A modernizing nation, 1840-1860 -- The Antebellum South -- Slavery, 1830-1860 -- Sectionalism politicized, 1848-1857 -- A house dividing, 1857-1860 -- The secession winter -- Lincoln, the Upper South, and the Sumter crisis -- The border states -- First campaigns -- The Virginia Front, 1861-1863 -- Union measures and men -- Problems of the Confederacy -- The Union government at war -- Financing the War in the North -- The American question abroad -- Emancipation: the War redefined -- The War's middle phase -- Military campaigns in 1864 -- The Naval War -- Northern politics, 1861-1864 -- The home front in the North -- The collapse of the Confederacy -- The end of the War -- The challenge of Reconstruction: legacies of the War in the North -- The challenge of Reconstruction: legacies of the War in the South -- Presidential Reconstruction -- Responses to Presidential Reconstruction -- Congressional Reconstruction: the first phase -- Congressional Reconstruction: the second phase, 1867-1869 -- Reconstruction in the South -- The failure of Reconstruction in the South -- The North, the Grant administration and Reconstruction -- The retreat from Reconstruction -- The end of Reconstruction.