People’s Contest, Chapter 7, “Agricultural and the Benefits of War” p. 151-169

1.    In what respect is the image of an agrarian South pitted against an industrial North during the Civil War, false?

2.    Identify one way in which railroads unleashed new forces in agrarian America between 1830 and 1860?

3.    In what way did the development of a national market create a new image of farmers?

4.    What does it mean when the author quotes “Agriculture, like all other business, is better suited for subdivisions”?

5.    Along with an expanding transportation network, mechanization helped transform self-sufficient farmers into profit-seeking businessmen.  To what extent was a man with a horse-drawn equipment be more productive than a man on foot?

6.    In what respect did the increase in profitability of agriculture also bring about problems?

7.    Identify one practice by railroads that caused resentment among farmers.

8.    In addition to meeting the demands of the war, what else contributed to giving Northern farmers the best years of their lives?

9.    What was one consequence that resulted from the enlistment of large numbers of farm laborers in the Union army?

10. What does it mean that women have always been “invisible farmers”?

11. In two words, briefly state how the Department of Agriculture described the life of a farmer’s wife.

12. How did women respond to criticism that engaging in farm work would degrade and coarsen them?

13. In what respect did the social environment of the Western frontier create an additional hardship for women that did not exist elsewhere in the North?

14. Identify one example of how modernization freed women from some of life’s drudgery during the Civil War.

15. Identify one of two economic factors during the Civil War that made farmers more willing to go into debt?

16. Briefly explain how the burgeoning shipments of grain and other foodstuffs reverberated in other industries.

17. Briefly explain how the development of the urban milk production industry created large scale-health problems.

18. Identify one way in which the Department of Agriculture provided assistance to the nation’s farmers.

19. Identify one way in which the Land Grant College Act laid the foundation for modern farming in America.

20. In what way did legislation, like the Land Grant College Act, shove farmers into a newer America?

21. In what way did the Homestead Act encourage the trend toward specialization and integration of the marketplace?

22. Identify one of three trends that the Civil War accelerated in Northern agriculture.

23. In what way did the Homestead Act bring partial relief to the high cost of land acquisition?

24. Identify one method employed by draft resisters to avoid serving in the military.

25. Because American draft dodgers were so numerous, how cheaply could Canadian farmers hire their laborers?

People’s Contest - Chapter 9, "The Meanings of Emancipation" 198-230

26. How did Horace Greeley describe the impact of slavery on a man?

27. Identify one factor that complicated the goal by many in the North to emancipate the slaves.

28. For what reason did the Emancipation Proclamation of January 1, 1863, not free all the slaves?

29. In what way did turning the war into a struggle for equality loosen the shackles of prejudice? (one example)

30. In what way was freeing the slaves considered both expedient and right to the North?

31. In what way did the condition of free blacks hardly reflect the goals of a free labor society?

32. How did the New York Times believe that freed slaves could be compelled to work if they did not adjust to entering the free labor force?

33. Briefly describe the effort made by Union chaplain Joel Grant to help former slaves begin a new life outside Memphis, Tennessee?

34. In what way did the Union army’s priority to establish order in the South restrict the freedom of former slaves?  (What was one imperative of the Union army?)

35. Why was it imperative for the Union army to have the freedmen work caring for themselves?

36. Although conditions for freedmen often resembled that of slavery, identify one difference of life under Union control.

37. What in the early days of the war reinforced the prejudice that blacks were too docile to become soldiers?

38. Identify one factor responsible for slowing recruitment efforts for black regiments in the Union army.

39. How did Lincoln counter the threat made by the Confederate government to execute or enslave captured blacks and to try their officers for inciting insurrection?

40. What happened at Fort Pillow, Tennessee, that infuriated the North and increased sympathy for blacks and their sacrifices?

41. Identify one example in which Congress acted to advance racial equality.

42. In what area did the struggle for equality gain national attention because the activity was a daily occurrence and quarrels were very public?

43. Briefly explain how Sojourner Truth helped integrate Washington, D.C. streetcars.

44. Briefly describe the incident at the White House that reflected the changes in race relations that the war had brought.

45. Although prejudice against blacks endured at the end of the war, identify one example that reflected a shifting trend toward political equality.

46. In your own words, briefly explain one reason why abolitionists opposed emancipation on the grounds of military necessity.

47. For what reason was Congress unwilling to support giving former slaves permanent title to land confiscated from slave owners?

48. In what way did contemporary beliefs in the “self-made man” limit support for blacks following the war?

49. For what reason did blacks prefer sharecropping over wage labor?

50. In what way did a post-war resurgence in states rights undermine protection and the independence for blacks?