The Civil War is the central event in the American historical consciousness. While the Revolution of 1776-1783 created the United States, the Civil War of 1861-1865 preserved this creation from destruction and determined, in large measure, what sort of nation it would be. The war settled two fundamental issues for the United States: whether it was to be a nation with a sovereign national government, or a dissoluble confederation of sovereign states; and whether this nation, born of a declaration that all men are created with an equal right to liberty, was to continue to exist as the largest slaveholding country in the world. The Constitution of 1789 had left these issues unresolved. By 1861 there was no way around them; one way or another, a solution had to be found. - Preface.

Maps on lining papers. Includes index.

Prologue : The setting of conflict -- Part one : The coming of war. American modernization, 1800-1860 -- The antebellum South -- The ideological conflict over slavery -- Texas, Mexico, and the Compromise of 1850 -- Filibusters, fugitives, and nativists -- Kansas and the rise of the Republican Party -- The deepening crisis, 1857-1859 -- The critical year, 1859-1860 -- Secession and the coming of war -- Part two : The Civil War. A brothers' war : the Upper South -- Mobilizing for war -- The balance sheet of war -- The war at home and abroad -- The springtime of Northern hope -- Jackson and Lee strike back -- Slavery and the war : Northern politics, 1861-1862 -- The first turning point : Antietam and emancipation -- The winter of Northern discontent -- The second turning point : Gettysburg, Vicksburg, and Chattanooga -- War issues and politics in 1863 -- Behind the lines -- Wartime reconstruction and freedmen -- Military stalemate, 1864 -- The third turning point : the reelection of Lincoln -- The end of the Confederacy -- Part three : Reconstruction. The problems of peace -- The origins of "radical" Reconstruction -- Reconstruction and the crisis of impeachment -- The first Grant administration -- The Southern question, 1869-1872 -- Social and economic Reconstruction -- The retreat from Reconstruction -- The new South -- Epilogue.