APUSH - Civil War & Reconstruction Terms

Pacific Railway Act (1862)

• authorized 1st transcontinental railroad

  • granted federal land and bonds to Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroad companies

  • reduced transcontinental travel time while increasing expansion westward

• huge incentives for industrialists, homesteaders, businessmen

• not good for plantation owners & Native Americans

  • pushed Natives off of their land as expansion increased

Homestead Act (1862)

• U.S. law providing 160 acres of federal land to settlers for a small fee

  • required them to live on, improve, and farm the land for minimum of 5 years

• aimed to develop the west

  • giving millions of acres to individuals like freed slaves, immigrants, and veterans

Morrill Land Grant Act (1862)

• states received federal land to sell

  • proceeds funding new agricultural colleges

    • creating institutions like the University of California and Rutgers

• impact:

  • expanded educational opportunities for farmers and laborers

  • laid groundwork for public universities & scientific research

Conscription Acts

• 1st national draft

• Union passed Enrollment Act 1863

• Confederacy passed 1st act 1862

Greenbacks

• printed money to finance the Civil War

  • named after the green ink used

• lost value quickly and led to inflation and economic struggle in northern economy

Emancipation Proclamation 1863

• issued by Abraham Lincoln January 1st, 1863

• declared enslaved people in rebellious confederate states to be free

  • transforming war’s purpose to include ending slavery

    • allowing black men to join the Union military

54th Regiment

• one of the 1st African American regiments in the Civil War

  • famous for bravery at the assault on Fort Wagner in 1863

• recruiting abolitionist Frederick Douglass’s sons, proving black soldier’s valor

NY Draft Riots (1863)

• violent disturbances in Manhattan

  • widely regarded as the culmination of working-class discontent with new laws passed by Congress that year to draft men to fight in the war

Freedman’s Bureau

• gov’t agency to aid formerly enslaved people & poor whites in the South

  • made in 1865

• gave food, shelter, healthcare, education, legal help, and labor contract help

  • wanted to redistribute land but failed

• field order #15 redistributed a bit of land and during war

  • lasted 3-4 years

Civil Rights Act of 1866

• defined citizenship rights of freedom

• authorized peds to bring soit against those who violated it

Reconstruction Act of 1867

• put South on Sunit martial law

• must have new elections & constitutions

• all men, including African Americans could vote

  • ex: condeds couldn’t vote

• guarantee equal rights for all

• ratified 14th amendment

13th Amendment

• abolished slavery

  • except as punishment for crime

• December 1865

14th Amendment

• established citizenship for those born in the US

• gave equal protection to citizens of their equal rights

• 1868

15th Amendment

• gave African-American men of the right to vote

• February 1869

Grantism

• a derogatory term for the political corruption, cronyism, and incompetence

  • characterized President Ulysses S. Grant’s administration

    • 1769-1877

• the term reflects widespread accusations of political fraud and patronage during his presidency

  • a stark contrast to the ideals of republican gov’t

Compromise of 1877

• the disputed 1876 presidential electron, granting Republican Rutherford B. Hayes the presidency in exchange for Democrats accepting the win

  • in return for the withdrawal of all remaining US federal troops from the South

    • effectively ended Reconstruction and allowed white Democrats to regain control of the South

Radical Republicans

• powerful fraction in the US Republican Party during the Civil War & Reconstruction (1850s-1870s)

  • advocating for the immediate abolition of slavery, equal civil rights, and federal protection for African Americans

    • led by Thaddeus Stevens & Charles Sumner

• clashed with Lincoln and Johnson who advocated more lenient treatment of the South

Wade-Davis Bill

• made re-admittance to the Union for former Confederate states

  • majority in each ex-confederate state to take Ironclad oath

    • they had never, in the past, supported the Confederacy

• passed both chambers of congress by vetoed by Lincoln

Lincoln’s 10% plan

• a state could be reintegrated when 10% of the population based on 1860 vote count had taken an oath of allegiance to the US

• delegates could be elected to revise states constitutions and establish new governments

• all but high ranking confederate officers would be granted pardons

• guaranteed protection of private property (not slaves)

Clara Barton

• 1821-1912

• a pioneering American nurse, humanitarian, and founder of the American Red Cross

• “Angel of the Battlefield”

  • provided crucial care to soldiers during the Civil War

The Committee on the Conduct of the War

• joint committee on the Conduct of the War was a U.S. Congressional investigative body formed in December 1861 during Civil War

  • to oversee the Union war effort

• heavily influenced by Radical Republicans

  • pushed dor more aggressive anti-slavery policies and investigated generals

Jayhawks

• militant, anti-slavery Kansans

  • often violent vigilantes and irregulars

• prominent during “Bleeding Kansas” in 1850s and early Civil War

  • known for raiding pro-slavery Missourians and liberating slaves

    • embodying the fierce ideological conflict between free-starers and slaveholders

Copperheads

• “Peace Democrats”

  • a faction pf Northern Democrats who opposed the war

• advocated for immediate peace with the Confederacy

  • criticized President Lincoln’s policies

    • clashing with Republicans and UNionists over conscription and civil liberties

  • opposed the draft, emancipation, and perceived threats to states’ rights

Sherman’s “March to the Sea”

• devastating Union campaign led be General William T. Sherman from Atlanta to Savannah, Georgia (Nov-Dec 1864)

  • employing “total war” tactics by destroying infrastructure, supplies, and civilian property to cripple the Confederacy’s war effort

Field order #15

• Civil War military order from January 1865

  • confiscated Confederate land along the South Carolikna, Georgia, and Florida coasts for redistribution in 40-acre plots to nely freed Black families

    • symbolizing hope for economic independence

    • was largely reversed by President Andrew Johnson, returning land to former owners and forcing many freedpeople into sharecropping

Appomattox Court House

• the site in Virginia where COnfederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant

  • April 9, 1865

• effectively ending the Civil War

  • symbolizing the Confederacy’s military defeat, and ushering in the era of Reconstruction and national reunification

Black Codes

• restrictive laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War

  • 1865-1866

  • to control and exploit African Americans

    • limiting their freedom, movement, and economic opportunities

      • effectively attempting to recreate a system similar to slavery for cheap labor

Carpetbaggers

• Northerners who moved South after the Civil War during Reconstruction (1865-1877)

  • derogatory term used by Southerners to describe these newcomers seen as opportunistic exploiters seeking personal finciial or political gain from the South’s chaotic state

• supporting the Republican Party

  • working alongside freed slabes and white Southerners (scalawags)to rebuild and reform Southern gov’ts

    • establishing crucial reforms like piblic education but also facing deep resentment

Scalawags

• white Southerners who supported Reconstruction policies and joined the Republican Party after the Civil War

  • seen as traitors by many ex-Confederates for collaborating with freedmen and “Carpetbaggers” to rebuild the South

• their motivations varied from genuine reform to personal gain

  • included former Whigs, small farmers, merchants, and some ex-slaveholders who sought economic development

Blanche K. Bruce

• 1841-1898; former slave who became the first African American to serve a full term in the U.S. Senate

• a significant figure in Reconstruction politics, advocating for Black civil rights, Native American rights, and Chinese American rights

Hiram Revels

• 1827-1901; a pioneering African American minister, educator, and poltitican

• became the first African American to serve in the U.S. Congress

  • elected to the senate from Mississippi in 1870 during Reconstruction

Sharecropping

• post-Civil War agricultural labor system where landowners (often former slave owners) allowed poor farmers (Black freedmen and poor whites) to use their land in exchange for a large portion of the harvested crop

  • keeping many trapped in debt and economic dependence

  • resembling slavery but with slight differences in control

Crop-lien system

• post-Civil War Southern credit system where poor farmers (Black and white) and sharecroppers pledged their future harvests (usually cotton) to local merchants

  • for essential supplies like food, seed, and tools, trapping them in perpetual debt due to high interest rates and low crop prices

General Nathan Bedford Forrest

• 1821-1877; a controversial Confederate lIeutenant General

  • renowned for his brilliant, unorthodox cavalry tactics as “the wizard of the saddle”

  • rising from private to general without formal training

• infamous for his buisness in slavery and leading the KKK as its first Grand Wizard

Force Acts of 1870 & 1871

• crucial Reconstruction-era federal laws designed to protect African Americans’ civil rights

  • especially their right to vote

• after the Civil War and the passage of the 14th. & 15th Amendments

  • empowering federal gov’t to intervene against violent white supremacist groups like the KKK

    • allowing President Grant to use troops and suspend habeaus corpus

Redeemers

• white Southern Democrats who regained political power after the Civil War

• aiming to “redeem” the South from Republican rule and restore white supremacy by undoing Reconstruction-era reforms

  • ousting Black and Republican officials

    • implementing Jim Crow laws and discriminatory voting practices

Bourbon Rule

• conservative, Democratic oligarchy that regained political power in the post-Civil War South

  • after Reconstruction ended in 1877

• characterized by ruling for the interests of wealthy planters, merchants, and industrialists, promoting Southern industrialization (the “New South”)

  • but also maintaining white supremacy through economic control (sharecropping) and political disenfranchisement of Black voters via Jim Crow tactics

Solid South

• post-Civil War era (Reconstruction through the mid-20th century)

  • where Southern states overwhelmingly voted Democratic- a loyalty rooted in white supremacy

    • opposition to federal interventions (especially civil rights)

  • shared Southern identity

    • effectively making the South a reliable one-party bloc for the Democrats