<<

HISTORY 6311 (CRN 36678) GRADUATE SEMINAR IN THE ERA OF THE , 1850-1877 WEDNESDAYS, 6:10-8:00, PHILLIPS 329 PROFESSOR TYLER ANBINDER OFFICE: ROOM 324 PHILLIPS; OFFICE PHONE: 994-6470; E-MAIL: [email protected] OFFICE HOURS: MONDAYS 2:15-3:15, WEDNESDAYS 3:30-5:30, OR BY APPOINTMENT

COURSE OVERVIEW: The purpose of this class is to provide graduate students with a thorough introduction to the scholarly writing on the era of the American Civil War. Students enrolled in the course will examine the sectional crisis that led to the outbreak of war, the conflict itself in its military, political, and social dimensions, as well as the attempts at racial and sectional reconciliation made during the Reconstruction years.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES: By the end of the semester, students should: 1) in class discussions, demonstrate the ability to describe and analyze historiographic trends concerning the political crisis of the 1850s, the origins of southern nationalism, the fighting of the Civil War, the impact of the war on politics North and South, emancipation, and the political and economic consequences of Reconstruction; 2) in a seminar paper, demonstrate the ability to synthesize and appraise the historiographic trends in one Civil War-era subfield and predict the future course of study in that subfield; or 3) in a seminar paper, identify a research-worthy topic, conduct a search of relevant primary and secondary source materials, carry out a critical analysis of these materials, and synthesize the data obtained in these materials into a historical narrative; 4) enhance their writing skills in a manner consistent with the standards of the history discipline.

REQUIREMENTS: There are no prerequisites for the class, but students are expected to have a good background in the history of the Civil War era. Those who feel they lack such a background are encouraged to read James McPherson’s Battle Cry of Freedom before the beginning of the semester. The main written work for the class will consist of a fifteen to twenty-page seminar paper. The essay can be either a research paper based mostly on primary sources, or a historiographic essay analyzing trends in the literature concerning a certain person, subject, or event relevant to this period. You must consult with me during office hours before the end of September to get advice concerning and approval of your paper topic. Papers will be graded on the basis of 1) how well the paper is written and organized; 2) the quality of the research and/or analysis; 3) originality; and 4) the sophistication of presentation and content. Papers may not, under any circumstances, be submitted by e-mail or in any other electronic form.

Smaller Assignments: 1) Book review assignment: You are to write a book review, 750 words maximum (no exceptions— just as the word limits of journals are very strict), of any book either assigned for this class or to be used in your research paper or historiographic paper. The review should briefly summarize the book’s scope and thesis, describe its strengths and weaknesses (including how the author might have improved the weak parts), and why it is or is not a significant work in its field. PLEASE DO NOT LOOK AT OTHER REVIEWS OF YOUR CHOSEN BOOK. It is virtually impossible for you to make someone else’s argument your own in a convincing manner. Besides, a regular reviewer does not get to look at other reviews, and in order to get the most out of the assignment, you should replicate the situation of a real reviewer. These can be handed in, in class only, any day by the end of October. Remember, there will be aspects of the book that you will not feel expert enough to 2 comment on. That’s OK. Everyone has some degree of expertise (even just experience reading good history books) that enables him or her to make critical judgments about the book under review. The keys are to 1) explain yourself clearly, 2) make sure to quote the book briefly at least a few times, and 3) to substantiate your criticisms with either quotations from the book or other forms of evidence or analysis.

2) Group footnote check assignment: You will be broken up into groups of two or three. Each group will be assigned a page or two from a published book about the period covered in this class. You will check the footnotes indicated (no more than three) to see if 1) the sources cited in the notes actually contain the information associated with that footnote; 2) the quotations contained on the page are accurately transcribed; 3) whether the quotations are contextually accurate (i.e. not taken “out of context”); and 4) whether the information in the footnote was sufficient to allow you to easily find the information cited. You should begin and end your paper with a very brief introduction and conclusion summarizing your findings. You will hand in a report of your findings of from three to five double-spaced pages and append to the report at least one copy of one primary source to substantiate your findings. The excerpts are posted on Blackboard under “Projects” and you will turn in your reports in class on October 3rd. Each group will give a brief (no more than 5 minute) presentation on its findings in class on October 3rd. Each group’s excerpt will be assigned in class.

Your grade for the semester will be determined as follows: 25% class participation; 10% book review; 5% footnote check assignment; 10% term paper draft; 50% final paper. Because this class will be devoted entirely to discussion, it is vital that students come to all the classes, do the reading, and participate in discussions. Missing classes will adversely affect one’s discussion grade.

The following books will be available for purchase at the GW bookstore: Edward Ayers, In the Presence of Mine Enemies Ira Berlin, et. al., Slaves No More David Blight, Race and Reunion Drew Gilpin Faust, This Republic of Suffering , Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men Eric Foner, Reconstruction (possibly shelved in bookstore with books for HIST 3312) , Been in the Storm So Long Kate Masur, An Example for All the Land John McCardell, The Idea of a Southern Nation Stephanie McCurry, Confederate Reckoning Manisha Sinha, The Counter-Revolution of : Politics and Ideology in Antebellum S.C. Daniel Sutherland, A Savage Conflict

3

CLASS SCHEDULE AND READING ASSIGNMENTS

AUGUST 29: Introduction

SEPTEMBER 5: The Emergence of the Republican Party Foner, Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party Before the Civil War, all Frank Towers, “Partisans, New History, and Modernization: The Historiography of the Civil War’s Causes, 1861–2011,” Journal of the Civil War Era 1 (2011): 237-264 (on Blackboard reserve)

Further Suggested Reading: The Abolition Movement Gilbert Hobbs Barnes, The Antislavery Impulse, 1830-1844 (1933). Whitney Cross, The Burned-Over District: The Social and Intellectual History of Enthusiastic Religion in Western , 1800-1850 (1950). Russel Nye, William Lloyd Garrison and the Humanitarian Reformers (1955). Perry, Lewis. Radical Abolitionism: Anarchy and the Government of God in Antislavery Thought (1973). Richard H. Sewell, Ballots for Freedom: Antislavery Politics in the United States, 1837-1860 (1976). James Brewer Stewart, Holy Warriors: The Abolitionists and American Slavery (1976). Paul E. Johnson, A Shopkeeper’s Millennium: Society and Revivals in Rochester, New York, 1815- 1837 (1978). Lawrence J. Friedman, Gregarious Saints: Self and Community in American Abolitionism 1830-1870 (1982). John R. McKivigan, The War against Proslavery Religion: Abolitionism and the Northern Churches, 1830-1865 (1984). Aileen S. Kraditor, Means and Ends in American Abolitionism: Garrison and His Critics on Strategy and Tactics, 1834-1850 (1969). William S. McFeely, Fredrick Douglass (1992). Robert Abzug, Cosmos Crumbling: American Reform and the Religious Imagination (1994). Julie Roy Jeffery, The Great Silent Army of Abolitionism: Ordinary Women in the Antislavery Movement (1998). John Stauffer, The Black Hearts of Men: Radical Abolitionists and the Transformation of Race. (2001). Bruce Dorsey, Reforming Men and Women: Gender in the Antebellum City (2002). Michael D. Pierson, Free Hearts, Free Homes: Gender and American Antislavery Politics (2003). Jonathan H. Earle, Jacksonian Antislavery and the Politics of Free Soil, 1824-1854 (2004). Stanley Harrold, The Rise of Aggressive Abolitionism: Addresses to the Slaves (2004). Bruce Laurie, Beyond Garrison: Antislavery and Social Reform (2005). Timothy McCarthy and John Stauffer, eds., Prophets of Protest: Reconsidering the History of American Abolitionism (2005). Edward B. Rugemer, The Problem of Emancipation: The Caribbean Roots of the American Civil War (2008).

4

SEPTEMBER 12: The Ethnocultural Interpretation; the “Party Period” and its Critics William Gienapp, “Nativism and the Creation of a Republican Majority,” Journal of American History 72 (1985): 529-559 (available on J-STOR) Anbinder, Nativism and Slavery, chs. 2, 5, and 10 (on Blackboard reserve) Bruce Levine, “Conservatism, Nativism, and Slavery: Thomas R. Whitney and the Origins of the Know-Nothing Party,” Journal of American History 88 (2001): 455-488 (J-STOR) Gienapp, “Politics Seems to Enter into Everything: Political Culture in the North, 1840-1860” (on Blackboard reserve) Glenn C. Altschuler and Stuart M. Blumin, “Limits of Political Engagement in Antebellum America: A New Look at the Golden Age of Participatory Democracy,” Journal of American History 84 (1997): 855-885 (J-STOR) John Brooke, “Liminal Rupture,” (Blackboard reserve)

Further Suggested Reading: The Collapse of the Second Party System, Ethno-Cultural Issues and Politics, and Northern Political Culture Northern Politics Avery Craven, The Coming of the Civil War (1942). , The Disruption of American Democracy (1948). , and the Coming of the Civil War (1960). Frederick Merk, Manifest Destiny and Mission in American History (1963). Holman Hamilton, Prologue to Conflict: The Crisis and Compromise of 1850 (1964). David Potter, The Impending Crisis, 1848-1861 (1976). Michael F. Holt, The Political Crisis of the 1850s (1978). Jean Baker, Affairs of Party: The Political Culture of Northern Democrats in the Mid-Nineteenth Century (1983). Thomas Hietala, Manifest Design: American Exceptionalism & Empire (1985). Joel Silbey, The Partisan Imperative: The Dynamics of American Politics Before the Civil War (1985). Richard McCormick, The Party Period and Public Policy: American Politics from the Age of Jackson to the Progressive Era (1986). William E. Gienapp, The Origins of the Republican Party, 1852-1856 (1987). James Huston, The Panic of 1857 and the Coming of the Civil War (1987). Paul Bourke and Donald DeBats, Washington County: Politics and Community in Antebellum America (1995). Michael Morrison, Slavery and the American West: The Eclipse of Manifest Destiny and the Coming of the Civil War (1997). Michael Holt, The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War (1999). Reeve Huston, Land and Freedom: Rural Society, Popular Protest, and Party Politics in Antebellum New York (2000). Glenn Altschuler and Stuart Blumin, Rude Republic: and Their Politics in the Nineteenth Century (2000). Leonard L. Richards, The Slave Power: The Free North and Southern Domination, 1780-1860 (2000). Charles McCurdy, The Anti-Rent Era in New York Law and Politics, 1839-1865 (2001). Don Fehrenbacher, The Slaveholding Republic: An Account of the United States Government’s Relations to Slavery (2001). 5

Robert E. May, Manifest Destiny’s Underworld: Filibustering in Antebellum America (2002). James Huston, Calculating the Value of the Union: Slavery, Property Rights, and the Economic Origins of the Civil War (2003). Nicole Etcheson, Bleeding Kansas: Contested Liberty in the Civil War Era (2004). Mark A. Lause, Young America: Land, Labor, and the Republican Community (2005). Amy Greenberg, Manifest Manhood and the Antebellum American Empire (2005). Sean Wilentz, The Rise of American Democracy: Slavery and the Crisis of American Democracy, 1840-1860 (2005). David Reynolds, John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights (2005). Leonard Richards, The California Gold Rush and the Coming of the Civil War (2007). John Ashworth, Slavery, Capitalism, and Politics in the Antebellum Republic, Volume 2: The Coming of the Civil War, 1850-1861 (2007). Earl Maltz, Dred Scott and the Politics of Slavery (2007). Marc Egnal, Clash of Extremes: The Economic Origins of the Civil War (2009). Williamjames Hoffer, The Caning of Charles Sumner: Honor, Idealism, and the Origins of the Civil War (2010).Ronald P. Formisano, “The Invention of the Ethnocultural Interpretation,” American Historical Review 99 (1994): 453-477

SEPTEMBER 19: The Emergence of Southern Nationalism McCardell, The Idea of a Southern Nation, all except ch. 4

Further Suggested Reading: Southern Nationalism and Its Leaders; Southern Politics and Political Culture Jesse Carpenter, The South as a Conscious Minority, 1789-1861: A Study in Political Thought (1930). Avery Craven, Edmund Ruffin, Southerner: A Study in Secession (1932). Charles S. Sydnor, The Development of Southern Sectionalism, 1819-1848 (1948). William Cooper, Jr., The South and the Politics of Slavery, 1828-1856 (1978). J. Mills Thornton III, Politics and Power in a Slave Society: Alabama, 1800-1860 (1978). Bertram Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor: Ethics & Behavior in the Old South (1982). James Oakes, The Ruling Race: A History of American Slaveholders (1982). Lacy K. Ford, Jr., Origins of Southern Radicalism: The South Carolina Upcountry, 1800- 1860 (1988). William Freehling, The Road to Disunion, Vol. 1: Secessionists at Bay, 1776-1854 (1991). Eric Walther, The Fire-Eaters (1992). William Taylor, Cavalier & Yankee: The Old South and American National Character (1993). Shearer Davis Bowman, Masters and Lords: Mid-19th Century U.S. Planters and Prussian Junkers (1993). Stephanie McCurry, Masters of Small Worlds: Yeoman Households, Gender Relations, & the Political Culture of the Antebellum South Carolina Low Country (1995). William Kauffman Scarborough, Masters of the Big House: Elite Slaveholders of the Mid- Nineteenth-Century South (2003). Frank Towers, The Urban South and the Coming of the Civil War (2004). Eric Walther, William Lowndes Yancey and the Coming of the Civil War (2006). William Freehling, The Road to Disunion, Vol. 2: Secessionists Triumphant, 1854-1861 (2007). 6

Matthew Guterl, American Mediterranean: Southern Slaveholders in the Age of Emancipation (2008). Elizabeth Varon, Disunion! The Coming of the American Civil War, 1789-1859 (2008). Robert Bonner, Mastering America: Southern Slaveholders and the Crisis of American Nationhood (2009).

SEPTEMBER 26: NO CLASS, Yom Kippur

OCTOBER 3: Was Southern Nationalism Revolutionary or Counter-Revolutionary? Manisha Sinha, The Counter-Revolution of Slavery: Politics and Ideology in Antebellum South Carolina, all Footnote Check Assignment (written version & oral report) due in class Oct. 3!!!!

OCTOBER 10: The War Commences: The View from Two Border Communities Ayers, In the Presence of Mine Enemies, pp. 1-276

Further Suggested Reading: Causes of the War; Community Studies North and South David Potter, Lincoln and his Party in the Secession Crisis (1942). Kenneth M. Stampp, And the War Came: The North and the Secession Crisis, 1860-1861 (1950). W. A. Swanberg, First Blood: The Story of Fort Sumter (1957). , The Civil War, A Narrative: Fort Sumter to Perryville, 3 vols. (1958). Richard Current, Lincoln and The First Shot (1963). Phillip Shaw Paludan, “A People’s Contest”: The Union and Civil War, 1861-1865 (1988). James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (1988). Gabor S. Boritt, ed., Why the Confederacy Lost (1992). Gary Gallagher, The Confederate War (1997). James McPherson and William Cooper, Jr., eds., Writing the Civil War: The Quest to Understand (1998). Edward Ayers, What Caused the Civil War? Reflections on the South and Southern History (2005). Robert Tracy McKenzie, Lincolnites and Rebels: A Divided Town in the American Civil War (2006). Joseph T. Glatthar, General Lee's Army: From Victory to Collapse (2008). Brian D. Schoen, The Fragile Fabric of Union: Cotton, Federal Politics, and the Global Origins of the Civil War (2009). Kenneth W. Noe, Reluctant Rebels: The Confederates who Joined the Army after 1861 (2010). Stephen Berry, ed., Weirding the War: Stories from the Civil War’s Ragged Edges (2011).

OCTOBER 17: The View from the Battlefield Sutherland, Savage Conflict, all.

Further Suggested Reading: Military History of the War (including the officers and enlisted men) 7

Kenneth Williams, Lincoln Finds a General: A Military Study of the Civil War (1949). John Barrett, Sherman’s March Through the Carolinas (1956). William McFeely, Grant, A Biography (1981). Richard E. Beringer, Herman Hattaway, Archer Jones, and William Still, Jr., Why the South Lost the Civil War (1986). Stephen Sears, George B. McClellan: The Young Napoleon (1988). Reid Mitchell, Civil War Soldiers (1988). Edward Hagerman, The American Civil War and the Origins of Modern Warfare: Ideas, Organization, and Field Command (1988). Paddy Griffith, Battle Tactics of the Civil War (1989). Michael Fellman, Inside War: The Guerrilla Conflict in Missouri During the American Civil War (1989). Alan Nolan, Lee Considered: General Robert E. Lee and Civil War History (1991). Charles Royster, The Destructive War: William Tecumseh Sherman, Stonewall Jackson, and the Americans (1991). Brian Steelwills, A Battle From the Start: The Life of Nathan Bedford Forrest (1992). Stephen Sears, To the Gates of Richmond: The Peninsula Campaign (1992). Gabor Boritt, ed., Why the Confederacy Lost (1992). Alice Rains Trulock, In the Hands of Providence: Joshua L. Chamberlain and the American Civil War (1992). Jeffry Wert, General James Longstreet: The Confederacy’s Most Controversial Soldier (1993). Reid Mitchell, The Vacant Chair: The Northern Soldier Leaves Home (1993). James McPherson, For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War (1997). Brooks D. Simpson, Ulysses S. Grant: Triumph Over Adversity, 1822-1865 (2000). Jean Edward Smith, Grant (2001). Noah Andre Trudeau, Gettysburg: A Testing of Courage (2002). James McPherson, Crossroads of Freedom: Antietam, The Battle That Changed the Course of the Civil War (2002). Deanne Blanton and Lauren Cook, They Fought Like Demons: Women Soldiers in the Civil War (2002). Donald Shaffer, After the Glory: The Struggles of Black Civil War Veterans (2004). Elizabeth Brown Pryor, Reading the Man: A Portrait of Robert E. Lee Through His Private Letters (2007). Mark Neely, The Civil War and the Limits of Destruction (2007). Chandra Manning, What This Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War (2007). Earl J. Hess, The Rifle Musket in Civil War Combat: Reality and Myth (2008). Chandra Manning, What This Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War (2008). Winston Groom, Vicksburg 1863 (2009). Barton Myers, Executing Daniel Bright: Race, Loyalty, and Guerrilla Violence in a Coastal Carolina Community, 1861-1865 (2009). Donald Stoker, The Grand Design: Strategy and the U.S. Civil War (2010). Mark Geiger, Financial Fraud and Guerrilla Violence in Missouri’s Civil War, 1861-1865 (2010). Paul Cimbala, Soldiers North and South: The Everyday Experiences of the Men Who Fought America’s Civil War (2010). 8

Andrew Bell, Mosquito Soldiers: Malaria, Yellow Fever, and the Course of the American Civil War (2010). Gary Gallagher, The Union War (2011). James Marten, Sing Not War: The Lives of Union and Confederate Veterans in America (2011). Wayne Wei-Siang Hsieh, “Total War and the American Civil War Reconsidered: The End of an Outdated “Master Narrative” The Journal of the Civil War Era 1 (Sept. 2011). Carol Reardon, With a Sword in One Hand and Jomini in the Other: The Problem of Military Thought in the Civil War North (2012).

OCTOBER 24: Lincoln and Emancipation LaWanda Cox, Lincoln and Black Freedom, ch. 1 (on BB Electronic Reserve) Ira Berlin, et. al., "The Destruction of Slavery," in Slaves No More (on BB Electronic Reserve) James McPherson, "Who Freed The Slaves?" in Drawn with the Sword (on Electronic Reserve) Anthony Kaye, “Slaves, Emancipation, and the Powers of War,” in Cashin, The War Was You and Me, ch. 3. (on BB Electronic Reserve) Eric Foner, “Lincoln and Colonization,” in Foner, ed., Our Lincoln: New Perspectives on Lincoln and His World, pp. 135-166 (on BB Electronic Reserve) Hahn, Political Worlds of Slavery and Freedom, ch. 2 (will be placed on BB Reserve)

Further Suggested Reading: Lincoln and Politics in the North T. Harry Williams, Lincoln and the Radicals (1941). James G. Randall, Constitutional Problems Under Lincoln (1951). Frank Klement, The Copperheads in the Middle West (1960). Hans L. Trefousse, The : Lincoln’s Vanguard for Racial Justice (1968). Christopher Dell, Lincoln and the War Democrats: The Grand Erosion of Conservative Tradition (1975). Charles Strozier, Lincoln’s Quest for Union: Public and Private Meanings (1982). Frank Klement, Dark Lanterns: Secret Political Societies, Conspiracies, and Treason Trials in the Civil War (1984). Iver Bernstein, The Draft Riots: Their Significance for American Society and Politics in the Age of the Civil War (1990). Grace Palladino, Another Civil War: Labor, Capital, and the State in the Anthracite Regions of Pennsylvania, 1840-68 (1990). Mark Neely, Jr., : and Civil Liberties (1991). David Herbert Donald, Lincoln (1995). Mark Neely, Jr., The Union Divided: Party Conflict in the Civil War North (2002). Daniel Farber, Lincoln’s Constitution (2003). Sven Beckert, “Emancipation and Empire: Reconstructing the Worldwide Web of Cotton Production in the Age of the American Civil War,” American Historical Review 109 (2004), 1405-1438. Allen Guelzo, Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation: The End of Slavery in America (2004). Joshua Wolf Shenk, Lincoln’s Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness (2005). Ronald White, Jr., The Eloquent President: A Portrait of Lincoln Through His Words (2005). , : The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (2005). 9

Adam I. P. Smith's No Party Now: Politics in the Civil War North (2006). Jennifer L. Weber, Copperheads: The Rise and Fall of Lincoln’s Opponents in the North (2006). Eric Foner, ed., Our Lincoln: New Perspectives on Lincoln and His World (2008). Brian McGinty, Lincoln and the Court (2008). William Lee Miller, President Lincoln: The Duty of a Statesman (2008). James McPherson, Tried By War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief (2008). Fred Kaplan, Lincoln: The Biography of a Writer (2008). George Frederickson, Big Enough to Be Inconsistent: Abraham Lincoln Confronts Slavery and Race (2008). Mark Neely, The Boundaries of American Political Culture in the Civil War Era (2009). Ronald White, Jr., A. Lincoln (2009). William Blair and Karen Fisher Younger, eds., Lincoln’s Proclamation: Emancipation Reconsidered (2009). Eric Foner, : Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery (2010). Stephen C. Neff, Justice in Blue and Gray: A Legal History of the Civil War (2010). Edward L. Ayers, “The American Civil War, Emancipation, and Reconstruction on the World Stage,” in L. Diane Barnes, Brian Schoen, and Frank Towers, eds., The Old South’s Modern Worlds: Slavery, Region and Nation in the Age of Progress (2011), 289-297.

OCTOBER 31: The War’s Culture of Death Faust, This Republic of Suffering, all

Further Suggested Reading: The Social History of the War, North and South Ralph Andreano, The Economic Impact of the American Civil War (1962). George Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War: Northern Intellectuals and the Crisis of the Union (1965). Clarence Mohr, On the Threshold of Freedom: Masters and Slaves in Civil War Georgia (1986). Randall Jimerson, The Private Civil War: Popular Thought During the Sectional Conflict (1988). Wayne Durrill, War of Another Kind: A Southern Community in the Great Rebellion (1990). Anne Rose, Victorian America and the Civil War (1992). Drew Gilpin Faust, Mothers of Invention: Women of the Slaveholding South in the American Civil War (1996). , The Greatest Nation of the Earth: Republican Economic Policies During the Civil War (1997). Gary Gallagher, The Confederate War (1997). William Blair, Virginia’s Private War: Feeding Body and Soul in the Confederacy, 1861- 1865 (1998). Nina Silber, Daughters of the Union: Northern Women Fight the Civil War (2005). Mark Wetherington, Plain Folk’s Fight: The Civil War and Reconstruction in Piney Woods Georgia (2005). Cheryl Wells, Civil War Time: Temporality and Identity in America, 1861-1865 (2005). Roger Ransom, The Confederate States of America: What Might Have Been (2005). Amy Murrell Taylor, The Divided Family in Civil War America (2005). Harry S. Stout, Upon the Altar of the Nation: A Moral History of the Civil War (2006). 10

Aaron Sheehan-Dean, Why Confederates Fought: Family and Nation in Civil War Virginia (2007). Sally Jenkins and John Stauffer, The State of Jones: The Small Southern County That Seceded From the Confederacy (2009). George C. Rable, God's Almost Chosen Peoples: A Religious History of the American Civil War (2011). Robert Sandow, Deserter Country: Civil War Opposition in the Pennsylvania Appalachians (2011).

NOVEMBER 7: Why the South Lost McCurry, Confederate Reckoning, all.

Further Suggested Reading: Why the South Lost; Southern Politics during the War Paul Escott, After Secession: Jefferson Davis and the Failure of Confederate Nationalism (1978). Emory Thomas, The Confederate Nation: 1861-1865 (1979). Beringer, et al., Why the South Lost the Civil War (1986). William Davis, Jefferson Davis: The Man and His Hour (1991). Gary Gallagher, The Confederate War (1999). Susan-Mary Grant, North Over South: Northern Nationalism and American Identity in the Antebellum Era (2000). John C. Inscoe and Robert Kenzer, eds., Enemies of the Country: New Perspectives on Unionists in the Civil War South (2001). William Freehling, The South vs. The South: How Anti-Confederate Southerners Shaped the Course of the Civil War (2001). Melinda Lawson, Patriot Fires: Forging a New American Nationalism in the Civil War North (2002). Anne Rubin, A Shattered Nation: The Rise and Fall of the Confederacy, 1861-1868 (2005). Anne Sarah Rubin, A Shattered Nation: The Rise and Fall of the Confederacy, 1861-1868 (2005). Bruce Levine, Confederate Emancipation: Southern Plans to Free and Arm Slaves during the Civil War (2006). David Williams, Bitterly Divided: The South’s Inner Civil War (2008).

NOVEMBER 14: The Experience of Emancipation Leon Litwack, Been in the Storm So Long: The Aftermath of Slavery, all DUE IN MY MAILBOX IN 335 Phillips by NOON, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 16: a polished draft of the first four pages of your paper

Further Suggested Reading: Emancipation Roger Ransom and Richard Such, One Kind of Freedom: The Economic Consequences of Emancipation (1977). Harold Woodman, “Post-Civil War Southern Agriculture and The Law,” Agricultural History 53 (1979): 319-337. Ralph Shlomowitz, "Bound" or "Free"? Black Labor in Cotton and Sugarcane Farming, 1865- 1880,” Journal of Southern History 50 (1984): 569-596. 11

Barbara Jeanne Fields, Slavery and Freedom on the Middle Ground: Maryland during the Nineteenth Century (1985). Julie Saville, The Work of Reconstruction: From Slave to Wage Laborer in South Carolina, 1860-1870 (1994). Leslie A. Schwalm, A Hard Fight For We: Women’s Transition from Slavery to Freedom in South Carolina (1997). John C. Rodrigue, Reconstruction in the Cane Fields: From Slavery to Free Labor in Louisiana’s Sugar Parishes, 1862-1880 (2001). , (2003) Susan O’Donovan, Becoming Free in the Cotton South (2007). Leslie Schwalm, Emancipation’s Diaspora: Race and Reconstruction in the Upper Midwest (2009).

NOVEMBER 28: Reconstruction: Local Masur, An Example for All the Land, all

Further Suggested Reading: Reconstruction , The Tragic Era: The Revolution After Lincoln (1929). W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America, 1860-1880 (1935). C. Vann Woodward, Reunion and Reaction: The and the End of Reconstruction (1951). Eric McKitrick, and Reconstruction (1960). Willie Lee Rose, Rehearsal for Reconstruction: The Port Royal Experiment (1964). Joel Williamson, After Slavery: The Negro in South Carolina During Reconstruction, 1861- 1877 (1965). William McKee Evans, Ballots and Fence Rails: Reconstruction on the Lower Cape Fear (1966). David Montgomery, Beyond Equality: Labor and the Radical Republicans, 1862-1872 (1967). Allen Trelease, White Terror: The Conspiracy and Southern Reconstruction (1971). Michael Perman, Reunion Without Compromise: The South and Reconstruction, 1865-1868 (1973). Thomas Holt, Black Over White: Negro Political Leadership in South Carolina during Reconstruction (1977). William Gillette, Retreat from Reconstruction, 1869-1879 (1979). Michael Perman, The Road to Redemption: Southern Politics, 1869-1879 (1984). Hans L. Trefousse, Andrew Johnson, A Biography (1989). Mark Wahlgren Summers, The Era of Good Stealings (1993). Peter Bardaglio, Reconstructing the Household: Families, Sex, and the Law in the Nineteenth- Century South (1995). Laura Edwards, Gendered Strife and Confusion: The Political Culture of Reconstruction (1997). Hans L. Trefousse, : Nineteenth-Century Egalitarian (1997). Michael Fitzgerald, Urban Emancipation: Popular Politics in Reconstruction Mobile, 1860- 1890 (2002). 12

James Alex Baggett, The : Southern Dissenters in the Civil War and Reconstruction (2003). Nancy Bercaw, Gendered Freedoms: Race, Rights, and the Politics of Household in the Delta, 1861-1875 (2003). Jane Turner Censer, The Reconstruction of White Southern Womanhood, 1865-1895 (2003). Andrew Slap, The Doom of Reconstruction: The Liberal Republicans in the Civil War Era (2006). Nicholas Lemann, Redemption: The Last Battle of the Civil War (2006). Heather Cox Richardson, West from Appomattox: The Reconstruction of America after the Civil War (2007). Gregory Downs, Declarations of Dependence: The Long Reconstruction of Popular Politics in the South, 1861-1908 (2011).

DECEMBER 5: Reconstruction: National Foner, Reconstruction, chs. 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12 J. Mills Thornton, "Fiscal Policy and the Failure of Radical Reconstruction," in Kousser and McPherson, Region, Race, and Reconstruction (New York, 1982): 349-394 (on Electronic Reserve on Blackboard) Michael Fitzgerald, “Republican Factionalism and Black Empowerment,” Journal of Southern History 64 (1998): 473-494 (available on J-STOR) Martha Hodes, “The Sexualization of Reconstruction Politics: White Women and Black Men in the South after the Civil War,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 3 (1993): 402- 417 (available on J-STOR) Karin L. Zipf, “‘The Whites Shall Rule the Land or Die:’ Gender, Race, and Class in North Carolina Reconstruction Politics,” Journal of Southern History 65 (1999): 499-534 (available on J-STOR)

DECEMBER 10: The Legacy of the Civil War; The Future of Civil War Studies David Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, chs. 1-5, 8-10

FINAL PAPER DUE IN MY MAILBOX IN 335 PHILLIPS BY NOON, DECEMBER 12th! 13

Directions for the Historiographic Essay Option

1) You must solicit my approval for a topic and for the selection of books you will cover. You should choose an area in which you have some competence, since you will be asked to make judgments about the future of the field and may not feel comfortable doing so unless you have some background. You need not have any background on nineteenth-century America per se to do this, but some background in women's history, political history, cultural history, etc., will give you preparation to make critical judgments and assessments.

2) The paper should be approximately 15 to 20 double-spaced typed pages long (about 4000 to 5000 words). It must be typed and double-spaced with one-inch margins. Use Chicago Manual-style footnote citations. YOU MUST NUMBER YOUR PAGES!!!

3) A historiographic essay should: a) have a thesis; b) describe critically or analytically the manner in which past historians have treated a given topic and c) make suggestions about where research and writing about that topic should be directed in the future. The bulk of the paper will consist of an analysis/critique of each book that you read. I suggest that you treat each book separately, usually in the order in which they were published. In some cases you could break from the chronological norm and group books in some other fashion. This might be advisable if you treat many books published at approximately the same time, or if you are particularly daring and want to try a thematic approach anyway. But since the point is to show the course the literature in your topic has taken over time, chronological organization is advisable in most situations. Whatever order you decide to use, it is vital that there be a rationale for the order in which you discuss the books, and that rationale should be transparent. In this section of the paper, be sure not to summarize the book except where absolutely necessary. You should be analyzing and critiquing the book, explaining how it relates to the theme of your paper. This might entail describing the most important contributions the author makes to the study of his or her subject; critiquing the methodology, selection of sources, or interpretations of the author; analyzing how the author's work changed the direction of research in his/her field; or comparing the author’s work to that of others in the field (especially works already mentioned in your paper). The analysis should be sophisticated, not a simplistic listing of sources an author cites or a comparison of theses. You can use more than one of these approaches for a given author, or use some of these for one author and some for another. But it is up to you to be sure that whatever approach you choose, the paper presents a coherent, logical, and sophisticated analysis and does not seem disjointed or unfocused. The point of this section of the paper is for you to provide perspective and judgment about the historiography of this field, not merely to give a blow-by-blow summary of each work in it. It is the addition of your insight that makes the paper valuable, so be sure that the emphasis is on what YOU think, not other experts in the field. By virtue of writing this paper YOU become the expert in the field, and your paper should reflect that. Your model for this paper should be that of a professional historical journal. The same standards and expectations used in evaluating submissions to such a journal are what I will use to evaluate and grade your paper.

4) The final part of the paper, which should be about three pages long, should present your views about where research in your chosen field should head in the future and why you think this. This section MUST also describe what we might expect to find if we head in the direction you propose. These new directions might include new research angles, new analytic perspectives, new conceptual frameworks, neglected subjects that need to be considered, or old ones that need to be reconsidered. This section usually requires some research, so do not be lulled into thinking that you can quickly complete this section at the last moment. This material will provide evidence to support your thesis concerning what historians will find if they move in your suggested direction. This section must emphatically consist of YOUR ideas, not someone else's!

If you would like to look at examples of good historiographic essays (albeit ones that use a different format than the one you are using), see Eric Foner, "Reconstruction Revisited," Reviews in American History 10 (Dec. 1982): 82-100, or one of the other historiographic essays in that issue (available on J-STOR). Or look at my recent historiographic article on nativism (the sections on Billington, Higham, and Hofstadter are most pertinent). 14

Hints (a more detailed version, “Elements of Style,” is on Electronic Reserve on Blackboard) 1) Do not cite, quote, or even look at book reviews. It is very difficult to make someone else’s argument your own in a convincing manner. 2) Do not use subheadings for your paper. Students who use subheadings tend to put no effort into transitions, which are a key part of writing a history paper. You must come up with effective transitions from book to book and from one part of the paper to the next. 3) Make sure you have smooth transitions from your own words to quotations. Never use a comma before a quotation, and almost never use a colon. Do not use block quotations unless the quotation is more than two sentences long. Try when possible to avoid using block quotations. 4) Do not use contractions. 5) Be sophisticated, not simplistic. 6) Use precise phrasing, not colloquialisms. 7) Be sure your introduction explains the scope of your paper and gives some sense of a theme or thesis. This section should NOT list the books you will consider and should NOT say “this paper will….” 8) Be sure to have a conclusion that sums up your findings and brings things to a fitting finish. It should NOT begin with “In conclusion,….”

Use proper footnote style (see http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html): 1. Kerby Miller, Emigrants and Exiles: Ireland and the Irish Exodus to North America (New York, 1985), 166-167. 2. Miller, Emigrants and Exiles, 179. 3. Oliver MacDonagh, "The Irish Famine Emigration to the United States," Perspectives in American History 10 (1976): 370-371. 4. MacDonagh, "Irish Famine Emigration," 361-366.

Note that footnotes are indented like other written paragraphs. Also note that after the first full citation of a given work, subsequent citations should only include the author’s last name, a shortened title, and page numbers. Also note that unlike the rest of your paper, the notes and bibliography should not be double-spaced.

Here is my grading scale: A+: as good as a professional historian who is expert in the field A: superlative in every way; insightful analysis and beautiful writing A-: only minor problems, most of the analysis is sophisticated and there are at most only minor style problems. A person who gets this grade or higher has demonstrated that he or she is ready to do dissertation-level work. B+: There is either a significant writing problem or a lack of analysis that separates these papers from the best. B: A "B" means that there are probably serious problems in both writing AND analysis. This grade will not be uncommon for students who are not in the history program. B-: Same as for "B," except the problems in writing and/or analysis are severe.