Top positive review
4.0 out of 5 starsAn excellent exploration of a very dark period in American History.
Reviewed in the United States on April 25, 2015
I have to confess that I read this book as part of the three course Civil War and Reconstruction series that Professor Foner delivered via EdX from 2014-2015. The final week of the third course began Wednesday, April 22nd. This has been an outstanding series of courses and really illustrates how a MOOC can be effective in delivering information to a large number of active learners. However, these MOOCs fall short of college credit for several reasons. I found that this particular series was useful as I read some of the suggested reading with them such as Foner’s The Fiery Trial of Abraham Lincoln and Reconstruction.
I really dislike this period of history. It is dark and gloomy compared with the brightness other periods have. Yet, in reading Reconstruction I see where we have to understand what happened following the Civil War in order to understand how America got to where it is. This book has been a great help in developing my understanding of this pivotal period in our nation’s history. It is full of information and uses a plethora of sources to support the author’s interpretation. In addition, the version I read was the Perennial Classics imprint and it had footnotes with it. That was very useful because Foner’s notes contained some nice comments and explained his thought process in ways the narrative did not.
Having read a few of Foner’s works, I can say that his writing style has definitely changed for the better over time. I find this is common with many historians. Their earlier works are still that of graduate students writing for an academic audience whereas their writing will change over time to the telling of a story supported by facts. They get better at writing for a larger audience and Eric Foner has been one historian who has accomplished this. Not all do, sad to say. I have to admit that this book was a bit difficult because of the way Foner used the facts in the narrative. It sort of bogged down the reading, but it did make it clear that he was not making up information, but working with these primary sources from the beginning.
The result is a very striking interpretation which completely rejects the old Dunning school of thought on this period. The overt racism is at times nauseating to read about. Thousands were murdered as whites sought to regain political control over the southern states. Terrorism was widespread as rifle clubs, the KKK, and other bands of whites used any means available to regain power and to put white supremacy back as the foundation of southern living. This is a very important issue that needs to be explained to our students as we deal with terrorism from Islamic fundamentalists in our modern age. The past is very illuminating.
Were I to teach a course on Reconstruction I would certainly use this book as the textbook. For that matter, I would use Foner’s course on it as the template for my lesson plans. That would fit very well into a flipped classroom design. While the book can be dry at times, breaking the reading down into segments built around lesson plans works well in helping readers absorb the information. There is a lot here in the book and it seriously conflicts with long held beliefs on Reconstruction.
Foner also notes how events in the rest of the US shaped Reconstruction and its end. This is important because the events that took place in this period were not confined to one area. Yet, Reconstruction or more importantly its end would shape the South for a century in ways that did not overly impact the rest of the nation. The economic disaster that was the South was created by the elites in the South who preferred political power and its trappings for themselves rather than posterity for the people of the South. To achieve this, they used racism to construct their political empires.
Foner also goes into the larger reasons as to why Reconstruction failed. Economics played a major role in this as well as racism in the entire country. Class interests in other sections precluded a shared national goal for all minorities as elites brought in cheap immigrant labor to the North instead of moving black laborers to the factories or factories to the South. I think Foner needed to explore this more because the elites in the South did not want those factories nor did they want their cheap black labor to move away from the agrarian system in place. He alludes to this system, but does not explore it in depth. I think there is a lot more to this, but much of it took place after 1877 and the end of Reconstruction.
All in all, this is a good book and one which I am glad I read. I definitely am happy that I did so in conjunction with the Reconstruction course through EdX. It definitely helped out. I will be referencing the book in my Fall 2015 American History from 1865 course as I show how Reconstruction and its aftermath led directly to events in the Civil Rights era and even today. I give it four stars which is a good solid rating for a good solid book.
