History

What are the 5 Key Historical Trends in American History

American Identities, Technology, Reform, US Constitution, America in the world

When the confederacy collapsed, which cities did the Unnion capture

Atlanta, Savannah, Charleston, Columbia, Mobile, New Orleans, and Memphis had fallen by early

1865.

Black Codes goal

Maintain white supremacy post-slavery

Vagrancy Laws

Forced Black people into labor contractsF

Freedmen’s Bureau Goal

Transition slave labor to wage labor

Bureau Education Focus

Advocated education, especially for women

Bureau Teachers

Many came from Northern states

Johnson’s stance

Opposed government intervention (Allowed the Black codes to happen)

Civil Rights Act of 1866

Granted citizenship, overrode Johnson’s veto

14th amendment Section 1

Citizenship and Equal Protection

War’s Aftermath and Cost

• 600,000 soldiers dead

• Cities and farmlands devastated

• Thousands of women widowed and children orphaned

• Entire communities lost generations of young men

  • Massive rebuilding efforts awaited the US

Scorched Earth Tactic

• Known as “March or the Sea”

• turning point in war

  • Sherman captured major cities and wiped out a swath of southern territory

Who surrendered to who? For the civil war

Confederate- General LEE surrendered to UNION General GRANT

Reconstruction Goals and Challenges-

• President Lincoln lenient 10% rule for reunification

• Radical Republicans opposition to Lincoln’s plan and their push for harsher measures

10% plan

Lincoln sought to reunify the nation with minimal punishment for the South.

o Offered pardon to most Confederates, except high-ranking officials.

o Required 10% of voters in each rebel state to pledge allegiance to the U.S. and accept

emancipation.

o States had to draft new constitutions without slavery.

How did Republicans see the 10% plan

Republican Opposition

• Many Republicans saw Lincoln’s plan as too lenient, forming the Radical Republicans.

• They pushed for punishment of the South and protections for people.

• Proposed the Wade-Davis Bill, barring Confederates from political participation.

• Lincoln vetoed the bill, prioritizing national reunification over harsh measures.

Which amendment officially abolished slavery

13th

Who issued the Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction

Andrew Johnson

Who rejected Johnson’s leniency, creating oversight committees to ensure freed people’s rights

Republicans (NORTH)

13 amendment (both sections)

Section 1

• Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for

crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist

within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2

• Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate

legislation

What did the Black Codes do

Denied freedmen the right to vote, serve on juries, or own land.

o Forced African Americans into labor contracts under threat of violence, replicating slavery in practice

Because of the Black codes, what did Congress do?

Made the 14 ammendment

14 amendment (1868) (put into action)

Guaranteed equal protection under state and federal law.

o Overturned the Dred Scott decision, which had denied Black citizenship.

o Abolished the Three-Fifths Compromise, ensuring full representation for freed people.

14th amendment (sections)

1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States are citizens

2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers (excluding Indians not taxed

3. No people shall be a senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath,

4. Public debt

5. Congress shall have power to enforce

15 Ammendment

Section 1

• The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or

abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race,

color, or previous condition of servitude–

Section 2

• The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate

legislation.

* This gave men the right to vote.

The collapse of Reconstruction

The Compromise of 1877 – There was a

contested election between Rutherford B.

Hayes and Samuel J. Tilden. Hayes an

abolitionist won.

• Political Exhaustion

• Financial Depression

• Increasing Conservatism

• Labor conflicts – Knight of Labor (1869)

• Increasing Fear of Poor, White, and Black

The Compromise of 1877 –

There was a contested election between Rutherford B. Hayes and Samuel J. Tilden. Hayes an abolitionist won.

What were the Major Events of Reconstruction

13th Amendment (1865): Abolished slavery.

• 14th Amendment (1868): Granted citizenship and equal protection under the law.

• 15th Amendment (1870): Guaranteed voting rights for African American men.

• Black Codes: Laws enacted in Southern states to restrict African Americans' rights.

• Reconstruction Acts (1867): Divided the South into military districts to enforce federal policies.

• Compromise of 1877: Ended Reconstruction by withdrawing federal troops from the South.

Northern Changes Post Civil War

• Economic growth driven by industrialization.

• Advocacy for civil rights and suffrage, though often limited by pervasive racism.

• Growing tensions between federal power and state sovereignty.

Southern Changes Post Civil War

• Economic devastation due to the destruction of infrastructure and the loss of enslaved labor.

• Resistance to Reconstruction policies, including the rise of white supremacist groups.

• A rigid social hierarchy persisted, enforced through segregation and systemic oppression.

Economic Shifts Post Civil War

• Transition from a slave-based economy to a wage-labor system.

• Emergence of new economic systems like sharecropping.

Racial Relations

• Tensions escalated due to efforts to enforce equality and backlash from white Southerners.

  • Federal enforcement waned after the Compromise of 1877, leading to systemic discrimination.

Cultural Legacies:

• Literature, art, and political discourse reflected Reconstruction's impact, highlighting themes of freedom, justice, and reconciliation.

The “Old West” was in which city?—began to hear about the

opportunities to be found in the “New West.”

Pennysilvania

What does Manifest Destiny mean?

a phrase that came to mean that they were expected to spread across the land given to them by God and, most importantly, spread predominantly American values to the frontier.

Why did Hundreds of thousands of settlers packed their lives into wagons and

set out, following the Oregon, California, and Santa Fe Trails, to seek a

new life in the West.

Manifest Destiny

Key Motivations for going West

Shifting Perceptions of the West and Cultural Justification

Economic Hardship and Panic of 1837

Government Incentives

Shifting Perceptions of the West and Cultural Justification:

• Beliefs in manifest destiny and the civilizing mission of Euro-American

settlers, coupled with technological advances, motivated expansion at the

expense of Native and Hispanic populations.

• Once considered an arid wasteland (the "Great American Desert"),

growing economic opportunities and ideology transformed the West into a

land of promise for settlers.

Economic Hardship and Panic of 1837:

• The economic depression caused by land speculation and the Second

National Bank's failure drove people to seek new opportunities.

• Many viewed the West as a chance for economic independence through

farming, but financial struggles often prevented the poorest from pursuing

this dream.

Government Incentives:

• Federal policies, such as land grants, made western migration more viable,

though the costs and risks limited participation to those with some

financial resources.

Romanticization of the Frontier

The West was portrayed as a place of freedom, adventure, opportunity, and a fresh start. Term Manifest Destiny was coined by John O’ Sullivan

Economic Opportunity

People saw the West as a place to make money through farming, ranching and mining. New technology like railroads, telegraphs, and steel plows made settlement easier

Federal Intervention

The federal government encouraged westward migration through policies such as Homestead Act and by building infrastructure like railroads

Which Federal Policies: Encouraged Westward Migration

The Homestead Act (1862):

The Pacific Railway Acts (1862 and 1864)

The Preemption Act (1841)

The Land Ordinance of 1785 and the Northwest Ordinance (1787)

The Donation Land Claim Act (1850):

Indian Removal Act (1830):

The Preemption Act (1841)

Allowed settlers who were already living on public land (squatters) to purchase up

to 160 acres at a low price before the land was made available to others.

The Land Ordinance of 1785 and the Northwest Ordinance (1787)

Established a system for surveying, selling,

and settling western lands, creating an organized process for westward expansion.

The Donation Land Claim Act (1850):

Granted free land (up to 320 acres for single men or 640 acres for married

couples) in the Oregon Territory to settlers who lived on and cultivated the land for four years.

Indian Removal Act (1830):

Authorized the forced relocation of Native American tribes to make land available

for non-Native settlers.

The Pacific Railway Acts (1862 and 1864):

this act commissioned the Union Pacific Railroad to build new track

west from Omaha, Nebraska, while the Central Pacific Railroad moved east from Sacramento, California, each

company received ownership of all public lands within two hundred feet on either side of the track laid, as well

as additional land grants and payment through load bonds. The nation’s first transcontinental railroad was

completed when the two companies connected their tracks at Promontory, Utah, in the spring of 1869.

The Homestead Act (1862):

Offered 160 acres of public land to settlers for a small filing fee, provided they

improved the land and lived there for 5 years. Available to both Men and Women, the government transferred

over 270 million acres of public domain land to private citizens.

Who were the people settling west?

Prosperous Families: Early settlers along the Oregon Trail (1840s-1850s) were moderately prosperous, White, native-born farming families.

2nd wave post civil war African Americans. (Did they migrate west?) (If so what did they do and why?)

Thousands migrated west to escape racism and seek economic opportunities.

Some became farmers but also some became cattle herders.

Exodusters

Who are Exodusters

African Americans migrating west

How did the government control western settlement?

Forts

Challenges of Western Expansion

Difficult land, High costs,

What are marketing pressures?

Increased production led to lower crop prices, impacting small family farms.

Cycle of Debt and Foreclosure:

Farmers often borrowed with the hope of repaying after harvest. Many faced debt and potential foreclosure, with fluctuating crop prices and the economics of supply and demand.

Dry Farming: Dee

Dry farming is an agricultural method that produces crops without artificial irrigation, relying instead on natural precipitation and moisture stored deep within the soil. [1, 2]

What houses did settlers have

Sod Houses (mud and sod with thatch roofs)

How did women struggle with these migrations?

Complications of birth, no nurse or midwife, not many rights for women

California Gold Rush (1848):

The discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill in Coloma, California, sparked a rush of prospectors seeking quick riches. This pattern repeated in places like Colorado and Nevada

Forty-Niners:

Individual prospectors using methods like panning and sluicing descended on new gold discovery sites.

Initial prospectors:

They mostly men but there was a diverse group of prospectors that included Mexican-Americans, Chinese-Americans, and women

Second wave of Gold Rush settlers included:

saloonkeepers,

prostitutes, store owners, and criminals, who all arrived in droves

Comstock Lode (1859):

Henry T. P. Comstock’s discovery of silver in Nevada was the first

significant silver find in the U.S., yielding over $300 million. Initially he was prospecting for

Gold

Shift to Industrial Mining:

By the 1860s and 1870s, larger businesses began to dominate mining operations, leading to the development of urban stability and infrastructure in cities like Denver.

Comstock Law (1873):

U.S. Congress passed both the Comstock Law (named after its

chief proponent, anti-obscenity crusader Anthony Comstock) in 1873 to ban the spread

of “lewd and lascivious literature” through the mail

Page Act (1875):

Prohibited transporting women into the United States for

employment as prostitutes. However, the “houses of ill repute” continued to operate

and remained popular throughout the West despite the efforts of reformers.

Community Building:

Abilene, Kansas, is one example of a lawless town, replete with

prostitutes, gambling, and other vices, transformed when middle-class women arrived

in the 1880s with their cattle baron husbands. These women began to organize

churches, school, civic clubs, and other community programs to promote family values.