Civil War and Reconstruction: Key Events, Laws, and Figures in U.S. History

Free Soil Party

It was a short-lived party focusing on opposing the expansion of slavery into western territories.

Fugitive Slave Law

A federal law passed as part of the Compromise of 1850, requiring the return of escaped slaves to their owners even if they were in free states.

Underground Railroad

A network of secret routes and safe houses that helped enslaved people escape to freedom.

Fort Sumter

Confederates fired on Fort Sumter, which was held by the Union, marking the first military engagement of the Civil War.

Battle of Antietam

The single bloodiest day in U.S. military history resulted in over 22,700 casualties.

Battle of Gettysburg

Major Civil War battle in Pennsylvania between Union and Confederate forces.

Gettysburg Address

A short speech by President Abraham Lincoln at the dedication of a national cemetery.

Appomattox Court House

Site of the surrender of the Confederate Army of Northern VA by General Robert E. Lee to Union General Ulysses S. Grant.

Black Codes

A series of restrictive laws passed by southern states to limit African Americans' freedom and control their labor after the Civil War.

Thaddeus Stevens

He was the influential leader of the Radical Republicans during the Civil War and Reconstruction Era.

Credit Mobilier

A scheme where insiders of the Union Pacific Railroad created a fraudulent construction company to overcharge the federal government and bribe politicians.

Compromise of 1850

A package of five bills that defused a political confrontation between slave and free states over the status of territories acquired in the Mexican-American War.

Kansas - Nebraska Act

A law that created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska and allowed settlers there to decide whether to allow slavery through popular sovereignty.

Missouri Compromise

It repealed the Missouri Compromise, led to violent clashes known as "Bleeding Kansas," and catalyzed the formation of the Republican Party.

John C. Fremont

An American military officer, explorer, and the first presidential candidate of the anti-slavery Republican Party.

Robert E. Lee

The commanding general of the Confederate Army during the Civil War.

Fredericksburg

A major civil war battle where the Confederate army defeated the Union forces in Fredericksburg, VA.

Vicksburg

Siege led by Union General Ulysses S. Grant that resulted in the capture of the Confederate stronghold Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Copperheads

A group of Northern Democrats who opposed the Civil War and wanted to negotiate peace with the Confederacy.

Scalawags

A negative term for white southerners who supported the Republican Party and Reconstruction after the Civil War.

Carpetbaggers

A negative term for northerners who moved to the South after the Civil War, often to profit from or participate in Reconstruction.

Whiskey Ring

A major scandal during President Grant's administration which government officials and whiskey distillers conspired to evade millions of dollars in federal taxes.

Conscience Whigs

A faction of the Whig Party in the North that opposed slavery and its expansion on moral grounds.

Bleeding Kansas

A period of violent clashes between pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers in the Kansas Territory.

Harpers Ferry

The site of an abolitionist raid led by John Brown, who planned to steal weapons and start a slave rebellion.

Anaconda Plan

The Union military plan, proposed by General Winfield Scott to slowly strangle the South by blockading its ports and taking control of the Mississippi River.

Emancipation Proclamation

A presidential order by Abraham Lincoln that declared all slaves in the Confederate States were to be set free.

March to the Sea

A military campaign led by Union General William T. Sherman through Georgia, where his army destroyed Confederate infrastructure and resources.

Amendments 13-15

A set of amendments that abolished slavery, granted citizenship and equal protection to African Americans, and gave Black men the right to vote.

Ku Klux Klan

A white supremacist terrorist organization that used violence to suppress African American rights and resist Reconstruction.

Wade-Davis Bill

A bill passed by Congress that proposed a stricter plan for reconstruction than Lincoln's, requiring a majority of a state's population to swear.

Panic of 1873

A severe economic depression triggered by the failure of a major banking firm heavily invested in railroads.

Popular sovereignty

The idea that the people living in a territory should be able to vote to decide if they would be a free or slave state.

Sumner caning

An event where Representative Preston Brooks beat Senator Charles Sumner with a cane on the Senate floor.

Jefferson Davis

The president of the Confederate States of America during the Civil War.

Bull Run

The 1st major battle of the Civil War was fought near Manassas, VA.

George McClellan

A Union general known for his cautious approach to warfare and his repeated clashes with President Lincoln.

Ulysses S. Grant

Commanding general of the Union Army during the Civil War and later 18th president of the United States.

Freedmen's Bureau

A government agency established to aid formerly enslaved people in the South after the Civil War.

Hiram Revels

The 1st African American to serve in the U.S. Senate.

Tenure of Office Act

A law passed by Congress that limited the president's power to fire cabinet members without Senate approval.

Compromise of 1877

An informal agreement that settled the disputed 1876 presidential election.