HIS 3430                                                                    Dr. Edward E. Baptist

Civil War and Reconstruction                                 eeb36@cornell.edu                           

Fall 2009                                                                     Office: McGraw 433/ 255-1881

MW 10:10-11:00 AM, BKL 335                              Office hours: MW 9-10 AM, and by appt.   

 

Course Description:

This course will survey and discuss the turning point of U.S. history: the Civil War (1861-1865) and its aftermath, Reconstruction (1865-1877).  The Civil War resolved some of the biggest questions that troubled American government, politics, culture and society during the years that followed the Declaration of Independence and Constitution.  But it also raised new ones, issues that continue to trouble and divide us today.  To understand American history, then, we must look at its most dramatic moment, the years of the Civil War and Reconstruction. We will look at the causes, the coming, and the conduct of the war, and we will also examine the ways in which it became a war for freedom.  We’ll talk about its implications for the American government, American society, and the conduct of future wars in both the U.S. and elsewhere. We’ll then follow the cause of freedom through the greatest slave rebellion in American history, and the attempts by formerly enslaved people to make freedom real in Reconstruction.  And we’ll see how Reconstruction’s tragic end, like the changing memory of the war itself, came to shape the future.

 

Requirements:

Each student will write two shorter essays, will take an in-class mid-term, and will take a cumulative final exam during our class’s assigned time.  You are expected to complete the readings and attend class regularly.  I have also set up two discussion sections.  You are expected to enroll in them, attend regularly, and participate.  Your grade will be computed with the following formula:

 

Participation: 25%

Short essays: 15%

Mid-term: 20%

Final: 40%

 

 

Texts:

The following texts are available at the campus book store and are on reserve at Uris library.  With the exception of McPherson, all are required.

Edward L. Ayers, In the Presence of Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863

Orville Vernon Burton, The Age of Lincoln

Charles Dew, Apostles of Disunion: Southern Secession Commissioners and the Causes of the Civil War

 Drew Gilpin Faust, This Republic of Suffering

James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era

William Lee Miller, Lincoln’s Virtues: An Ethical Biography

Pauli Murray, Proud Shoes: The Story of an American Family

 

Schedule of Classes:

Week 1: (Readings for this week: Burton, 3-31; Miller, 1-250 but emphasize chs. 1, 3, 5, 7-8)

8/31                 Introduction: What does the Civil War mean?

9/2                   The U.S. Before the Civil War

 

Week 2: (Miller, 231-end, you may skip chs. 12 and 13; Burton, 32-76)

9/7                   Politics and parties                 

9/9                   Freedom and slavery  

 

Week 3: (Dew, 1-81; finish any essential Miller reading that you have not yet done; Burton 77-103)

9/14                 The Election of 1860

9/16                 Secession

 

Week 4: (Ayers, 1-188; Burton, 134-167)

9/21                 The War comes                      

9/23                 Drawing blood

 

Week 5: (Ayers 189-276; Burton, 168-192)

9/28                 The technology of war, ESSAY I due.

9/30                 The battles of 1862 [I]

 

Week 6: (Ayers, 277-end; Burton, 193-211)

10/5                 The battles of 1862 [II]

10/7                 War without mercy

 

Week 7: (Faust, xi-136)

10/12               FALL BREAK

10/14               The empty chair

 

Week 8: (Faust, 137-210; Burton, 212-233)

10/19               Turning points: 1863

10/21               PRELIM EXAM.  (No sections this week)

 

Week 9:  (Faust, 211-end)

10/26               Mothers of invention

10/28               The Great American Slave Rebellion, 1861-1865

 

Week 10:  (Burton, 234-270)

11/2                 Grant takes control

11/4                 Twilight of the slaveholder republic

 

Week 11: (Burton, 271-299)

11/9                 Palm Sunday and Good Friday; Presidential Reconstruction

11/11               In the South, ESSAY II due.

 

Week 12: (Burton, 300-322)

11/16               Radical Reconstruction

11/18               Reconstruction on the ground

 

Week 13: (Burton, 323-350; Murray, vii-101)

11/23               The decline of Reconstruction, North and South

11/25               Compromise and consequences

 

Week 14: (Burton, 351-370; Murray, 101-end)

11/30               “Nor is it over yet”: The long aftermath of the war in the South

12/2                 What the war meant: freedom, race, region, reunion, memory, government power, and war