Edwards, America's History for the AP® Course 10e - Chapter 13

King Cotton

The Confederates' belief during the Civil War that their cotton was so important to the British and French economies that those governments would recognize the South as an independent nation and supply it with loans and arms.

habeas corpus

A legal writ forcing government authorities to justify their arrest and detention of an individual. During the Civil War, Lincoln suspended habeas corpus to stop protests against the draft and other anti-Union activities.

contrabands

Slaves who fled plantations and sought protection behind Union lines during the Civil War.

Radical Republicans

The members of the Republican Party who were bitterly opposed to slavery and to southern slave owners since the mid-1850s. With the Confiscation Act in 1861, Radical Republicans began to use wartime legislation to destroy slavery.

Emancipation Proclamation

President Abraham Lincoln's proclamation issued on January 1, 1863, that legally abolished slavery in all states that remained out of the Union. While the Emancipation Proclamation did not immediately free a single slave, it signaled an end to the institution of slavery.

greenbacks

Paper money issued by the U.S. Treasury during the Civil War to finance the war effort.

one-tenth tax

A tax adopted by the Confederacy in 1863 that required all farmers to turn over a tenth of their crops and livestock to the government for military use. The tax demonstrated the southern government's strong use of centralized power; it caused great hardship for poor families.

draft (conscription)

The system for selecting individuals for conscription, or compulsory military service, first implemented during the Civil War.

twenty-Negro rule

A law adopted by the Confederate Congress that exempted one man from military conscription for every twenty slaves owned by a family. The law showed how dependence on coerced slave labor could be a military disadvantage, and it exacerbated class resentments among nonslaveholding whites who were required to serve in the army.

draft riots

Violent protests against military conscription that occurred in the North, most dramatically in New York City; led by working-class men who could not buy exemption from the draft.

Lieber Code

Union guidelines for the laws of war, issued in April 1863. The code ruled that soldiers and prisoners must be treated equally without respect to color or race; justified a range of military actions if they were based on "necessity" that would "hasten surrender"; and outlawed use of torture. The code provided a foundation for later international agreements on the laws of war.

U.S. Sanitary Commission

An organization that supported the Union war effort through professional and volunteer medical aid.

Woman's Loyal National League

An organization of Unionist women that worked to support the war effort, hoping the Union would recognize women's patriotism with voting rights after the war.

Gettysburg Address

Abraham Lincoln's November 1863 speech dedicating a national cemetery at the Gettysburg battlefield. Lincoln declared the nation's founding ideal to be that "all men are created equal," and he urged listeners to dedicate themselves out of the carnage of war to a "new birth of freedom" for the United States.

hard war

The philosophy and tactics used by Union general William Tecumseh Sherman, by which he treated civilians as combatants.

miscegenation

A derogatory word for interracial sexual relationships coined by Democrats in the 1864 election, as they claimed that emancipation would allow African American men to gain sexual access to white women and produce mixed-race children.

Special Field Order No. 15

An order by General William T. Sherman, later reversed by policymakers, that granted confiscated land to formerly enslaved families in Georgia and South Carolina so they could farm independently.