Emancipation and Reconstruction

I am very pleased to have been asked to prepare a new edition of this book. The invitation was not only an acknowledgment that the book has been well received but a recognition that the historical episode it deals with continues to attract interest and stimulate significant schol- arly investigation.

Indeed, during the fourteen years since Emancipation and Re- construction first appeared, many new works on the period have emerged. Most of them have focused on Emancipation, so I have added a new section on “The Impact of Emancipation” as well as several segments presenting some of the recent scholarship. In the Reconstruction part of the book, the revisions mainly discuss new books or particular aspects of the era that have become more salient during the past decade.

In the process of revising and rewriting, I have been helped by several people. Most of all, Andrew Davidson, the publisher, read the entire manuscript and gave it a very careful and thoughtful editing. He raised valuable questions and made numerous suggestions. This degree of interest and involvement is hard to come by, and I am ex- tremely grateful to him for the clarifications and improvements that resulted. I received advice and encouragement from two other sources. My colleague in the UIC History Department, Daniel Scott Smith, read the first chapter and offered comments that I found most useful, while Michael Averbach, Head of the History Division at Oak Park–River Forest High School, gave the revised text a careful read- ing. Both of them should know how much I appreciate their generos- ity and help.

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