COURSE OBJECTIVES

This seminar investigates a variety of postbellum transitions in the United States South, as whites grudgingly relinquished slaveholding, the region experimented with less restrictive labor systems, and African Americans attained limited civil and social equality. Unlike traditional treatments of the era -- which limit their focus to political issues before 1878 -- Reconstructing the South also considers changing modes of economic and social life. The course concludes with the establishment of the Solid South in 1902.

ASSIGNMENTS AND GRADES

Grades will be determined on the basis of a mid-term examination, a final examination, a research paper, and class participation. Each component will contribute 25 percent toward the course grade, and all of these elements must be submitted to pass the course. Class participation will be evaluated daily on the basis of attendance at class meetings, discussion of assigned texts, performance on short essays, and original contributions to our understanding of the Reconstruction era. Assignments are due at the beginning of class on the day designated for their completion.

CONSULTATION

I hold office hours in Walsh-Ellett #201 on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 3:00 -- 4:30, and at other times by appointment. I can be reached via e-mail at jwillis@sewanee.edu, or by phone at my office (598-1534) or home (598-9249; please do not call after 9:00 p.m.).

PRINTED SOURCES

Eric Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction
Michael Perman, ed., Major Problems in the Civil War and Reconstruction (second edition)
Altina L. Waller, Feud:  Hatfields, McCoys, and Social Change in Appalachia, 1860-1900
John C. Willis, Forgotten Time:  The Yazoo-Mississippi Delta After the Civil War

CLASS SESSIONS, EASTER SEMESTER, 2007

January

• 17:  Reconstructing Reconstruction
  • Text: 
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. xi-xvi, 1-15
      
• 22:  The Long View
  • Text:
    • Waller, Feud
• 24:  Reconstruction's Wartime Origins
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 16-34
  • Essay: 
    • Berlin, "Who Freed the Slaves?  Emancipation and Its Meaning"
  • Documents:
    • George B. McClellan to Abraham Lincoln, 7 July 1862
    • The Emancipation Proclamation, 22 September 1862/1 January 1863
    • Freedmen's Bureau Bill, 3 March 1865
• 29:  The Implications of Confederate Defeat
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 35-81
  • Documents:
    • Mrs. J. E. White to Irene ___, 13 May 1865
      
    • Josiah Gorgas, A Confederate Leader Contemplates War's End
    • Susan Sillers Darden, Transitions From War: The Summer of 1865
      
• 31:  Andrew Johnson's Dilemma
  • Text: 
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 82-86
  • Documents:
    • Andrew Johnson, Amnesty Proclamation, 29 May 1865
    • J. W. Norwood to Kemp P. Battle, 19 June 1865
    • Ann G. Thomas to Henry Taylor, 19 August 1865
    • James L. Alcorn to Amelia Alcorn, 26 August 1865
      

February

• 5:  Summer of Uncertainty
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 86-103
  • Documents:
    • Louisa A. H. Minor, "Troubled in mind about the servants"
    • W. J. Robertson to Henry Taylor, 5 June 1865
    • Ann Falkener to Kemp P. Battle, 12 June 1865
    • Humphrey Dudley to Henry Taylor, 25 July 1865
    • Jourdon Anderson to My Old Master, 7 August 1865
    • Martha Ann Battle to Kemp P. Battle, 2 & 21 August 1865
    • The Indenture of Susan___, 19 August 1865
      
• 7:  Thaddeus Stevens and the Radical Republicans
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 104-108
  • Essay:
    • Foner, "Thaddeus Stevens, Confiscation, and Reconstruction"
  • Documents:
    •  Thaddeus Stevens, Lancaster (Pa.) Speech, 6 September 1865
      
• 12:  Winter of Discontent
  • Documents:
    • Thirteenth Amendment
    • Miss. Gov. Benjamin Humphreys's Message to the Legislature, 1865
    • Judith P. W. Rives to William C. Rives, Jr., 28 September 1865
    • Judith P. W. Rives to William C. Rives, Jr., 15 January 1866
    • George Hannah's Contract with Freedmen, 30 December 1865
    • Susan Sillers Darden, Disorder and Distress: The Winter of 1865-1866
      
• 13:  Research topic statement due by noon.
• 14:  Resistance in the "Conquered Provinces"
  • Documents:
    •  William Henry Redman to Emeline Redman, 5 November 1865
    •  Robert W. Flournoy to Thaddeus Stevens, 20 November 1865
    •  S. Carolina African Americans Present Their Demands, 24 Nov. 1865
      
• 19:  Andrew Johnson's Isolation
  • Text:
    •  Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 108-119
  • Documents:
    • Andrew Johnson, Veto of the Freedmen's Bureau Bill, 19 February 1866
    • Thompson Powell to Thaddeus Stevens, 22 February 1866
    • Andrew Johnson, "Fellow Citizens of Cleveland," 3 September 1866
    • Andrew Johnson, "Fellow Citizens of Saint Louis," 8 September 1866
• 21:  Mid-term examination
  
• 26:  Imposing Congressional Reconstruction
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 119-123, 142-144
  • Documents:
    • Fourteenth Amendment
    • First Reconstruction Act, 2 March 1867
    • Judith P. W. Rives to William C. Rives, Jr., 19 March 1867
    • E. Morris to Kemp P. Battle, 8 May 1867
    • Susan Sillers Darden, Politics -- Public and Private
      

March

• 5:  Southern Republicans and the Limits of Radicalism
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 123-179
  • Essays:
    •  Powell, "Carpetbaggers and the Problems of Republican Rule. . . ."
    •  Foner, "Black Reconstruction Leaders at the Grass Roots"
• 7:  Changes in Cotton's Kingdom
  • Initial research bibliography due
  • Essays:
    • Jones, "The Political Economy of the Black Family. . . ."
    • Woodman, "The Reconstruction of the Cotton Plantation. . . ."
  • Documents:
    • Edward King Describes the Postwar Plantation System. . . , 1875
    • Barrow Plantation, 1860 and 1881
      
• 12:  On the Margins
  • Text:
    • Willis, Forgotten Time, pp. 1-77
• 14:  The Conservative Counter-Revolution
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 180-198, 217-237
  • Essay:
    • Perman, "Reconstruction Under Attack"
  • Documents:
    • Revised and Amended Prescript of the Order of the Ku Klux Klan (1868)
    • The Rev. Elias Hill's Description of KKK Tactics, 1871
    • Fifteenth Amendment
    • Former Gov. J. L. Orr Defends South Carolina's Republican Gov't, 1871
    • Albert T. Morgan of Mississippi Recalls His Achievements. . . , 1884
    • Rep. L. Q. C. Lamar of Mississippi Assails Reconstruction, June 1874
    • Gov. W. P. Kellogg Demands Punishment for . . . Assassins, Sept. 1874
• 26:  Ballots, Bullets, and Compromise:  1876-1877
  • Text:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 238-247
  • Essay:
    • Abbott, "Reconstruction Winds Down: The Grant Years, 1869-1877"
  • Documents:
    • Rep. Alexander White of Alabama Defends 'Carpetbaggers,' 1875
    • Charles Nordhoff Censures Mississippi Politicians, 1875
    • Gov. Adelbert Ames Deplores the Violence in Mississippi, Sept. 1875
    • The Mississippi Plan of 1875
    • "Instructions to Red Shirts in South Carolina, 1876"
    • Albion Tourgee Later Condemns Congress's Reconstruction Policy, 1879
• 28:  Re-Fighting the Last War
  • Documents:
    • James Longstreet to Augustus Baldwin Longstreet, 24 July 1863
    • Robert E. Lee to Jefferson Davis, 31 July 1863
    • Jubal Early, "The Campaigns of Gen. Robert E. Lee"
    • James Longstreet's Account of the Campaign and Battle at Gettysburg
      

April

• 2:  The New South Creed
  • Texts:
    • Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 247-253
    • Willis, Forgotten Time, pp. 78-113
  • Documents:
    • Henry W. Grady on "The New South," 21 December 1886
    • Henry W. Grady at the Boston Banquet, December 1889
    • Henry W. Grady before the Bay State Club, December 1889
      
• 4:  Crises of the 1890s
  • Documents:
    • Greenville (Miss.) Times editorial, 15 March 1890
    • Tom Watson, "The Negro Question in the South," 1892
    • Booker T. Washington at the Atlanta Exposition, 1895
      
• 9:  The Plantation Empire
  • Text:
    • Willis, Forgotten Time, pp. 114-185
• 11:  No class meeting
  
• 16:  The "Solid" South.  Research paper rough drafts due by 5:00 p.m.
  • Text:
    •  Foner, Reconstruction, pp. 254-260
  • Documents:
    • Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896
    • Williams v. State of Mississippi, 1898
      
• 18:   Student presentations begin.
• 23:   Student presentations
  
• 25:   Student presentations
  
• 30:   Student presentations
  

May

• 2:   Looking Back on the Reconstructed South.  Research paper final drafts due by 5:00 p.m.
  
• 5:   Final examination due by 5:00 p.m.

  
  

  Last updated 28 February 2007