. The AFL was not as successful as the Knights in gaining membership, partly because of its own policies. It opposed women members, because Gompers believed their presence in the workplace would drive wages down. While it was theoretically open to African Americans, local branches usually found ways to exclude them.

Workers Strike Against Pullman

In 1893, the Pullman Palace Car Company, which produced luxury railroad cars, laid off workers and reduced wages by 25 percent. Inventor George Pullman, who owned the company, required workers to live in the company town near Chicago and controlled their rents and the prices of goods. In May of 1894, workers sent a delegation to negotiate with Pullman. He responded by firing three workers and shutting down the plant. Desperate, the workers turned to the American Railway Union (A.R.U.), led by Eugene V. Debs. Debs had begun work in a low-level railroad job while still a teenager, working his way up. He had condemned the railroad strike of 1877, which he said was a result of disorganization and corruption within the unions. Debs organized the A.R.U. as an industrial union, grouping all railroad workers together rather than separating them by the job they held. He believed that industrial unions allowed groups to exert united pressure on employers. The A.R.U. called for a nationwide strike. By June of 1894, nearly 300,000 railworkers had walked off their jobs. The Pullman Strike escalated, halting both railroad traffic and mail delivery. Railroad owners cited the Sherman Antitrust Act in its argument that the union was illegally disrupting free trade. On July 4, President Grover Cleveland sent in federal troops, ending the strike. When he refused the government's order to end the strike, Debs was imprisoned for conspiring against interstate commerce. Though Debs appealed the conviction, claiming that the government had no authority to halt the strike, the Supreme Court upheld it in the case In re Debs in 1895.

Steel: A Practical Wonder

In the 1850s in England, a man named Henry Bessemer developed a process for purifying iron, resulting in strong, but lightweight, steel. American industries quickly adopted the Bessemer process, and by 1890 the United States was outproducing British steel manufacturers. Strong steel made possible a host of innovations, including skyscrapers and the elevators to service them. However, one of its most dramatic uses was in the construction of suspension bridges, bridges in which the roadway is suspended by steel cables. The first suspension bridge was the Brooklyn Bridge, spanning the East River in New York City. Completed in 1883, it was at the time of its construction the longest bridge in the world.

Lincoln Honors the Dead

In November 1863, Lincoln came to the Gettysburg battlefield to dedicate a cemetery for the fallen soldiers. There, he delivered his Gettysburg Address. He described the Civil War as a struggle to fulfill the Declaration of Independence and to preserve a nation "dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." Today, the speech is recognized as an enduring statement of American values and goals. The President concluded his speech by urging: "[W]e here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." —Abraham Lincoln, November 19, 1863

Socialism Spreads

In the 1830s, a movement called socialism spread throughout Europe. Socialism is an economic and political philosophy that favors public, instead of private, control of property and income. Socialists believe that society at large, not just private individuals, should take charge of a nation's wealth. That wealth, they argue, should be distributed equally to everyone. In 1848, the German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels expanded on the ideas of socialism in a treatise titled Communist Manifesto. This pamphlet denounced capitalism and predicted that workers would overturn it. Most Americans rejected these ideas, believing that they threatened the American ideals of free enterprise, private property, and individual liberty. The wealthy in particular opposed socialism because it threatened their fortunes. But many labor activists borrowed ideas from socialism to support their goals for social reform.

What influence did the proposed Thirteenth Amendment have on peace talks between the Union and the Confederacy

It ended the possibility of a negotiated peace because it would outlaw slavery

How did the federal government regulate the railroads?

It established the Interstate Commerce Commission. The federal government regulated railroad operations through the Interstate Commerce Commission, which could require railroads to submit their records for investigation.

Where was the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, located

In Union territory

How did John D. Rockefeller use trusts to avoid Ohio laws against horizontal integration

In a trust, a board of trustees controls the stock of several companies

Effects on Government and Politics

In many ways, the Civil War eased the history of disunity in American political life. While sectional differences remained strong, never again would such differences trigger threats of secession. Instead, over time, the economic, political, and social life of the nation's disparate regions would increasingly intertwine. Debates over states' rights did not end with the Civil War. Still, the war helped cement federal authority. The government had fought a war to assert that individual states did not have the power to break the national bond forged by the Constitution. Increasingly, the federal government would come to play a larger role in Americans' lives. And more Americans would see themselves as citizens not just of a state but of a united nation.

Which of the following was a major failure of Reconstruction

It failed to end the bitterness between the North and the South

Factory Work

In the 1880s and 1890s, factory owners, seeking to maximize profits, employed people who would work for low wages. Immigrants made up a large percentage of the workforce. Far from home, lacking good English-speaking skills, and often very poor, immigrants would generally take almost any job. Factory workers toiled long hours—12 hours a day, 6 days a week—in small, hot, dark, and dirty workhouses known as sweatshops. These sweatshops employed thousands of people, mainly women, who worked for long hours on machines making mass-produced items. Owners ensured productivity by strictly regulating workers' days. Owners clocked work and break hours, and they fined workers for breaking rules or working slowly. Factory work was often dangerous. Workspaces were poorly lit, often overheated, and badly ventilated. Some workers lost their hearing from the noisy machines. Accidents were common, both from faulty equipment and lack of proper training. Despite the harsh conditions, employers suffered no shortage of labor. There were always more people than jobs.

Thinking About the Environment

In the early 1800s, few worried about how industry might affect the environment. However, by the late 1800s, industrial waste had risen dramatically and mining had begun to destroy the land. In the Midwest, increasing agricultural production had led to soil erosion and dust storms. People began to raise concerns about protecting natural resources. Congress responded by setting aside protected lands that would eventually become part of the National Park Service. Its creation of Yellowstone Park in 1872 was one of the first federal responses to concerns about the environment.

Threatened by Advancing Settlers

In the early 1800s, the government carried out a policy of moving Native Americans out of the way of white settlers. President Jackson moved the Cherokees off their land in Georgia and onto the Great Plains. To white settlers, Native Americans were welcome to this "Great American Desert," so called as it was thought to be uninhabitable. To limit conflict, an 1834 law regulated trade relations with Indians and strictly limited the access of white people to this Indian Territory. White settlement generally paused at the eastern rim of the territory and resumed in the Far West. By the 1850s, however, federal policy toward Native Americans was challenged by new circumstances: Gold and silver had been discovered in Indian Territory as well as settled regions further west. Americans wanted a railroad that crossed the continent, and railroad owners, newspapers, and even some scientists were promoting the idea that "rain followed the plow"—a belief that if one farmed in arid areas, the rains would come. In 1851, therefore, the federal government began to restrict Indians to smaller areas. By the late 1860s, Indians were forced onto separate reservations, specific areas set aside by the government for the Indians' use. No longer free to roam the Plains, Indians faced suppression and poverty. Two more staggering blows threatened Native American civilizations: White settlers introduced diseases to which Indians had no immunity, and the vitally important buffalo herds were destroyed. In the 1870s, hunters slaughtered hundreds of buffaloes in a single day. They skinned the animals for their hides and left the meat to rot. Trainloads of tourists came to kill buffaloes purely for sport, leaving behind both the valuable meat and hides

Why was the Fifteenth Amendment viewed as both a success and a failure

It gave African American men the right to vote, but ignored the rights of women

How did the Dawes Act replace the reservation system

It gave each Indian family 160 acres of land

Steelworkers Strike at Homestead

In the summer of 1892, a Carnegie Steel plant in Homestead, Pennsylvania, cut workers' wages. The union immediately called a strike. Andrew Carnegie's partner, Henry Frick, responded by bringing in the Pinkertons, a private police force known for their ability to break up strikes. The Pinkertons killed several strikers and wounded many others in a standoff that lasted some two weeks. Then, on July 23, an anarchist who had joined the protesters tried to assassinate Frick. The union had not backed his plan, but the public associated the two. Recognizing that public opinion was turning against unions, the union called off the strike in November. The Homestead Strike was part of an epidemic of steelworkers' and miners' strikes that took place as economic depression spread across America. In each case, troops and local militia were called in to suppress the unrest.

How did policymakers hope the policy of assimilation would work

Indians would blend into white culture after the buffalo died out

What advantage was the Confederacy missing that might have turned the war in its favor

International support

What key political decision made by Abraham Lincoln helped change the nature of the war in the Union's favor

Issuing the Emancipation Proclamation

How did mass production contribute to the rapid economic growth of the late 1800s

It allowed large numbers of goods to be produced quickly and inexpensively

How did Abraham Lincoln's reelection affect the South

It destroyed Confederate hope for negotiated peace

What was the significance of the presidential election of 1876

It ended Reconstruction because it led to the Compromise of 1877

What was a result of the Dawes General Allotment Act of 1887

It granted 160-acre farmsteads to Indian families

How did the federal government change after the Civil War

It more directly influenced the everyday lives of Americans

What did the government do to reduce violence against African Americans after the Civil War

It passed the Enforcement Acts

How did the federal government react to racial violence?

It passed the Enforcement Acts. The federal government passed the Enforcement Acts that made it illegal to interfere with a citizen's right to vote. Congress also held hearings inviting people to describe the troubling situation in the South.

How were small businesses in trusts treated unfairly

They received few profits

What was the significance of the Interstate Commerce Commission

It was the first government body to monitor business operations

Battle of the Little Big Horn

It was the lure of gold, not animal hides, that led to the defeat of the Indians on the northern Plains. The Black Hills Gold Rush of 1875 drew prospectors onto Sioux hunting grounds in the Dakotas and neighboring Montana. When the Sioux, led by chiefs Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, assembled to drive them out, the U.S. Army sent its own troops against the Native Americans. In June 1876, a colonel named George Custer rushed ahead of the other columns of the U.S. cavalry and arrived a day ahead of the main force. Near the Little Bighorn River, in present-day Montana, Custer and his force of about 250 men unexpectedly came upon a group of at least 2,000 Indians. Crazy Horse led the charge at what became known as the Battle of the Little Big Horn, killing Custer and all of his men. Cries for revenge motivated army forces to track down the Indians. Sitting Bull and a small group of followers escaped to Canada. Crazy Horse and his followers surrendered, beaten by weather and starvation. By then, the will and the means to wage major resistance had been crushed.

How did the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments change the Constitution

The Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments granted citizenship to all and voting right to African American males

Which action taken by President Andrew Johnson triggered his impeachment trial

Johnson ignored the Tenure of Office Act

What event finally caused Congress to move to impeach Andrew Johnson

Johnson ignored the provisions of the Tenure of Office Act

What labor union recruited a range of workers and focused on broad social reform?

Knights of Labor The Knights of Labor included both skilled and unskilled workers and was devoted to broad social reform.

What is one factor that limited industial expansion in the South

Lack of an educated work force

What issue brought mining companies and farmers into conflict

Lack of clean water

After the war, what was the South's most valuable asset

Land

Union Troops Engage Lee at Gettysburg

Lee's invasion caused great concern throughout the Union. The Army of the Potomac, now under the leadership of General George Meade, set out to engage the Confederates. Meanwhile, a Confederate unit headed for the town of Gettysburg, hoping to seize footwear from the shoe factory there. On the morning of July 1, Lee's men ran into several brigades of Union cavalry commanded by General John Buford. Buford's men spread out northwest of town and called for reinforcements. This was the start of the decisive Battle of Gettysburg, which would last for the next three days. As the main bodies of both armies converged on Gettysburg, the first day of the fighting went to the Confederates. They pushed the smaller Union force back through the town and onto higher ground to the south. But nightfall halted the Confederate advance. This allowed General Meade to bring up the rest of his army and strengthen the Union position. Union troops dug in along a two-and-a-half mile defense line stretching from Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill southward along Cemetery Ridge. The Federal line ended at two more rocky hills, Little Round Top and Big Round Top. Troubled that the Union now held the high ground, Confederate General James Longstreet regretted, "It would have been better had we not fought at all than to have left undone what we did.

What event marked the end of the Confederacy's hopes in the Civil War?

Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House Although Lee's surrender did not officially end the war, it did mark the end of the Confederacy's hope to govern the South.

Johnson Seeks to Restore the Union

Like Lincoln, Johnson wanted to restore the political status of the southern states as quickly as possible. He offered pardons and the restoration of land to almost any Confederate who swore allegiance to the Union and the Constitution. His main requirement was that each state ratify the Thirteenth Amendment and draft a constitution that abolished slavery. However, Johnson resented wealthy planters and required that they and other Confederate leaders write to him personally to apply for a pardon. Johnson's dislike of the planter class did not translate into a desire to elevate African Americans. Like many southerners, Johnson expected the United States to have a "government for white men." He did not want African Americans to have the vote. In fact, he had little sympathy for their plight. Johnson supported states' rights, which would allow the laws and customs of the state to outweigh federal regulations. States would, therefore, be able to limit the freedoms of former slaves. By the time Congress reconvened in December 1865, most Confederate states had met Johnson's requirements for readmission. Radical and moderate Republicans were concerned about the lack of African American suffrage, but they remained hopeful that black political rights would soon follow.

What resource issue caused problems between miners, ranchers, and farmers in the West

Limited water supply

Which is the best example of a laissez-faire economic policy that helps businesses make profits

Limiting regulations on the steel industry

Grant Marches Toward Richmond

Lincoln recalled General Grant from the Mississippi Valley in early 1864 to take charge of the entire Union military effort. The President knew that Grant would accept nothing less than victory. He was correct. Grant set his sites on the Confederate capital of Richmond. "I propose to fight it out," he declared, "if it takes all summer." Grant's campaign did last all summer and for months beyond. He engaged Lee's army in a series of ferocious battles: the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, and Cold Harbor. Grant's strategy was to inflict more losses on the Confederates than their limited resources could withstand. The cost of Grant's relentless advance was horrifying. Tens of thousands of Union and Confederate soldiers fell on the battlefields of Virginia. In the North, public outrage began to grow. Grant's attack did not target the South's military forces alone. He was following a strategy of total war, which involves striking civilian as well as military targets. The purpose of total war is to weaken not just an enemy's armies but also the economy that supports them and the overall will of the people to fight. The South was suffering serious losses that it could not hope to replace.

What part of the Radical Republicans' Reconstruction plan was supported by President Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln supported the creation of a government agency to assist war refugees

Johnson's Reconstruction Plan

Lincoln was assassinated in April 1865, just weeks after his second inaugural. Lincoln's death thrust his Vice President, Andrew Johnson, into the presidency.

Vaqueros and Texas Longhorns

Long before the arrival of eastern settlers in the West, Mexicans in Texas had developed an efficient system for raising livestock. The Texas longhorn, which originated in Mexico, roamed freely and foraged for its own feed. Each owner marked—or "branded"—the cattle so they could be identified. Under this open-range system, property was not fenced in. Though ranchers claimed ownership and knew the boundaries of their property, cattle from any ranch grazed freely across those boundaries. When spring came, the ranchers would hire cowboys to comb thousands of acres of open range, "rounding up" cattle that had roamed all winter. The culture of the cowboy owed its very existence to the Mexican vaqueros who had learned to train horses to work with cattle and had developed the roping skills, saddle, lariat, and chaps needed to do the job.

How did low wages contribute to the rise in child labor

Low wages meant that all family members needed to work to survive

What was one thing the Farmers' Alliance worked for

Lower interest on bank loans

How did the Homestead Act of 1862 pull settlers to the Plains

The Homestead Act offered 160 acre farm plots for no cost

Living in Company Towns

Many laborers, especially those who worked in mines, were forced to live in isolated communities near their workplaces. The housing in these communities, known as company towns, was owned by the business and rented out to employees. The employer also controlled the "company store," where workers were forced to buy goods. The company store sold goods on credit but charged high interest. As a result, by the time the worker received wages, most of the income was owed back to the employer. Since workers could be arrested if they left their jobs before they repaid these loans, employers could hold workers to their jobs through a system that workers' advocates called "wage slavery." Through its management of the company town, employers could also reinforce ethnic competition and distrust. For example, Mexican, African American, or Chinese workers could be segregated in separate towns.

Remaking the Southern Economy

Many of the South's problems resulted from the uneven distribution of land. As an agricultural region, the South's wealth was defined by landownership. Yet, in 1860, the wealthiest 5 percent of white southerners owned almost half the region's land. Relatively few people held the rest of the land. In fact, more than 90 percent of southern land was owned by only 50 percent of the people. This meant that even before the war, the South had a large number of white citizens with little or no land. After the war, the millions of landless southern white people were competing with millions of landless black people for work as farm laborers on the land of others. The plan developed by General Sherman and the Radical Republicans to give or sell land to freed people did not provide a solution. Congress had no interest in Thaddeus Stevens's radical suggestion that large plantations be confiscated from once-wealthy planters and redistributed to freedmen. A few African American men, however, were able to gather together the means to buy land. By 1880, about 7 percent of the South's land was owned by African Americans.

White Backlash Begins

Many realities of southern black lives did not change much, however. Some white southerners focused their own frustrations on trying to reverse the gains African Americans had achieved during Reconstruction. Groups such as the Ku Klux Klan used terror and violence to intimidate African Americans. Meanwhile, many African American freedoms were whittled away. Churches that were once integrated became segregated. New laws supported the elimination of black government officials. With Congress's enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1875, they guaranteed black patrons the right to ride trains and use public facilities such as hotels. However, in a series of civil rights' cases decided in 1883, the Supreme Court ruled that decisions about who could use public accommodations was a local issue, to be governed by state or local laws. Southern municipalities took advantage of this ruling to further limit the rights of African Americans.

Changing American Society

Massive changes in industry altered how Americans lived and worked. Even farms became mechanized, meaning that fewer farm laborers were needed to feed the nation. Out-of-work farmers and their families moved to urban areas to find work, especially in the increasingly industrial North. Many moved to manufacturing centers that had sprung up around growing factories or industries. The mass production of goods meant that these new urban dwellers had easy access to clothing and supplies that they would have had to make by hand in the past. Yet they faced higher costs of living, were dependent upon cash wages to buy food, and performed repetitive work in factories.

Radicals Oppose the Ten Percent Plan

Members of Lincoln's own party opposed his plan. Led by Representative Thaddeus Stevens and Senator Charles Sumner, these "Radical Republicans" in Congress insisted that the Confederates had committed crimes—by enslaving African Americans and by entangling the nation in war. The Radical Republicans advocated full citizenship, including the right to vote, for African Americans. They favored punishment and harsh terms for the South, and they supported Sherman's plan to confiscate Confederates' land and give farms to freedmen. Rejecting Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan, Congress passed the Wade-Davis Bill in 1864. It required that a majority of a state's prewar voters swear loyalty to the Union before the process of restoration could begin. The bill also demanded guarantees of African American equality. President Lincoln killed this plan with a "pocket veto" by withholding his signature beyond the 10-day deadline at the end of the congressional session.

What effect did the development of mechanized farming have on American society

More people moved from farming areas to cities

Which was one belief shared by all Native American culture

Native Americans were part of the natural world and that world was sacred

What was one cause of the nation's growth

Natural resources

What was the outcome of Andrew Johnson's impeachment proceedings

The House impeached the President, but the Senate failed to remove him

Lincoln Is Assassinated

On April 14, just days after Lee's surrender, Lincoln decided to relax by attending a new comedy, Our American Cousin, at nearby Ford's Theatre. During the performance, actor and Confederate supporter John Wilkes Booth approached the President's private box. Booth fired a single shot into the back of Lincoln's head. Leaping to the stage, he was heard to call out "Sic semper tyrannis!" ("Thus ever to tyrants," the motto of Virginia) and "the South is avenged." Mortally wounded, Lincoln died the next morning. Booth became the target of a massive manhunt. After several days, he was shot and killed while hiding in a barn in Virginia. Soon, it was discovered that Booth had been part of a plot to kill not only Lincoln, but also the Vice President and the Secretary of State. The plotters hoped to cause chaos and panic in the North, thereby giving the South time to regroup and continue the war. Although Secretary of State William Seward was attacked and seriously injured by one of Booth's accomplices, Booth was the only man to carry out his part of the plot. Four of his accomplices were later hanged as coconspirators. Lincoln's tragic death had a deep political impact. His murder united his northern supporters and critics, who now saw him as both a hero and a symbol of freedom. Gone was the strong, skilled leader who had guided the nation through its greatest crisis. As you will read in the next chapter, his presence would be greatly missed in the difficult days ahead.

Violence Erupts in Haymarket Square

On May 1, 1886, thousands of workers mounted a national demonstration for an eight-hour workday. Strikes erupted in several cities, and fights broke out between strikers and strikebreakers. Conflict then escalated between strikers and police who were brought in to halt the violence. On May 4, protesters gathered at Haymarket Square in Chicago. The diverse crowd included anarchists, or radicals opposed to all government. A frenzy broke out when a protester threw a bomb, killing a policemen. Dozens of people, both protesters and policemen, were killed. Eight anarchists were tried for murder, and four were executed. The governor of Illinois, deciding that evidence for the convictions had been scanty, pardoned three of the others. The fourth had already committed suicide in jail. The Haymarket Riot left an unfortunate legacy. The Knights of Labor fizzled out as people shied away from radicalism. Employers became even more suspicious of union activities, associating them with violence. In general, much of the American public at that time came to share that view.

Cowboys and Cattle Drives

Once cows were rounded up, cowboys began the long cattle drive to take the animals to a railroad that would transport them to eastern markets. The trek from Texas, Colorado, or Montana to the nearest junction on the transcontinental railroad could take weeks or even months. The cowboys' work was hard, dangerous, low-paying, and lonely—often involving months of chasing cattle over the countryside. A band of cowboys often included a mix of white, Mexican, and African American men.

Government Aids Freedmen

One Radical Republican plan did receive the President's support. This was the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, known as the Freedmen's Bureau. Created a few weeks before Lincoln's death, its goal was to provide food, clothing, healthcare, and education for both black and white refugees in the South. The Freedmen's Bureau helped reunite families that had been separated by slavery and war. It negotiated fair labor contracts between former slaves and white landowners. By representing African Americans in the courts, the Bureau also established a precedent that black citizens had legal rights. The Freedmen's Bureau continued its efforts until 1872.

Effects on Women's Suffrage Movement

One of the ironies of Reconstruction is that it gave the vote to black American men, while fragmenting the women's movement that had often been supportive of black freedom. In the debate over the Fifteenth Amendment, there was disagreement about whether it should also include a clause giving women the right to vote. Some felt the Fifteenth Amendment could not get ratified if it included women's suffrage. Those who agreed with this position formed the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA) in 1869. Others, like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, believed that women and African Americans should get the vote immediately. They formed the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA). This group scored its first victory in 1869, when the Wyoming Territory became the first political unit to extend the vote to women. Both the NWSA and the AWSA included some black women. However, a further division occurred when a group of black women split off to form the Colored Women's Progressive Franchise association in 1880.

Which plan of the Radical Republican did President Abraham Lincoln support

One that provided for basic needs of the war refugees

The End of Open-Range Ranching

Open-range ranching flourished for more than a decade after the Civil War. During that time, several million cattle were driven from Texas north to the railroad stops in Wyoming, Nebraska, and Kansas. But by the mid-1880s, however, the heyday of open-ranching came to an end

How did the open-range system of cattle ranching work

Owners branded cattle that roamed freely, and then cowboys rounded them up

Why was there a need for Reconstruction of the South

Parts of the South lay in ruins

How did patents help support the work of inventors such as Thomas Edison

Patents protected inventors and let them profit from their inventions

What power did the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) have over railroad operations

The ICC could make railroads submit their records to Congress

What was an important advantage of corporations

They reduced financial risk for individual investors

What was the conclusion of the United States Indian Peace Commission

Peace would come if Native Americans settled on farms and adapted to white civilization

How did business leaders earn the nickname "robber barons"

People accused them of using unfair business practices

Why did mining camps spring up quickly after the discovery of gold or silver

People flooded camps, hoping to become wealthy quickly

Which of the following is an economic reason that the South needed a Reconstruction plan

Plantations, factories, and other businesses were destroyed during the war

Where was the first major battle for African American troops in the Union army

Port Hudson, Mississippi

How did public opinion of labor issues change in response to the violence of the Homestead Strike

Public opinion turned against all labor unions

The Federal Government Responds

Racial violence grew even more widespread, in the North as well as in the South, after the Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed all American men the right to vote. In Arkansas, Republican legislators were murdered. In New Orleans, riots broke out. One freed woman from South Carolina reported that the Klan killed her husband, a sharecropper on the land of one Mr. Jones. The widow explained that Klan members were incensed because Mr. Jones had had "poor white folks on the land, and he [evicted them], and put all these blacks on the premises." The United States Congress took action, passing Enforcement Acts (also known as Ku Klux Klan Acts) in 1870 and 1871. The acts made it a federal offense to interfere with a citizen's right to vote. Congress also held hearings inviting black politicians and other observers to describe the situation in the South. George Ruby of Texas told how he had been dragged into the woods and beaten because he had opened a school in Louisiana. Emanuel Fortune, one of Florida's political organizers, reported that his "life was in danger at all times" because he was "a leading man in politics." Racial violence at the polls was not limited to the South. In the 1870 election in Philadelphia, a company of marines was sent in to protect African American voters. When no such protection was supplied for the 1871 elections, an African American teacher, Octavius Catto, was killed in antiblack political riots. At a protest meeting that followed, one African American Philadelphian spoke out: "The Ku Klux of the South are not by any means the lower classes of society. The same may be said of the Ku Klux of the North. . . . Let no man think that we ask for people's pity or commiseration. What we do ask is fairness and equal opportunities in the battle of life." —Isaiah Wears, 1871 Congress used the Ku Klux Klan Acts to indict hundreds of Klansmen throughout the South. After 1872, on account of the federal government's readiness to use legal action, there was a decline in violence against Republicans and African Americans. The hatred may have been contained, but it was far from extinguished. Smoldering beneath the surface, it would flare up in the coming decades.

In the "New South," how were rural areas joined to urban hubs

Railroad lines

The development of what industry was most responsible for advances in mass production

Railroads

A Spiral of Growth

Railroads played a key role in transforming American industries and businesses. They could transport large amounts of goods quickly, cheaply, and efficiently. Because they linked the nation, they allowed businesses to obtain raw materials easily and to sell finished goods to larger numbers of people. They encouraged new methods for management and administration, which were soon adopted by the business community. In addition, the expanding railroad network stimulated innovation in many other industries. An abundance of natural resources and an efficient transportation system to carry raw materials and finished goods set up a spiral of related growth. For example, factories turned out plate glass for windows of passenger rail cars. The factories needed freight cars to carry the windows to their destinations. Those freight cars were created in factories that used railroads to transport fuel to supply the furnaces that turned out more railroad cars. In this way, factory production generated more factory production. To meet the growing demand, factory owners developed systems for turning out large numbers of products quickly and inexpensively. Known as mass production, these systems depended upon machinery to carry out tasks that were once done with hand tools.

How did the South's use of raw materials change after the war

Raw materials were used by new southern industries

Which group had the goal of the South regaining power in Congress

Redeemers

What group focused on finding common issues that would unite white southerners around the goal of regaining power in Congress?

Redeemers The Redeemers aimed to "redeem" the South in the eyes of Congress and reclaim the South from northern domination.

How did the Compromise of 1877 help end Reconstruction

Republican Rutherford B. Hayes was elected President in return for withdrawing federal troops from the South

How did Republicans gain control of southern state governments during Reconstruction

Republicans sought the support of African American men

Which Confederate military leader actually opposed slavery and secession and turned down an offer to command Union forces

Robert E. Lee

The End of Open-Range Ranching

Several factors contributed to the demise of the open range. The invention of barbed wire made it possible to fence in huge tracts of land on the treeless plains. The supply of beef exceeded demand, and the price of beef dropped sharply. Added to these factors was a period of extreme weather in the 1880s—brutally freezing winters followed by summer droughts. As springs dried up, herds of cattle starved. The nature of cattle ranching changed as ranchers began to raise hay to feed their stock, and farmers and sheepherders settled on what had been open range.

Lee Surrenders to Grant

Several weeks later, the Confederates made a desperate attempt to break the siege of Petersburg. They failed. Recognizing that the situation was hopeless, Lee ordered a retreat from Petersburg on the night of April 2. Richmond, now defenseless, was evacuated and set aflame. Lee's one hope was to join with Confederate forces in North Carolina. Setting out on the march, the men suffered from a lack of food and constant harassment by Union forces. Finally, Lee and his starving, exhausted soldiers were trapped at the town of Appomattox Court House, Virginia. On April 9, Lee formally surrendered to Grant. The Union general refused to allow his troops to gloat. "The war is over," he said, "the rebels are our countrymen again." Lee's surrender did not officially end the war. The South still had some 170,000 soldiers under arms, and it took until June for other Confederate generals scattered around the South to complete similar surrenders. In Texas, African Americans celebrated June 19, 1865, as "Juneteenth," the day the news of surrender reached the Southwest.

How did Clara Barton participate in the Civil War

She traveled with Union ambulances to care for wounded soldiers on both sides

Which of the following military strategies allowed the Union to gain control of Vicksburg

Siege

What new advantage did the North acquire during the course of the war

Strong military leadership

How did the production of steel change Americans' lives

Strong steel made it possible to build skyscrapers and suspension bridges

What sparked the Sand Creek Massacre

Sioux attacks on stagecoach lines

Why did some southerners reject William Techumseh Sherman's plan to give land to former slaves

Some southerners felt that confiscating property violated the Constitution

Which of the following limited the economic recovery of the South

Southern banks struggled to support industrial development

Goals of Total War

Strike military and civilian targets Destroy materials and crops that enemy forces might be able to use Destroy railroads and factories to damage the local economy Break the people's will to continue fighting

Southerners Aim to Restore Old Ways

That hope was soon dashed. Beginning with the state conventions required by Johnson, southern leaders proceeded to rebuild their prewar world. Many states specifically limited the vote to white men. Some states sent their Confederate officials to the United States Congress. All of the states instituted black codes—laws that sought to limit the rights of African Americans and keep them as landless workers. The codes required African Americans to work in only a limited number of occupations, most often as servants or farm laborers. Some states prohibited African Americans from owning land, and all set up vagrancy laws. These laws stipulated that any black person who did not have a job could be arrested and sent to work as prison labor. Even though the South remained under Union military occupation, white southerners openly used violence and intimidation to enforce the black codes.

What agreement did the Sioux accept for peace under the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868

That no road would be built through their territory

What did socialists believe

That society at large should control industry and wealth

Lee Wins Two Victories and Pushes North

The Army of the Potomac met General Lee's Army of Northern Virginia at Fredericksburg, Virginia, in December 1862. Burnside had 120,000 troops, while Lee had fewer than 80,000. But Lee, aided by generals Stonewall Jackson and James Longstreet, soundly defeated the new Union commander. Union casualties were more than double those of the Confederacy Lincoln replaced Burnside with General Joseph Hooker, who launched his own offensive against Lee in the spring. The two armies clashed at Chancellorsville, just west of Fredericksburg. Once again, the Confederates overwhelmed the Federals. The loss at the Battle of Chancellorsville was devastating to the Union. Upon hearing the news, President Lincoln paced the room, muttering "What will the country say? What will the country say?" Nevertheless, Lee paid dearly for his victory, losing the incomparable Stonewall Jackson during the fighting. After being accidentally shot by his own men, Jackson died a few days after the battle. Though he was upset by the loss of Jackson, Lee sensed an opportunity to win international support for the Confederacy, demoralize the Union, and perhaps even force an end to the war. Once again, he decided to invade the North. In June 1863, Lee's army set off through Virginia's Shenandoah Valley and crossed into Union territory, eventually reaching Pennsylvania.

How Will the Southern Economy Be Rebuilt?

The Civil War devastated the South's economy. Between 1860 and 1870, the South's share of the nation's total wealth declined from more than 30 percent to 12 percent. The Union army had destroyed factories, plantations, and railroads. Nearly half of the region's livestock and farm machinery were gone. About one fourth of southern white men between the ages of 20 and 40 had died in the war. In addition, more than 3 million newly freed African Americans were now without homes or jobs. After the war, the land was the South's most valuable asset, and arguments raged over who should control it. During Reconstruction, some people proposed using the land to benefit former slaves. General William Tecumseh Sherman proposed that millions of acres abandoned by planters, or confiscated by the federal government, should be given to former slaves. "Forty acres and a mule," he suggested, would be sufficient to support a family. Many northerners thought this might also be a way to restore the South's productivity, reconstruct its economy, and provide employment as well as income for many African Americans. Not everyone agreed. Southern landowners rejected the idea that the government could simply give away their land. Many white northerners worried that confiscating property violated the Constitution. Even some southern African Americans felt that the government should pay white southerners for farmland, and then sell it to former slaves on easy terms.

The War's Lasting Impact

The Civil War ushered in the harsh reality of modern warfare. For the first time, ordinary citizens could see the carnage of the battlefield through the photographs of journalists such as Mathew Brady. His exhibition "The Dead at Antietam" provided graphic evidence of the terrible realities of war.

What was the effect of the action at Glorieta Pass on the Confederacy's attempt to control the American Southwest

The Confederates retreated to Texas and never again threatened Union control of the Southwest

How were the goals of Terence V. Powderly's Knights of Labor different from the goals of Samuel Gompers' American Federation of Labor (AFL)

The Knights advocated broad changes in society, while the AFL focused on specific workers' issues

Red River War

The Red River War, a series of major and minor incidents, led to the final defeat of the powerful southern Plains Indians, including the Kiowas and Comanches. It marked the end of the southern buffalo herds and the opening of the western panhandle of Texas to white settlement. At the heart of the matter was the failure of the United States government to abide by and enforce the terms of the 1867 Treaty of Medicine Lodge. White buffalo hunters were not kept off Indian hunting grounds, food and supplies from the government were not delivered, and white lawlessness was not punished. Hostilities began with an attack by Indians on a group of Texans near the Red River in June 1874. They came to an end in June 1875 after the last Comanche holdouts surrendered to U.S. troops.

What role did the Redeemers play in ending Reconstruction

The Redeemers organized to put white southerners back into power

Scalawags and Carpetbaggers Take Part in Southern Politics

The Republican Party attracted not only black southerners but also others who sought change and challenge. Scalawags, as southern white critics called them, were white men who had been locked out of pre-Civil War politics by their wealthier neighbors. The new Republican Party invited them in. Scalawags found allies in northern white or black men who relocated to the South. These northerners came seeking to improve their economic or political situations, or to help make a better life for freedmen. Many southern white people resented what they felt was the invasion of opportunists, come to make their fortunes from the South's misfortune. Southerners labeled the newcomers "carpetbaggers," after the inexpensive carpet-cloth suitcases often carried by northerners For carpetbaggers, the opportunities in the new South were as abundant as those in the western frontier: new land to be bought, new careers to be shaped. The progress of Blanche K. Bruce presents an example. Born a slave in Virginia, Bruce learned to read from his owner's son. When the war began, Bruce left the plantation and moved to Missouri, where he ran a school for black children for a short time before moving on to Oberlin College in Ohio. In 1866, Bruce—now 25 years old—went south to Mississippi, where he became a prosperous landowner and was elected to several local political positions. In 1874, in his mid-thirties, Bruce was elected to the United States Senate. . Bruce's story highlights several characteristics of the carpetbaggers. First, they were often young. Second, since only the wealthy minority of white southerners were literate, a northerner with even a basic education had a real advantage. Finally, for African Americans, the South was the only place to pursue a political career. Even though the Fifteenth Amendment established suffrage nationally, no black congressman was elected from the North until the twentieth century.

How did the Supreme Court rulings in 1883 work against the Civil Rights Act of 1875

The Supreme Court rulings said civil rights were decided by state and local law

What Rights Will African Americans Have?

The Thirteenth Amendment freed African Americans from slavery, but it did not grant them the privileges of full citizenship. The former slaves hoped that they would gain voting rights and access to education, benefits that most northern black people also did not have. Most leaders of the Republican Party, which at the time dominated the federal government, supported programs to extend full citizenship to African Americans. However, most white southerners opposed the idea. They feared it would undermine their own power and status in society.

Supreme Court Decisions Impede Equality

The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments guaranteed African Americans' rights. Yet it was left to the courts to interpret how these new amendments would be applied. In a series of landmark cases, the Supreme Court chipped away at African American freedoms in the 1870s. In what became known as the Slaughterhouse Cases (1873), the Court restricted the scope of the Fourteenth Amendment. It concluded that though a citizen had certain national rights, the federal government would have no control over how a state chose to define rights for the citizens who resided there. Three years later, the Supreme Court heard the case of United States v. Cruikshank. This case involved a white mob in Louisiana who had killed a large group of African Americans at a political rally. The Court ruled that the due process and equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment protected citizens only from the action of the state and not from the action of other citizens.

Why did Lee's charge fail?

The Union army was not broken by the artillery barrage. Lee had hoped his cannon would break up the Union defenses. Instead, the Confederates were mowed down by Union rifle and cannon fire.

Which factor helped Abraham Lincoln win reelection in 1864

The Union's military success

Sherman Drives to the Sea

The Union's total-war strategy was also implemented by General William Tecumseh Sherman. In May 1864, he set out from the Tennessee-Georgia border with 60,000 troops on a 250-mile march to capture the port of Savannah, Georgia. During his "March to the Sea," Sherman ordered his men to get supplies by looting along the way, then to destroy anything of potential value left behind. Cutting a 60-mile-wide swath through Georgia, Sherman's army tore up railroad tracks, destroyed buildings, and vandalized hundreds of private homes. With Union forces closing in on Atlanta, Confederate troops abandoned the city. Sherman's men occupied it on September 2 and forced the residents to leave. When the mayor asked Sherman to reconsider his order, the general responded: "You might as well appeal against the thunder-storm as against these terrible hardships of war. They are inevitable, and the only way the people of Atlanta can hope once more to live in peace and quiet at home is to stop the war. . . . We don't want your negroes or your horses or your houses or your lands . . . but we do want, and will have, a just obedience to the laws of the United States. That we will have, and if it involves the destruction of your improvements, we cannot help it." —William T. Sherman, letter to James Calhoun, September 12, 1864 Once Atlanta was emptied, Union troops burned it to the ground. "Sherman the Brute," as southerners called him, continued eastward and captured Savannah in late December.

How did the Civil Rights Act of 1875 change the lives of African Americans

The act allowed African Americans to ride on trains and stay in hotels

What was the purpose of the Enforcement Acts

The acts made it a federal offense to interfere with a citizen's right to vote

How did the close of Reconstruction affect the federal government

The balance of power between federal and state governments was restored

What farming techniques helped farmers adapt to the dry environment in the West

They built windmills and plows

Why did workers in company towns feel that they worked in a system of wage slavery

They could not leave their jobs until their debts were paid to the company

Which statement best describes the Republicans most enduring success during Reconstruction

They created a tax-supported public school system

Natural Resources Fuel Growth

The country's growth was fueled, in part, by its vast supply of natural resources. Numerous coal mines along the eastern seaboard provided fuel to power steam locomotives and factories. Thick forests across the country were cut into lumber for construction. The nation's many navigable riverways transported these and other resources to cities and factories. Then, in 1859, Edwin Drake drilled what became the world's first oil well in Titusville, Pennsylvania. Before Drake's invention, oil, which was used for light and fuel, was mainly obtained from boiling down whale blubber. But whale hunting was time-consuming, and whales were becoming scarce. Drilled oil was relatively cheap to produce and easy to transport. The oil industry grew quickly after 1859 and encouraged the growth of related industries such as kerosene and gasoline.

What outcome of Reconstruction caused change in the women's movement

The debate over the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment

Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address at what event

The dedication of a cemetery

What problem was the 1884 system of time zones meant to solve

The difficulty of setting railroad schedules over long distances

Railroads Intensify Settlement

The effects of the railroads were far reaching. They tied the nation together, moved products and people, and spurred industrial development. The railroads also stimulated the growth of towns and cities. Speculators vied for land in places where a new railroad might be built, and towns already in existence petitioned to become a stop on the western rail route. Railroads intensified the demand for Indians' land and brought white settlers who overwhelmed Mexican American communities in the Southwest. There was no turning back the tide as waves of pioneers moved west. The addition of states to the Union exemplifies the West's growth. Requirements for statehood included a population of at least 60,000 inhabitants. Between 1864 and 1896, ten territories met those requirements and became states.

Why Did Reconstruction End?

The end of Reconstruction did not come suddenly. However, ever since the Radical Republicans failed to convict President Johnson, their power and crusading zeal had faded.

Large Companies Make Mining Big Business

The first western mining was done by individuals, who extracted the minerals from the surface soil or a streambed. By the 1870s, the remaining mineral wealth was located deep underground. Big companies with the capital to buy mining equipment took over the industry. Machines drilled deep mine shafts. Tracks lined miles of underground tunnels. Crews—often recruited from Mexico and China—worked in dangerous conditions underground. The arrival of the big mining companies highlighted an issue that would relentlessly plague the West: water and its uses. Large-scale mining required lots of water pumped under high pressure to help separate the precious metals from silt. As the silt washed down the mountains, it fouled water being used by farmers and their livestock. Despite these concerns, the federal government continued to support large mining companies by providing inexpensive land and approving patents for new inventions. Mining wealth helped fuel the nation's industrial development.

Which outcome of Reconstruction most likely appealed to both southern blacks and whites

The introduction of a tax-supported school system

Closing of the Frontier

The last major land rush took place in 1889 when the federal government opened the Oklahoma Territory to homesteaders. On April 22, thousands of "boomers" gathered along the border. When the signal was given, they charged in to stake their claims. However, they found that much of the best land had already been taken by "sooners," who had sneaked into the territory and staked their claims before the official opening. The following year, the 1890 national census concluded that there was no longer a square mile of the United States that did not have at least a few white residents. The country, the report said, no longer had a "frontier," which at the time was considered an uninhabited wilderness where no white person lived. The era of free western land had come to an end. However, the challenges and tensions were far from over. Controversies over Indians' land rights were still to come. So, too, were more battles over water and over the mistreatment of minority citizens—especially the Chinese and the Mexican Americans. One historian has described Mexican Americans as "foreigners in their own land." And as the number of African Americans increased in the West, they, too, would battle discrimination.

Challenges Demand Solutions

The life of homesteaders was hard. Windstorms, blizzards, droughts, plagues of locusts, and heart-rending loneliness tested their endurance. On the treeless plains, few new arrivals could afford to buy lumber to build a home. Instead, they cut 3-foot sections of sod and stacked them like bricks, leaving space for a door and one window. The resulting home was dark, dirty, and dingy. Necessity is the mother of invention, and farmers on the Plains had many needs beyond housing. The development of barbed wire, a length of wire with twisted barbs, enabled a farmer to fence land cheaply to keep out wandering livestock. The development of a plow that could tackle the sod-covered land, the grain drill that opened furrows and planted seed, the windmill that tapped underground water, and dry-farming techniques were some of the innovations that enabled farmers to succeed. To spur development of better ways to farm, Congress passed the Morrill Act in 1862, which granted land to states for the purpose of establishing agricultural colleges. Nothing, however, prepared farmers for a series of blizzards and droughts in the 1880s and 1890s that killed animals and ruined harvests. Some of the discouraged and ill-prepared settlers headed back east. The farmers who remained became more commercial and depended more on scientific farming methods.

How did members of the Ku Klux Klan try to intimidate African Americans

The members used violence against African Americans

How did Eugene V. Debs organize the workers of the American Railway Union

The members worked in the same industry

The Ku Klux Klan Strikes Back

The more progress African Americans made, the more hostile white southerners became as they tried to keep freedmen in a subservient role. During Reconstruction, dozens of loosely organized groups of white southerners emerged to terrorize African Americans. The best known of these was the Ku Klux Klan, formed in Tennessee in 1866. Klan members roamed the countryside, especially at night, burning homes, schools, and churches, and beating, maiming, or killing African Americans and their white allies. Dressed in white robes and hoods, mounted on horses with hooves thundering through the woods, these gangs aimed to scare freed people away from voting. The Klan took special aim at the symbols of black freedom: African American teachers and schools, churches and ministers, politicians, and anyone—white or black—who encouraged black people to vote. Unfortunately, often their tactics succeeded. In many rural counties, African American voters were too intimidated to go out to the polls.

Tenant Farmers

The most independent arrangement for both farmer and landowner was a system known as tenant farming. In this case, the tenant paid cash rent to a landowner and then was free to choose and manage his own crop—and free to choose where he would live. This system was only viable for a farmer who had good money-management skills—and some good luck.

Effects on the Labor Movement

The outcome of the Pullman Strike set an important trend. Employers appealed frequently for court orders against unions, citing legislation like the Sherman Antitrust Act. The federal government regularly approved these appeals, denying unions recognition as legally protected organizations and limiting union gains for more than 30 years. As the twentieth century opened, industrialists, workers, and government agencies lashed out at one another over numerous labor issues. Contract negotiations, strikes, and legislation would become the way of life for American industry. In the decades after Pullman, the labor movement split into different factions, some increasingly influenced by socialism. By the end of the 1800s, Debs had become a Socialist. He helped organize the American Socialist Party in 1897, running for President in 1900. In 1905, he helped found the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), or Wobblies. The IWW was a radical union of unskilled workers with many Socialists among its leaders. In the first few decades of the 1900s, the IWW led a number of strikes, many of them violent.

Congress Impeaches the President

The power struggle between Congress and the President reached a crisis in 1867. To limit the President's power, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act. Under its terms, the President needed Senate approval to remove certain officials from office. When Johnson tried to fire Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, the last Radical Republican in his Cabinet, Stanton barricaded himself in his office for about two months. Angrily, the House of Representatives voted to impeach Johnson, that is, to charge him with wrongdoing in office, for trying to fire Stanton. The trial in the Senate lasted through the spring of 1868. In the end, the Radicals failed—by only one vote—to win the two-thirds majority necessary in the Senate to remove Johnson from office. Angrily, the House of Representatives voted to impeach Johnson, that is, to charge him with wrongdoing in office, for trying to fire Stanton. The trial in the Senate lasted through the spring of 1868. In the end, the Radicals failed—by only one vote—to win the two-thirds majority necessary in the Senate to remove Johnson from office.

Economic Panic Leads to Depression

The public's discontent was worsened by economic turmoil and uncertainty. In the fall of 1873, one of the nation's most influential banks failed, apparently as a result of overextended loans to the expanding railroad industry. Suddenly, the southern economy was not the only one in trouble. Across the nation, bank failures, job losses, and the uncertain economy added to the array of concerns that preoccupied northerners. The stamina necessary to keep pressure on the South waned.

Farmers Move to the Plains

The push-and-pull factors that encouraged settlement were varied. Like the miners and cattle ranchers, farmers were looking for a better life. Railroads advertised land for sale, even sending agents to Europe to lure new immigrants, especially from Scandinavia. Other immigrants fled political upheavals in their native lands. Under the Homestead Act, passed in 1862, the government offered farm plots of 160 acres to anyone willing to live on the land for five years, dig a well, and build a road. Some of these new settlers were former slaves who fled the South after the end of Reconstruction. Benjamin Singleton, a black businessman from Tennessee, helped organize a group of African Americans called the "Exodusters." They took their name from the biblical story of Moses leading the exodus of the Jews out of bondage and into a new life in the "Promised Land." The Exodusters' "promised land" was in Kansas and Oklahoma, where they planted crops and founded several enduring all-black towns. Mining, railroad building, and cattle herding were generally male occupations, so much of the western migration was led by men. But women arrived, too. Everyone had a job to do, either tending the family and farm or working as an entrepreneur running a boardinghouse, laundry, or bakery.

After the Civil War, what change was seen in southern agriculture

The replacement of large plantations with smaller farms

What was the relationship between the Farmers' Alliance and African Americans

They encouraged black farmers to join

Economic Rivalries

The various ways that settlers sought to use western land were sometimes at odds with one another. Conflicts between miners, ranchers, sheepherders, and farmers led to violence and acts of sabotage. And no matter who won, Native Americans lost. Grazing cattle ruined farmers' crops, and sheep gnawed grass so close to the ground that cattle could not graze the same land. Although miners did not compete for vast stretches of grassland, runoff from large-scale mining polluted water that ran onto the Plains—and everyone needed water. Early on, geologist John Wesley Powell recognized water as an important but limited resource. He promoted community control and distribution of water for the common good. Despite his efforts, water usage remained largely unregulated to the benefit of some but not all.

What class did the theory of Social Darwinism say had the most social value

The wealthy

How did laissez-faire government policies encourage the growth of American businesses

They allowed businesses to operate with few regulations

How did corporations use the Sherman Antitrust Act to their advantage

They argued that trade unions restrained trade

How did African American churches change life in the South after the Civil War

They became centers of leadership and community

What did moderate and Radical Republicans in Congress do as violence against African Americans in the South increased

They blamed the problem on Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction policies

How did scalawags change government in the South

They brought Republican ideas to southern politics

How did wealthy business leaders benefit society

They built universities and libraries

What is the primary goal of both a monopoly and a cartel

To control competition and keep prices high

What was the main purpose of the Freedman's Bureau

To help black and white war refugees

Why was the Land Grant College Act enacted in 1862

To help states teach agriculture and mechanical arts

What was the main goal of the Farmers' Alliance

To help struggling farmers make a profit

What was the purpose of the Homestead Act

To make western land available for farming at low cost

How Will Southern States Rejoin the Union?

To many Americans, the most important issue was deciding the political fate of Confederate states. Should Confederate leaders be tried for treason, or should they be pardoned so that national healing could proceed as quickly as possible? And what should be the process by which southern representatives could reclaim their seats in Congress The Constitution provided no guidance on secession or readmission of states. It was not clear whether Congress or the President should take the lead in forming Reconstruction policy. Some argued that states should be allowed to rejoin the Union quickly with few conditions. But many claimed that the defeated states should first satisfy certain stipulations, such as swearing loyalty to the federal government and adopting state constitutions that guaranteed freedmen's rights.

What was the purpose of the Thirteenth Amendment

To outlaw slavery

What was the reason behind the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment

To protect the rights of freedmen

The Corporation Develops

To take advantage of expanding markets, investors developed a form of group ownership known as a corporation. In a corporation, a number of people share the ownership of a business. If a corporation experiences economic problems, the investors lose no more than they had originally invested in the business. The corporation was the perfect solution to the challenge of expanding business, especially for risky industries such as railroads or mining. A corporation had the same rights as an individual: it could buy and sell property, and it could sue in the courts. If one person chose to leave the group, the others could buy out his interests. Corporations were perfectly suited to expanding markets. They had access to huge amounts of capital, or invested money, allowing them to fund new technology, enter new industries, or run large plants across the country. Aided by railroads and the telegraph, corporations had the ability to operate in several different regions. After 1870, the number of corporations in America increased dramatically. They were an important part of industrial capitalism, or the economic free-market system centered around industries.

What was the mission of the Ku Klux Klan

To terrorize African Americans

"[We] here highly resolved that these dead shall not have died in vain-that this nation under God, shall have a new birth of freedom-and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." What task does Lincoln ask the people to do in this excerpt

To win the war and keep the Union intact, so those who died at Gettysburg did so for a reason

Why did farmers band together to form the Farmers' Alliance

To work for lower prices on farm supplies

Which factor contributed to the destruction of the southern buffalo herd

Trainloads of tourists killed buffalo purely for sport

Corruption Plagues Grant's Administration

Ulysses S. Grant was a popular war hero but a disappointing President. Allied with the Radical Republicans, he promised to take a strong stand against southern resistance to Reconstruction. But Grant's ability to lead was marred by scandal. He gave high-level advisory posts to untrustworthy friends and acquaintances who used their positions to line their own pockets. His own Vice President, Schuyler Colfax, was investigated and implicated in a scheme to steal profits from the Union Pacific Railroad. A plan by railroad developer and financier Jay Gould to corner the gold market actually included President Grant's brother-in-law. When Grant ran for reelection in 1872, some reform-minded Republicans withdrew their support and teamed up with some Democrats to create the Liberal Republican Party. The Liberal Republicans advocated civil service reform, removal of the army from the South, and an end to corruption in southern and national governments. Grant easily defeated their presidential candidate, the New York Tribune editor, Horace Greeley. Not long after the election, however, Americans sensed the aura of greed surrounding American politics. When scandal swirled around the members of his administration including his private secretary, the Secretary of War, and members of Congress, Grant seemed to look the other way. Even though he had stated, "Let no guilty man escape," he seemed to lack the will to root out this corruption. Confidence in public officials plummeted. Across the nation, local scandals came to light. Many city officials sold lucrative public construction contracts to their friends or diverted money from city accounts. The most notorious of these scandals involved a band of New York City Democratic politicians led by state senator William "Boss" Tweed. The "Tweed Ring," as it came to be known, plundered millions of dollars from the city's treasury. By 1873, when Tweed was convicted and sentenced to prison, the public's confidence in its leaders was at a low ebb.

Building the Transcontinental Railroad

Unlike Europe, where railroads were built and owned by governments, the United States expected its railroads to be built by private enterprise. Congress supported construction of the transcontinental railroad in two ways: It provided money in the form of loans and made land grants, giving builders wide stretches of land, alternating on each side of the track route. Simultaneously in 1863, the Central Pacific started laying track eastward from Sacramento, California, while the Union Pacific headed westward from Omaha, Nebraska. Construction proved to be both difficult and expensive. The human cost of building the railroad was also high. Starved for labor, the Central Pacific Company brought recruits from China and set them to work under harsh contracts and with little regard for their safety. Inch by inch, they chipped and blasted their way through the granite-hard Sierra Nevada and Rockies. Meanwhile, working for the Union Pacific, crews of Irish immigrants crossed the level plains from the East. The two tracks eventually met at Promontory, Utah, in 1869, the same year that the Suez Canal was completed in Egypt. The continent and the world were shrinking in size.

How did the development of large-scale mining affect the environment in the west

Water used in large mines polluted water needed by farmers

What was the basic idea of Social Darwinism

Wealth was a measure of a person's value to society

The Effects on State and Federal Power

What political unit has more power—the federal government or the individual states? In cases of disputes of public policy, which branch of the federal government has the last word? These questions have perplexed American lawmakers since the Constitution's creation. During Reconstruction, they acquired deeper meaning as the federal government asserted its authority not only over southern states but over state laws in other regions as well. In the end, American voters and their representatives in government opted for a balance of power, at the expense of protecting freed people in the South. With the demise of the Radical Republicans, most congressmen concluded that it was better to let the South attend to its own affairs than to leave a whole region under the control of federal military power and federal political control. That choice would have far-reaching social, political, and economic implications.

Grant Fights in Tennessee

While McClellan began to organize his Army of the Potomac, General Ulysses S. Grant pursued the Mississippi Valley wing of the Anaconda Plan. In February 1862, he directed the attack and capture of two Confederate strongholds—Fort Henry on the Tennessee River and Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River. His bold action drove Confederate forces from western Kentucky and much of Tennessee, and boosted northern morale. However, in April, Grant's troops fought a terrible battle in southwest Tennessee. In just two days of fighting, nearly 25,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were killed or wounded. The Battle of Shiloh horrified both the North and South and damaged Grant's rising reputation.

Southern Whites Gain Power

While the Klan intimidated with violence and the courts with legal interpretation, some southern Democrats devised a more subtle strategy for suppressing black rights. They put together a coalition to return the South to the rule of white men. To appeal to small farmers, they emphasized how Republican programs like schools and road-building resulted in higher taxes. They compromised with local Republicans by agreeing to African American suffrage. In return, southern Republicans joined their Democratic neighbors in ostracizing white southerners who supported the Radical Republicans. Playing on the national sensitivity to corruption, the new coalition seized every opportunity to discredit black politicians as being both self-serving and incompetent. These Democrats and Republicans agreed that racial segregation should be the rule of the new South. The main focus of their strategy was compromise: finding common issues that would unite white southerners around the goal of regaining power in Congress. These compromisers have become known as Redeemers, politicians who aimed to repair or "redeem" the South in the eyes of Congress. Sometimes their strategy is described as being designed to "redeem" or reclaim the South from northern domination. In either case, their plan brought some success. By 1870, Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee had reinstated wealthy white southern men as governors, and had sent Confederate leaders back to the United States Congress. Other Confederate states soon followed their lead. In the congressional elections of 1874, the Republicans lost their control over the House of Representatives.

Why were Native Americans moved to smaller and smaller reservations in the 1850s

White settlers discovered gold and silver in land already set aside for Native Americans

Why were Native Americans moved to reservations on the Great Plains in the early 1800s

White settlers viewed this land as unusable and far away

Why the North Won

With hindsight, it is tempting to claim that the Union victory had been certain from the outset, but that is not the case. When the war began, the South had confidence, outstanding military leadership, and a strong determination to defend its land. By contrast, many northerners were far less committed to the fight. But as northerners warmed to the conflict, they were able to marshal their greater technological prowess, larger population, and more abundant resources. Moreover, the Union was able to develop new advantages, particularly brilliant and fearless military leaders, such as Grant and Sherman, who were willing to do everything it took to win the war. Meanwhile, the South used up its resources, unable to call upon fresh troops and supplies. According to historian Richard Current, the Confederacy's inability to gain a European ally and northern military superiority sealed the South's fate: "[I]t seems to have become inevitable once two dangers for the Union had been passed. One of these was the threat of interference from abroad. The other was the possibility of military disaster resulting from the enemy's superior skill or luck on the battlefield. . . . Both dangers appear to have been over by midsummer, 1863. . . . Thereafter, month by month, the resources of the North began increasingly to tell, in what became more and more a war of attrition." —Richard N. Current, in Why the North Won the Civil War The North also enjoyed the steady leadership of President Lincoln. At a time when opinion in the North was bitterly divided, he applied uncommon skill to the difficult task of keeping the nation together. Finally, Lincoln's decision to proclaim emancipation was a fateful step that changed the nature of the war. Lincoln's determination—and the determination of thousands of African Americans in the North and South—sustained northern spirits, even as the war sapped southern resolve.

Lincoln Looks to the Future

With the Confederate position truly desperate, southerners began to talk of peace. In February 1865, a party led by Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens met with Lincoln to discuss a feasible end to the war. However, these discussions produced no results. One reason for the failure was that the U.S. Congress, with Lincoln's support, had recently proposed the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution. If ratified, the amendment would outlaw slavery in the United States. The Confederate peace delegation was unwilling to accept a future without slavery. (The Thirteenth Amendment was ratified in December 1865.) Despite the failure of the February meeting, Lincoln was confident of an eventual victory. He now began to turn his attention to the process of bringing the Confederate states back into the Union. This would be no easy task. Many northerners had a strong desire to punish the South harshly. Lincoln had a different goal. While committed to the defeat of the Confederacy and an end to slavery, he believed that the Union should strike a more generous stance with the rebellious states. At the beginning of March, in his Second Inaugural Address, Lincoln declared his vision of a united and peaceful nation. "With malice toward none," Lincoln said, Americans should "do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace."

Reconstruction Officially Ends

With the Radical Republicans' loss of power, the stage was set to end northern domination of the South. The 1876 election pitted Ohio Republican Rutherford B. Hayes against New York Democrat Samuel Tilden. Hayes, a respected Union general, had served in the House of Representatives in 1866. He had resigned to become governor of Ohio, where he developed a reputation for honesty and reform-mindedness. Tilden had been active in fighting corruption in New York City. Both candidates, then, held appeal for voters who were tired of corrupt leadership. Tilden received 51 percent of the popular vote and carried all of the southern states. However, Republicans claimed that the votes had been miscounted in three southern states, which happened to be states where Republicans controlled the reporting of ballots. Not surprisingly, in the recount, the Republicans found enough mistakes to swing the election to Hayes by one electoral vote. When southern Democrats protested the results of this vote, Congress was charged with mediating the crisis. It created a commission of five senators (chosen by the Republican-dominated Senate), five representatives (chosen by the Democratic House of Representatives), and five Supreme Court Justices. In what became known as the Compromise of 1877, Hayes was elected President. In return, the remaining federal troops were withdrawn from the South, a southerner was appointed to a powerful cabinet position, and southern states were guaranteed federal subsidies to build railroads and improve their ports. Federal Reconstruction was over. The South and the millions of recently freed African Americans were left to negotiate their own fate.

Wounded Knee

With the loss of many leaders and the destruction of their economy, Native Americans' ability to resist diminished. In response, many Indians welcomed a religious revival based on the Ghost Dance. Practitioners preached that the ritual would banish white settlers and restore the buffalo to the Plains. As the popularity of the movement spread, government officials became concerned about where it might lead. In 1890, in an effort to curtail these activities, the government ordered the arrest of Sitting Bull. In the confrontation, he and several others were killed. Troops then set out after the group of Indians as they fled. Hostilities broke out at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, when the well-armed cavalry met and outgunned the Indians. The ground was stained with the blood of more than 100 men, women, and children. The tragic end of the Ghost Dance War at Wounded Knee sealed the Indians' demise.

How did Reconstruction positively affect women?

Women found new opportunities outside the home. Women now had the chance to get involved at medical facilities, orphanages, and schools.

How did the economic role of women change during the Civil War

Women took roles and entered professions previously dominated by men

What early success did workers have using collective bargaining in New England

Workers succeeded in reducing the factory workday

What was the cause of the Homestead Strike?

Workers' wages were cut. After losing the standoff, steelworker unions lost power throughout the country.

What was the Union's two-part plan?

blockade southern ports and drive southward along the Mississippi River The Union strategy was more aggressive than the Confederacy's strategy; it aimed for a quick victory by blockading southern ports and driving south to split the Confederacy in two.

Why did the Confederacy face severe economic problems during the Civil War?

blockades, declining value of resources, and little revenue The Union blocked trade and transportation at southern ports, rivers, and rail lines. Much of the wealth in the South was invested in land and slave labor, which had declined in value. Because the Confederate government had little revenue from tariffs or taxes, it lacked resources to cover war costs.

What were the two main parts of the Confederacy's strategy?

small armies and foreign aid The Confederate strategy was more passive than the Union's strategy and was based on gaining foreign military aid and preserving its small armies for a prolonged war to erode the Union's will to fight.

What were some of the reasons the North prevailed in the Civil War?

technology, a large population, and strong leadership Great technological prowess, a large population, abundant resources, fearless military leaders in Grant and Sherman, the steady leadership of President Lincoln, and Lincoln's decision to proclaim emancipation were some of the reasons the North prevailed in the Civil War.

What was the name of the decree issued by President Lincoln that was an important turning point in the war?

the Emancipation Proclamation The Emancipation Proclamation focused the war on slavery for northerners, convinced southerners not to negotiate but to fight to the end, and encouraged more African Americans in the North to join the Union army to fight against slavery.

What Amendment guaranteed equality under the law for all citizens?

the Fourteenth Amendment The Fourteenth Amendment penalized states by taking away seats in the House of Representatives if they denied black men the right to vote.

What two factors limited southern economic recovery?

the lack of workers and capital Although the South had plenty of natural resources, the lack of lab`or and funds limited economic growth in the South.

What global development helped the railroads regulate their train schedules?

time zones Throughout most of the 1800s, cities set their clocks independent of one another, which caused scheduling problems with the railroads. The formation of time zones helped solve this problem.

What group of people was denied the right to vote under the Fifteenth Amendment?

women In 1869, Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment, which forbade states from denying suffrage on the grounds of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, but not on the grounds of sex.

Who often supplied Union troops information on navigating through the unfamiliar terrain of the South

African American scouts

What kind of troops formed the 54th Massachusetts Regiment

African American soldiers and a white commanding officer

How did African Americans respond to Union recruitment efforts after the Emancipation Proclamation?

African Americans responded enthusiastically. More than 180,000 African Americans volunteered to serve in the Union army, and their performance in battle proved that the low expectations of many whites were unfounded.

Victory Comes at Antietam

After his army's recent victories, General Lee was brimming with confidence. In early September 1862, he led his troops into Maryland, the border state where many favored the South. Lee hoped to inspire a pro-Confederate uprising. A victory on Union soil might also spur European recognition of the Confederacy. Lee also hoped to acquire an abundance of food supplies for his hungry army in an area unmolested by war. Lee's invasion did not go according to plan. On September 8, the general issued a "Proclamation to the People of Maryland" that invited them to ally themselves with the South. But Marylanders responded to the invitation with far less enthusiasm than Lee had anticipated. A few days later, Union soldiers found a copy of Lee's battle plan wrapped around some cigars at an abandoned rebel campsite. As a result, Lee lost the crucial element of surprise. When McClellan reviewed the orders, he exclaimed, "Here is a paper with which if I cannot whip Bobbie Lee, I will be willing to go home." The two armies converged at Sharpsburg, Maryland, and McClellan's troops fanned out near Antietam Creek. On September 17, Union troops attacked Lee's army in three phases, moving from one side of the Confederate line to the other. By the end of the day, more than 23,000 soldiers lay dead or wounded. The Battle of Antietam marked the bloodiest single day of the Civil War. With his army exhausted and Maryland still in the Union, Lee retreated to Virginia. Though Union losses exceeded Confederate losses, Lincoln had the victory he needed to move forward with emancipation.

President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation after which of the following battles

Antietam

Confederate and Union Strategies

As the two sides prepared for war, Union and Confederate leaders contemplated their goals and how they might go about meeting them. While northerners hoped for a quick victory, southern strategists planned for a prolonged war.

How did General Ulysses S. Grant's siege finally lead to the Union victory at Vicksburg

Constant fire and lack of supplies weakened Confederate defenders

How did President Abraham Lincoln respond to the Union retreat at the Battle of Bull Run

He called for additional troops and put General George B. McClellan in command

What was the most common cause of death for soldiers serving in the Civil War

Disease

War Threatens Civil Liberties

Draft rioters were not the only northerners angered by the war effort. A faction calling themselves "Peace Democrats" opposed Lincoln's conduct of the war and demanded an end to the fighting. Their opponents dubbed them Copperheads, after a type of poisonous snake found in the South. While some Copperheads promoted violence against the Union, most remained loyal to it and wanted only to end the war. The President, however, viewed any effort to undermine the war effort as a grave threat to the nation. To deal with this crisis, he suspended the constitutional right of habeas corpus, which protects a person from being held in jail without being charged with a specific crime. Lincoln empowered the military to arrest people suspected of disloyalty to the Union, including some who had criticized the President and others who had participated in draft riots.

Enslaved People Help the Union Cause

Enslaved African Americans in the South also played an important role in the war, finding a variety of ways to passively or actively help the Union forces. White owners often abandoned plantations for the safety of southern cities, leaving trusted slaves to manage the farm. Advancing Union forces often enlisted these African Americans to produce food for the northern troops. Other African Americans used their familiarity with the terrain to serve as spies or scouts for Union armies. Sometimes, emancipated slaves organized their own military units. Regiments of former slaves appeared in such places as South Carolina, Kansas, and Missouri. Across the South, ambitious slaves seized the opportunity to begin to shape their own civilian lives. Some demanded, and got, wages for their work. Others simply abandoned their masters, fleeing to Union camps or to the North or West. They turned Lincoln's promise of freedom into a reality.

Which of the following actions taken by President Lincoln contributed to General George B. McClellan's failure to capture Richmond in 1862

He did not give McClellan enough troops

The Monitor Battles the Virginia

Few of the major battles of the Civil War took place at sea. However, one notable exception occurred in 1862 when the Union ship Monitor clashed with its Confederate opponent Virginia off the Virginia coast. The Union had hired a European engineer to design the Monitor as a model for a fleet of ships plated with iron armor. The Confederacy, meanwhile, had built the ironclad Virginia by refitting a Union ship previously known as the Merrimack. On March 9, the two ironclads met in battle. Though neither ship emerged the victor, the contest signaled the beginning of the end of wooden warships.

Southern Leaders Argue

Hardships quickly began to weaken southern unity. As early as August 1861, Mary Boykin Chesnut of South Carolina wrote in her diary of "the rapid growth of the party forming against Mr. Davis." Indeed, Jefferson Davis found that his attempts to build unity were often hampered by his stubborn personality and by the fierce spirit of independence that had led to secession in the first place. Some states resisted sending troops outside their own borders or having their militia serve under commanders from other states. As in the North, the Confederate government enacted conscription laws, seized private property in support of the war effort, and suspended habeas corpus. In response, some southerners called for Davis's impeachment. In Georgia, there was even talk of seceding from the Confederacy!

How did Abraham Lincoln help ensure that border states supported the Union

He insisted that his only goal was to save the Union, not end slavery

Why did Robert E. Lee lead the Confederate army into Maryland and the Battle of Antietam

He wanted to inspire a pro-Confederate uprising

Why did Union General Benjamin Butler declare enslaved African American refugees to be contraband, or captured war supplies

He would not have to return them to slaveholders in the South

Abraham Lincoln authorized women to oversee which operations in military installations

Hospitals and sanitation

The Draft Triggers Rioting

In 1863, the Union instituted conscription, also called the draft, to meet the unending demand for fresh troops. Under this system, any white man between the ages of 20 and 45 might be called for required military service. However, a man could pay $300 to hire a replacement. Thus, at a time when laborers earned less than $2 per day, the burden of conscription fell mostly on recent immigrants and others who held low-paying jobs. Many working men resented the fact that the rich could pay to avoid the draft. They also worried about losing their jobs to African Americans, who were not subject to conscription. Anger over the draft led to violence. In the New York Draft Riot of July 1863, a mob of poor white working men went on a four-day rampage, damaging factories that made war supplies and attacking African Americans. Blacks were also targeted in similar race riots in other northern cities.

Bull Run Shakes Union Confidence

In July 1861, General Scott sent General Irvin McDowell and more than 30,000 Union troops to do battle with Confederate forces waiting outside Washington. The two armies met at Bull Run, a creek near Manassas, Virginia. In the battle's first hours, Union troops gained the upper hand. But a determined stand led by Confederate General Thomas J. Jackson sent them scrambling back to Washington. Confederates nicknamed their hero Stonewall Jackson in honor of his refusal to yield to the Union armies. The battle, known as the Battle of Bull Run in the North and the Battle of Manassas in the South, proved a shock to those who had hoped the war would end quickly—and who were unprepared for the carnage modern warfare could produce. Lincoln responded by calling for additional troops and by replacing McDowell with General George B. McClellan.

Nurses Care for the Sick and Wounded

In both the North and South, the most notable military role for women was nursing. The development of nursing as a profession began slowly, as small groups of women formed organizations to assist returning soldiers and their families. Beginning in 1861, Clara Barton took the effort one step further. After collecting medical supplies in her Massachusetts community, she secured permission to travel with Union army ambulances and assist in "distributing comforts for the sick and wounded of both sides." President Lincoln approved the formation of the United States Sanitary Commission, which authorized women to oversee hospitals and sanitation in military installations. This systematic program of federal responsibility for public health would be yet another lasting effect of the Civil War.

Grant Initiates a Brilliant Plan

In the spring of 1863, Grant devised a new plan to take the Confederate stronghold. First, he marched his troops southward through Louisiana to a point south of Vicksburg. At the same time, he ordered a cavalry attack on rail lines in central Mississippi to draw Confederate attention away from the city. On April 30, some 20,000 of Grant's men crossed the river and headed northeast to capture the Mississippi state capital at Jackson. After sacking that city, the Federals turned west toward Vicksburg, gaining control of the main rail line leading into the city and fortress. Vicksburg was completely cut off. Grant launched two frontal assaults against the Confederates but failed to break their defenses. So, on May 22, he placed Vicksburg under siege. A siege is a military tactic in which an army surrounds, bombards, and cuts off all supplies to an enemy position in order to force its surrender. For over a month, Union guns kept up a steady fire from land and river. One astonished resident noted "ladies walk[ing] quietly along the streets while the shells burst above them, their heads meanwhile protected by parasol." The constant fire and lack of supplies gradually weakened Vicksburg's defenders. Finally, on July 4, 1863, the Confederate commander concluded that his position was hopeless and ordered his forces to surrender. The siege of Vicksburg was over. Days later, after it learned of the Vicksburg surrender, the Confederate garrison at Port Hudson, Louisiana, also surrendered to the Union. With its last strongholds on the Mississippi in Union hands, the Confederacy was split in two.

What did the Union government tax in order to help meet the cost of the war

Individuals' incomes

What effect did the Emancipation Proclamation have on the Union army

It actively began recruiting African American soldiers to fight

How did the actions of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson at Bull Run lead to General George B. McClellan taking charge of the Union army

Jackson led a determined stand against the Union army

Why did Abraham Lincoln withhold troops from General George B. McClellan, even as he pushed the general to attack

Lincoln wanted troops to defend Washington, D.C., from Confederate attack

Why did Lincoln and McClellan clash in early 1862?

Lincoln was anxious for military victories. McClellan was cautious and did not want to act until his troops were ready, but Lincoln was anxious for military victories and wanted McClellan to take action.

Why did Confederate currency experience inflation

Many people doubted the value of paper money and raised the price of goods

What was the response in the North to conscription?

Many working men reacted violently, staging riots, damaging factories, and attacking African Americans. Many working men resented the fact that the rich could pay to avoid the draft. They also worried about losing their jobs to African Americans, who were not subject to conscription.

McClellan Fails to Take Richmond

McClellan's army was actually larger than the force defending Richmond. But Confederate General Robert E. Lee led his troops skillfully. In a series of battles known as the Seven Days (June 26-July 2), Lee took advantage of McClellan's cautious style. The Union advance stalled and McClellan retreated to Washington. After the retreat, Lincoln replaced McClellan. The move proved to be a mistake. At the Second Battle of Bull Run in late August, Lee's Confederates handed the Union a crushing defeat. Stonewall Jackson was instrumental in outmaneuvering a larger Union force and nearly destroying it before the Federals could retreat. The victory, known in the South as the Second Battle of Manassas, energized Lee and led Lincoln to return McClellan to command. Lee and McClellan would soon face off in the single bloodiest day of the Civil War.

Davis Struggles to Pay for War

Much of the South's wealth was invested in land and in more than 3 million slaves. Most of that slave labor was devoted to producing market crops, such as cotton, tobacco, and sugar. The war drastically reduced the value of these assets, leaving President Jefferson Davis with few sources of money with which to finance the Confederate military effort. The South used every opportunity to ease its economic squeeze. When possible, Confederate soldiers seized Union weapons, food, and supplies—often from bodies on the battlefields. Union shoes and boots were especially prized. Although Britain remained officially neutral, British shipyards helped the Confederacy build blockade runners. Entrepreneurs built ironworks in several southern cities. Still, the costs of the war quickly outran the South's resources. Duties on the South's few imports were hard to collect, and many southerners resisted the 10 percent tax on farm produce. Like the Union, the Confederacy issued paper money, backed only by the government's promise to pay. Many doubted the value of Confederate money. Prices soared as those with items to sell demanded more and more Confederate cash. This inflation, combined with the shortage of food, led to riots in some parts of the South. In a note to North Carolina Governor Zebulon Vance, one woman reported on the dire conditions in that state: "I have threatened for some time to write you a letter—a crowd of we poor women went to Greensborough yesterday for something to eat as we had not a mouthful [of] meat nor bread—what did they do but put us in jail—we women will write for our husbands to come home and help us." —Nancy Mangum, 1863

What was the outcome of the battle at sea between the Union ship Monitor and the Confederate ship Virginia

Neither side won

Soldiers Face Death in Many Forms

New technology used in the Civil War resulted in killing on a scale never before seen in America. Tens of thousands of soldiers died on the battlefields and many more were injured. Powerful new weapons caused gaping wounds, and the most frequent treatment was the amputation of limbs—sometimes without anesthesia. Doctors lacked modern knowledge about infection, so even minor wounds could prove deadly. For those who survived the fighting, life in camp had its own dangers. Poor drinking water and lack of sanitation led to a rapid spread of illness in the ranks. For every soldier killed in battle, two died of disease. Worse yet were the prison camps. On both sides, prisoners of war faced overcrowding and filth while in captivity. African American prisoners in Confederate camps were usually killed outright. The most notorious camp was the open-pen prison at Andersonville, Georgia. By the summer of 1864, some 33,000 Union prisoners had been crowded into its confines. With their own troops starving, Confederates had little incentive to find food for Union prisoners. During the 15 months that Andersonville remained in operation, more than 12,000 union prisoners died of disease and malnutrition.

Emancipation at Last

On September 22, 1862, Lincoln formally announced the Emancipation Proclamation. Issued as a military decree, it freed all enslaved people in states still in rebellion after January 1, 1863. It did not, however, apply to loyal border states or to places that were already under Union military control. Lincoln hoped the proclamation might convince some southern states to surrender before the January 1 deadline. Many northerners responded to the Emancipation Proclamation with great excitement. "We shout for joy that we live to record this righteous decree," rejoiced Frederick Douglass. Some who had once criticized Lincoln for inaction now praised his name and held rallies in honor of the proclamation. An African American minister in Philadelphia said: "The morning dawns! The long night of sorrow and gloom is past. . . . The Proclamation has gone forth, and God is saying . . . to this nation Man must be free. . . . Your destiny as white men and ours as black men are one and the same." —Jonathan C. Gibbs, January 1, 1863 Others were less enthusiastic. William Lloyd Garrison grumbled that "what is still needed is a proclamation distinctly announcing the total abolition of slavery." British abolitionists applauded the President's move—but also wondered about Lincoln's conviction, since he attacked slavery only in areas over which he had no control. Lincoln also received criticism in Congress. Many Republicans felt the proclamation had not gone far enough, while many Democrats felt it was too drastic a step. The Proclamation may have been one factor leading to Democratic gains in the fall congressional elections. Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not actually free a single slave, it was an important turning point in the war. For northerners, it redefined the war as being "about slavery." For white southerners, the call to free the slaves ended any desire for a negotiated end to the war. Confederate leaders now felt they must fight to the end. For African Americans in the North, the proclamation made them eager to join the Union army and fight against slavery. Even before Lincoln's decree, growing demands by African Americans—and a growing need for soldiers on the frontlines—had led the Union to reconsider its ban on African American soldiers. Just two months before the proclamation, Congress had passed the Militia Act, mandating that black soldiers be accepted into the military.

Enslaved African Americans Seek Refuge

On the battlefield, Union officers faced a dilemma: what to do with enslaved African Americans who came under their control. It was absurd, argued these officers, to return slaves to their owners. Early on, Union General Benjamin Butler had gathered hundreds of black refugees into his camps and set them to manual labor. He declared the fugitives under his protection to be contraband, or captured war supplies. General John Frémont went a step further, declaring that enslaved people who came under his command in Missouri were free. Fearing retaliation from the border states, Lincoln reversed Frémont's order.

Lincoln Urges McClellan to Attack

Since taking command of Union forces after Bull Run, General McClellan had been planning what he hoped would be a decisive drive on the Confederate capital at Richmond, Virginia. A skilled leader beloved by his troops, McClellan was also very cautious. He did not want to execute his plan until he felt his troops were ready. McClellan's caution created friction with Lincoln, who was anxious for military victories. Yet, even as he pushed McClellan to act, the President was unwilling to give the general all the forces he asked for. Lincoln insisted on holding a large force near the capital to protect it from a Confederate attack. Stonewall Jackson's brilliant campaign in the spring of 1862 in the nearby Shenandoah Valley of Virginia increased Lincoln's concerns. By midsummer, Lincoln insisted that McClellan take action. Reluctantly, McClellan sailed his army southward across Chesapeake Bay. The force landed on a peninsula southeast of Richmond and then began its march toward the capital. Thus, the action was called the Peninsular Campaign.

War Transforms the Northern Economy

Paying to supply the military was a major economic challenge. To help meet the cost, the Union government introduced a tax based on an individual's earnings. At first, the income tax was 3 percent on all income over $800 a year. As the war continued, the tax was increased. The Union also raised tariffs, which brought in revenue and helped northern industry by raising the cost of imported goods. The biggest source of wartime funds came from the sale of government bonds. In return for the purchase price, the buyer received a certificate promising to pay the holder a larger amount of money at a future date. The Union sold billions of dollars worth of bonds to banks and individuals. Citizens were encouraged to buy bonds as an act of patriotism To increase the amount of cash in circulation and to help people buy war bonds, Congress passed the Legal Tender Act in 1862. This law allowed the Treasury to issue paper money, called "greenbacks" because of the color of the paper used. For the first time, the United States had a single, common currency that its citizens could use to purchase goods. The Civil War also helped bring about far-reaching changes in the use of public land in the West. For years, the question of how to use this land had been dominated by the slavery issue. In addition, northern and southern companies squabbled over the route for a proposed rail line linking California to the East. With secession, however, these issues disappeared. In 1862, Congress passed the Homestead Act, making western land available at very low cost to those who would farm it. The war also resolved the argument over the route of the intercontinental railroad. The Pacific Railroad Act granted land to companies to build rail lines through Union territory.

The Push Toward Emancipation

Pressures at home and abroad urged Lincoln to address the issue of slavery. Abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison, as well as the thousands who supported them, were impatient with Lincoln's policies. Another reason for Lincoln to act was that slavery was unpopular in Europe. Antislavery sentiment was one of the main reasons why Great Britain was reluctant to aid the Confederacy.

African American Soldiers Fight Bravely

Racist attitudes left many whites with low expectations for black troops. But performance in battle proved these expectations to be false. In June 1863, accounts appeared of a battle in Port Hudson, Mississippi—the first major test for African American soldiers. A Union officer declared that "my prejudices with regard to negro troops have been dispelled by the battle. . . . The brigade of negroes behaved magnificently." A few weeks later, the 54th Massachusetts followed Robert Gould Shaw, their respected white officer, into battle at Fort Wagner in Charleston harbor. During the unsuccessful assault, Shaw and many of his men were killed. Nevertheless, the 54th had earned respect for its discipline and courage. One soldier received the Congressional Medal of Honor—the first of almost two dozen African American soldiers to be decorated for bravery. Still, African American troops faced prejudice. They were usually assigned menial tasks, such as cooking, cleaning, or digging latrines. They often served the longest guard duty and were placed in exposed battle positions. It took a three-year effort to win equal pay. Black soldiers also knew that if captured, they would be killed. In one bloody incident, Confederates massacred more than 100 African American soldiers who were trying to surrender at Fort Pillow, Tennessee. Nevertheless, African Americans supported the Union in hundreds of battles, and some 70,000 lost their lives.

The Emancipation Proclamation freed enslaved people living where

States still in rebellion against the Union after January 1, 1863

Advantages of the Confederacy

Still, the North did have some distinct weaknesses compared to the South. One of the Confederacy's advantages was psychological. Many northerners were willing to let the slaveholding South go. To them, preserving the Union was not worth killing and dying for. But the Confederacy was fighting for survival. Although there were pockets of pro-Union feeling in places such as western Virginia, most southern whites believed passionately in the Confederate cause. Even those who were not slaveholders resented what they saw as northern efforts to dominate them. When the war began, Union forces consisted of only 16,000 men. New recruits signed on for three months of service, hardly long enough to form an efficient fighting team. The South faced similar challenges in assembling its armies, but it had a strong military tradition and fine leaders like Virginia's Robert E. Lee. Lee, who had an outstanding record in the United States Army, actually opposed secession and slavery. Yet he turned down an offer to command Union forces. He wrote: "With all my devotion to the Union, and the feeling of loyalty and duty of an American citizen, I have not been able to make up my mind to raise my hand against my relatives, my children, my home. I have therefore resigned my commission in the army, and save in defense of my native state . . . I hope I may never be called upon to draw my sword." —Robert E. Lee, letter to his sister, April 20, 1861 In fact, Lee did accept command of the Confederate army and provided the South with inspiring military leadership throughout the war. The North struggled to find a commander of such caliber. Finally, the Confederacy had a number of strategic advantages. It did not need to conquer the North; it simply had to avoid defeat, expecting that in time the North would give up the effort. By and large, southern forces would be fighting a defensive war on familiar, friendly ground while northern forces had to fight an offensive war in enemy territory. Union troops and supplies had to travel farther to reach the field of battle. The North also had to devote precious military resources to defending Washington, D.C. Only the Potomac River separated the Union capital from Confederate Virginia.

What advantage did Robert E. Lee offer the Confederacy

Strong military leadership

What did the Militia Act mandate

That African Americans be accepted into the Union military

Fighting Spreads to the Southwest

The American Southwest held strategic value to both sides in the Civil War. The region held rich gold mines and offered access to California and the Pacific Ocean. Despite its importance, neither side stationed many troops in the region. Fighting did take place as far west as Arizona. But the most significant action occurred in New Mexico in early 1862, when a Confederate force marched up the Rio Grande from Texas. The goal was to drive Union troops from the Southwest and capture it for the Confederacy. The rebel troops were defeated in late March at Glorieta Pass, thanks in part to the destruction of their supply train by a Union force under Major John Chivington and Lt. Col. Manuel Chavez. The Confederates eventually retreated back into Texas, never to mount another threat to Union control of the Southwest. The Union and Confederacy also vied for the loyalty of the Southwest's residents—many of whom in the past had been treated as outcasts. The Union got help from Mexican American militia in Texas, which worked to disrupt Confederate supply lines. Both sides also courted Native American groups throughout the entire West. The Cheyennes were able to bargain with the Union government for land in return for their aid. The Confederates persuaded the Creeks and Choctaws to support their cause. They also sought support from the Cherokee nation. The Cherokees, however, split over the question of which side to support. Such conflict within Native American groups was not uncommon as loyalties shifted during the course of the war.

Camp Life Offers New Experiences

The Civil War gave many young men their first taste of travel. A typical regiment was comprised of recruits from the same town who had all joined up together. Still, soldiers were often homesick and bored. When not preparing for battle, they passed the time writing letters home, playing games, or attending religious revivals. One Confederate chaplain noted that many southern men "have come out of this war Christian soldiers." In the border states especially, many families suffered divided loyalties, with brothers or sons fighting on different sides. Soldiers might find themselves far from home but camped across the battlefield from family. It was not uncommon for soldiers to exchange greetings with the "enemy" between engagements.

The Home Front in the South

The Civil War made great economic demands on the South as well. But, unlike the North, the Confederacy lacked the resources to meet these demands. As the war dragged on, the South seemed in danger of collapse.

How did women's lives change because of the Civil War?

The Civil War offered women opportunities to have an active role in public life. Women ran businesses, farms, and plantations; taught school; fought as men did; cooked and did laundry in military camps; served as spies and guides; nursed sick and wounded soldiers; and oversaw hospitals and sanitation at military installations.

Why was it necessary for the Confederacy to seek the support of Great Britain and France

The Confederacy needed access to the manufactured` goods of Great Britain and France

How did the Union victory at Vicksburg affet the Confederacy

The Confederacy was split in two after it lost its strongholds along the Mississippi River

What was the outcome of the siege of Vicksburg?

The Confederacy was split in two.

Advantages of the Union

The North enjoyed a tremendous advantage in population. Some 22 million people lived in the states that stayed in the Union. By contrast, the Confederacy had a population of only 9 million, of whom 3.5 million were enslaved African Americans. The industrialized North was far better prepared to wage war than the agrarian South. Most of the nation's coal and iron came from Union mines, and the vast West was a source of gold, silver, and other resources. The densely populated urban areas of the Northeast supported a wide variety of manufacturing. With mechanized factories and a steady flow of European immigrants seeking work, the Union could produce more ammunition, arms, uniforms, medical supplies, and railroad cars than the Confederacy could. In addition, the Union had a larger railroad network for moving troops and material. The Union had a small but well-organized navy. By late 1861, the Union had launched more than 250 warships, with dozens more under construction. The South had no navy at all, leaving it vulnerable to a naval blockade in which Union ships prevented merchant vessels from entering or leaving the South's few good ports, thereby crippling southern trade. Finally, while the Confederate government was new and inexperienced, the North had an established government and an outstanding leader in Abraham Lincoln. Not everyone recognized this fact at the outset of the war, but Lincoln's leadership would prove invaluable to the Union cause

Lincoln Avoids the Slavery Issue

The Union also faced a tricky political question: how to prevent the secession of Missouri, Kentucky, Delaware, and Maryland. Although these border states allowed slavery, they had not joined the Confederacy. Lincoln knew that if they chose to secede, the Union could be lost. To reduce this threat, the President insisted that his only goal was to save the Union. In his First Inaugural Address, he announced, "I believe I have no lawful right to [free the slaves], and I have no inclination to do so." Although Lincoln's stand troubled abolitionists, he did succeed in keeping the border states loyal to the Union.

Where did the Homestead Act open land to farming

The West

Why was the Battle of Bull Run so shocking

The battle was more brutal than people expected

What battlefield event damaged Ulysses S. Grant's rising military reputation

The deaths of nearly 25,000 Union and Confederate troops at the Battle of Shiloh in Tennessee

How did the public react to the Battle of Shiloh

The public was shocked and horrified by the large number of dead and injured

The Union Devises the Anaconda Plan

The initial Union strategy was a two-part plan devised by General Winfield Scott, a Virginia-born hero of the Mexican-American War and the commander of all U.S. forces in 1861. First, the Union would blockade southern ports, starving the South of income and supplies. Then, Union forces would drive southward along the Mississippi River. Union control of the Mississippi would split the Confederacy in two, fatally weakening it. Scott's plan came to be known as the Anaconda Plan, after a type of snake that coils around its prey and squeezes it to death. Some antislavery congressmen thought Scott's plan was too timid. They favored a massive military campaign that would quickly free the slaves across the South. Lincoln also hoped that a decisive victory over rebel forces massed in northern Virginia and around Richmond might lead the Confederacy to negotiate an end to the crisis. Despite such criticism and concentration on winning quickly, the Anaconda Plan remained central to the Union war strategy.

Blockade Brings Hardships

The most pressing threat was the Union blockade of southern ports. Small, swift ships known as "blockade runners" were initially effective at avoiding capture and delivering needed supplies to the South. However, by 1863, the Union blockade was about 80 percent effective. As a result, southerners were forced to depend almost entirely on their own farms and factories. This production was often complicated by nearby military operations. Even when farmers were able to harvest crops, they had difficulty getting the food to market or to the troops because rivers and rail lines were often blocked by Union forces.

The Confederacy Seeks Foreign Support

The strategy of the Confederacy had two main thrusts. Militarily, the South hoped to preserve its small armies while doing enough damage to erode the Union's will to fight. Politically, it hoped to win formal recognition from Britain and France. Trade with these nations was crucial to the South, since the supply of manufactured goods from the North was now cut off. By the same token, the European textile industry was dependent on southern cotton. Confederate leaders reasoned that if the war dragged on, French and British mills would run out of raw cotton. Therefore, these countries might be willing to provide military aid to the South.

Women Do New Work

The vast majority of women did not get close to military action, but many took over family businesses, farms, or plantations. With so many men away at the front, women made inroads into professions that had previously been dominated by men. By war's end, for example, most teaching jobs had been taken over by women. A few white women from the North and the South masqueraded as men and marched into battle. More commonly, wives joined husbands in camps, cooking and doing laundry. Like their husbands and brothers, some African American women in the South served as spies and guides.

How did the Emancipation Proclamation change the focus of the Civil War

The war was now about slavery

What is one effect the Emancipation Proclamation had on African Americans in the North

They became eager to join the Union army

How did some African Americans in the South manage to join the fighting

They organized their own military to help the Union

Why did Congress pass the Militia Act before Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation

To allow African Americans to join the Union military

Lincoln's Plan Needs a Victory

ncoln realized he could not avoid the slavery issue for long. He secretly began working on a plan for the emancipation of enslaved African Americans living in Confederate states. In the summer of 1862, he shared his ideas with a surprised Cabinet. The members generally supported Lincoln's plan but agreed that its announcement should wait. After the Union failure at the Second Battle of Bull Run, such a proclamation might look like an act of desperation. What was needed was a major Union victory. Several weeks later, Lincoln got his opportunity.