Lincoln’s Peace: The Struggle to End the American Civil War

Historian Vorenberg (Final Freedom) reflects on when and where the Civil War really ended in this intricate account. Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox in April 1865 is generally considered to be the war’s end, but Vorenberg notes how fighting still waged in pockets around the country. (He singles out as the culprit behind the unrest an “unrepentant” Jefferson Davis—a “fantasist with a following” who nursed deluded visions of guerrilla grandeur.) After Lincoln’s assassination, Andrew Johnson issued two proclamations in August 1865 addressing amnesty and reconstruction, the purpose of which, Vorenberg argues, was to again “signal that the war was over.” Other notable “endings” include June 19, 1865, or Juneteenth, the day slavery ended in Texas, the last state to still enforce it; and Feb. 1, 1871, when Georgia became the last seceded state to rejoin Congress. Signs of continuation, on the other hand, also abounded, most notably white Southerners’ violent resistance to Black political participation, but also the continuation of the Indian Wars of the plains and southwest. Vorenberg ruminates intriguingly on whether the latter conflict, which was prosecuted by both the Union and the Confederacy during the war, was actually an integral part of the Civil War itself, and whether its continuation into the 1880s can be seen as the war’s long tail. He also astutely interrogates the notion that modern America is uniquely mired in “forever wars,” suggesting instead that today’s political scientists are likely idealizing the past. Expert analysis and eloquent prose make this a must-read for U.S. history buffs. (Mar.)