Start here to learn more about the events discussed in this chapter.
American Social History Project, Freedom’s Unfinished Revolution (1996). A wonderful collection of images and eyewitness accounts.
Philip Dray, Capitol Men (2008). A readable history of Reconstruction from the perspective of the first African American congressmen.
Faye E. Dudden, Fighting Chance: The Struggle over Woman Suffrage and Black Suffrage in Reconstruction America (2011). A thoughtful exploration of the split among radical reformers.
Eric Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction (1990). The best short overview of events in this decade, combining grassroots and political perspectives.
Steven Hahn, A Nation Under Our Feet (2003). Hahn’s groundbreaking study of the rural South shows how African Americans’ strategies during Reconstruction were built on earlier experiences during slavery and the Civil War.
Brooks D. Simpson, The Reconstruction Presidents (1998). A lively assessment of presidential politics from Lincoln through Hayes, full of entertaining quotations.