1865 – The House passes the Thirteenth Amendment, which freed all slaves without compensating their owners.

Lee surrenders to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia. Realizing that further fighting was futile, Lee surrendered on April 9. Nine days later, General Joseph E. Johnston surrendered to Sherman near Durham, North Carolina. Jefferson Davis refused to accept defeat and tried to escape to Texas to plan further action. He was apprehended in Georgia. Three million had fought in the Civil War and 600,000 died.

On April 14, John Wilkes Booth assassinates Lincoln as he watches a play in Ford's Theater, Washington, D.C. Andrew Johnson becomes president.

Freeman's Bureau established to distribute food to millions of former slaves, to establish schools staffed by missionaries, and, to a lesser extent, to settle blacks on their own lands. Later, Johnson vetoed a bill to expand the Freeman Bureau's powers, but Congress overrode his veto.

Congress establishes the Joint Committee on Reconstruction. The Committee was created as a reaction to President Johnson who inaugurated his reconstruction plan while Congress was in recess.

1866 – Congress passes the Civil Rights Bill over Johnson's veto. The Bill declared blacks to be citizens and gave the federal government power to intervene in state affairs to protect the rights of citizens.

Republicans gain in congressional elections. Johnson found himself disagreeing with Republicans on every major issue of the Reconstruction period. As a result, he campaigned vigorously for candidates who would support his policies. He met hecklers all along the campaign trail, and he responded to them inappropriately, sacrificing the dignity of the office by losing his temper and arguing with them. The result was a voter backlash targeted at Johnson, which cost him not only new congressional support but also swept most of his supporters out of office.

The Western cattle industry booms. Estimates place the number of Texas longhorn cattle at some 5 million at this time. After the Civil War, Confederate veterans made up the majority of cowhands in Texas, but at least a third of all cowboys were Mexicans or blacks. The cattle industry grew as railroads stretched westward.

National Labor Union founded. Unions began forming before the Civil War, but a national union had to wait. The NLU attacked the wage system, but gained popularity among workers by pressing for an eight-hour workday. By the early 1870s, the NLU enrolled over 600,000 members, but disbanded during the depression of 1873.

Ku Klux Klan organized. The Klan was founded to terrorize black and white Republicans, to prevent blacks from voting, and to maintain white domination in the South.

1867 – Congressional Reconstruction begins. Over Johnson's veto, Congress put forth a coherent plan for Reconstruction. The process of Reconstruction produced much disagreement, disarray, and much bitterness. However, at a crucial point in American history, Reconstruction and the presence of federal troops assured black Americans the protection that enabled them to establish their own institutions. But when President Rutherford Hayes removed the federal troops in 1877, white Southerners regained power and oppressive measures met little resistance.

William Henry Seward, Secretary of State, negotiates purchase of Alaska. The United States paid Russia $7.2 million or about 2 cents an acre for a territory rich in minerals and about twice the size of Texas. Critics called the purchase "Seward's Folly" or "Polar Bear Garden."

1868 – Johnson tried for impeachment but acquitted. When Johnson removed Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton from office, he violated the Tenure of Office Act of 1867, which stipulated that the President could remove no civil official without the consent of the Senate. The House quickly impeached the president on eleven charges (nine dealt with the Tenure of Office Act, one with slandering Congress, and with not enforcing the Reconstruction Acts). The trial in the Senate lasted for two months throughout April and May. The vote was 35 to 19 against Johnson, but one short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority. Thus Johnson survived his presidency by one vote.

Fourteenth Amendment is ratified. The amendment offered the first constitutional definition of American citizenship: anyone born in the United States, and anyone naturalized was automatically a citizen. In addition, the amendment stipulated that there would be a reduction in Congressional representation and in the electoral college on states that denied the vote to any adult male inhabitants, and it prohibited Confederate leaders from holding political office unless two-thirds of Congress voted to pardon them.

Grant elected president. The military hero's victory over New York Democrat Horatio Seymour was surprisingly narrow. Although he carried twenty-six states to Seymour's eight, Grant won the popular vote by only 310,000.

Louisa May Alcott publishes Little Women.

1869 – Congress passes the Fifteenth Amendment. This amendment declares that states could not prevent anyone from voting on the grounds of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. Fearing that only a conservative version would be ratified, the authors of the amendment did not forbid literacy and property requirements; loopholes therefore allowed some Southern districts to continue discrimination against blacks. States ratified the amendment in 1870.

Transcontinental railroad completed.

Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor founded. A national union created secretly, the Knights of Labor wore regalia and practiced secret rituals to evade prying and hostile owners. Their membership was small and, by choice, Protestant at first. However, in 1879, Terence V. Powderly, a Catholic, became their Grand Master. He dropped the secrecy and recruited all laborers. By 1886, membership had grown to 700,000. The union supported an eight-hour workday, sponsored some 200 political candidates, setup cooperative workshops, and campaigned against the prohibition of child labor. However, coordinating the activities of a national union with many locals proved too burdensome, and the Union was all but extinct by 1890.

Mark Twain publishes The Innocents Abroad.

Cincinnati Red Stockings become the first professional baseball team.

Rutgers beats Princeton in the first intercollegiate football game.

1870 – John D. Rockefeller incorporates Standard Oil Company of Ohio. The oil industry was fiercely competitive at this time. Rockefeller bribed rivals, spied on competitors, cut prices, and, most decisively, worked out shipping deals with the railroads. Within a decade, Standard Oil dominated every facet of the oil industry, from drilling to selling. By the 1880s, Standard Oil, the nation's first great trust, controlled access to about 90 percent of the nation's refined oil.

Elevated railroads begin operating in New York City. The elevated trains, like the trolleys in San Francisco in the 1880s, attempted to reduce the number of horse-drawn carriages that crowded and dirtied city streets. However, neither development proved effective: trolleys were slow and unreliable, and "els" were noisy, dirty, and ugly. Electricity solved many traveling problems for cities: electric trolleys proved more efficient, and, without a steam engine's smell and soot, subway lines could be constructed.

Bret Harte publishes The Luck of Roaring Camp.

1872 – Amnesty Act returns political rights to all former Confederates except for some two to three hundred of the most prominent leaders.

Grant reelected. Grant's opposition was Horace Greeley, New York Tribune editor who had grown disillusioned with Reconstruction. Grant won easily with 56 percent of the popular vote.

1872 - 1874 – The great buffalo slaughter. During this three-year period, approximately nine million buffalo were killed. As hides grew in popularity, commercial companies hired hunters who killed more than one hundred buffalo an hour. Tourists would hunt buffalo for sport from railsides. By 1883, the buffalo had nearly disappeared from the plains. The effect was devastating on Indian tribal life.

1873 – Carnegie Steel Company founded. Andrew Carnegie and his associates soon came to dominate the industry. By the 1890s, Carnegie Steel controlled not only steel mills, but also mines, railroads, and other industries that supported their steel industry.

The Women's Christian Temperance Union founded to combat the ill effects of alcohol on the family and society. The WCTU had over 500,000 members by the turn of the century.

Comstock Law signed by Grant. Anthony Comstock led the crusade against what he saw as a widespread and threatening moral pollution. He petitioned against pornography, gambling, prostitution, and even the use of nude art models. The Comstock Law banned all materials from the mail "designed to incite lust." After the signing of the bill, Comstock went to work as a special agent for the Post Office, where in a 41-year career, he claimed to have intercepted and destroyed 160 tons of obscene materials and arrested more than 3000 individuals.

1873 - 1877 – Financial Panic of 1873 and depression. When a leading investment firm, Jay Cooke and Company, failed as a result of heavy investments in postwar railroad building, a panic ensued followed by a severe depression. Too much paper currency of questionable value was in circulation.

1874 – Democrats win control of the House. As a result of the depression, the Democrats gained control of the House of Representatives for the first time since 1861. The Republicans were seen as overly concerned with the South, Reconstruction, and fair treatment of blacks, while the Democrats were perceived as the more economically astute party.

1875 – Civil Rights Act. This law prohibited racial discrimination in all public accommodations, transportation, theaters, and juries. Congress did not ban segregation in public schools, which was practiced in the North as well as the South. The law was rarely enforced, and in 1883, the Supreme Court struck down its provisions, except the one relating to juries. This decision, as much as anything, set the nation's laissez faire tone with regard to race relations. Within twenty years of the decision, every Southern state had enacted "Jim Crow"statutes, which legalized various forms of segregation.

The Mississippi Plan carries the Democrats to victory. To regain the state from Republican legislators, Democrats used violence and intimidation to prevent as many as 60,000 Republicans and blacks from voting. President Grant rejected the request of Republican Governor Adelbert Ames to use federal troops to protect the electorate. In the midst of a depression, Northerners were clearly opposed to using federal funds to finance the troops.

1876 – Rutherford B. Hayes elected president in a disputed election. Republican and Ohio Governor Hayes lost by some 250,000 popular votes to New York Democrat Samuel Tilden. However, Southern Republicans, numbering approximately the same as the margin of victory, were prevented from voting. The Electoral College vote was also disputed as both candidates claimed South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana. Reviewing district election boards in these states, Republicans were able to disqualify enough votes to give the states and the presidency to Hayes. When angry Democrats threatened to filibuster the electoral vote procedure, key Republicans and Southern Democrats worked out a compromise. Under the Compromise of 1877, Hayes, as President, would withdraw federal troops from the South and not oppose the new Democratic state governments. Southern Democrats would no longer contest Hayes's election and pledged to respect the rights of African Americans. Reconstruction ended with the compromise.

Battle of Little Big Horn. Although the Sioux War had ended in 1868 with the Treaty of Fort Laramie, the United States government sought to renegotiate for control of the sacred Black Hills of the Sioux. When negotiations failed, President Grant ordered that all hostile Indians be removed to reservations. The Sioux allied for the first time with the Cheyenne. George Armstrong Custer's Seventh Cavalry of about 600 troops was part of several army columns sent to Montana. Custer, anxious for glory, arrived a day ahead of the other columns and decided to attack an Indian village, unaware that the "village" extended for three miles and included 12,000 Sioux and Cheyenne. Crazy Horse defeated Custer at what became known as Custer's Last Stand. However, Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, the two Sioux leaders, could not maintain a prolonged resistance, and by early 1877 Crazy Horse had surrendered while Sitting Bull barely escaped to Canada.

Nez Percé evade United States army. A relatively peaceful tribe, the Nez Percé, led by Chief Joseph, covered 1,321 miles in seventy-five days before finally surrendering to U.S. troops just short of the Canadian border. The Nez Percé had been forced off their land in Idaho, but en route to their assigned reservation, several young Indians killed four white settlers. Rather than face retribution, Chief Joseph tried to lead his tribe to Canada to join the Sioux. After their surrender, the Nez Percé were relocated from one place to another.

Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone. By the following year, New York and Boston were linked by the first intercity telephone line.

Although opened some eighteen years earlier, Central Park is completed in New York City. Other large cities followed in designing their own pastoral retreats.

Mark Twain publishes Tom Sawyer.

Baseball's National League founded.

1877 – The Great Railroad Strike leaves 100 dead. When the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad announced wage cuts of 20 percent, a crew in Martinsburg, West Virginia, took control of the local depot and blocked the line. Crews around the country followed in sympathy. After twelve days and the intervention of state militia and federal troops, the Great Railroad Strike ended, but not before leaving one hundred people dead and $10 million in damage to railroad property.

Thomas Edison invents the phonograph. Edison brought order and profitability to invention by employing fifteen workers in an invention factory in Menlo Park, NJ. He divided them into departments: gifted inventors, engineers, toolmakers, and others.

1878 – Samoan Treaty grants the United States the right to maintain a naval station at Pago Pago. The way station served American merchant ships while trading in the Pacific.

1879 – Edison develops the incandescent light bulb, which could be used for both home and street. Edison and others had designed large generators and power plants, so that by the turn of the century, electric power was available in street railway systems, elevators, and increasingly in offices and homes.

Exodusters migrate to Kansas. By the end of 1879, the height of the Exoduster migration, some 20,000 black Southerners or Exodusters (from Exodus) settled in Kansas seeking to live more freely and perhaps in time to purchase some cheap land. Adjusting to the new land with little wood and harsh winters proved more difficult than expected. The Exodusters were a part of America's move westward.

Henry George publishes Progress and Poverty. George proposed a way to redistribute wealth: eliminate all taxes and institute a single tax on "unearned" profits, like those from land. His radical plan was an attack on corporate capitalism.

1880 – Republican James A. Garfield elected president with a narrow popular-vote margin but a decisive electoral margin over Winfield Scott Hancock.

James Bonsack, an eighteen-year-old Virginian, invented a cigarette-rolling machine that led to increased sales of tobacco.

Metropolitan Museum of New York City opens.

1881 – Just four months after his inauguration, President James Garfield assassinated by Charles Guiteau, a frustrated individual seeking a government position. Garfield lingered for nearly three months before dying. Chester A. Arthur sworn in as president.

Booker T. Washington founds Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute in Alabama. Tuskegee's curriculum stressed vocational skills for farming, manual trade, and industrial work.

Henry James publishes Portrait of a Lady.

Boston Symphony founded.

1881 - 1882 – Walt Whitman publishes what many come to consider the definitive edition of Leaves of Grass.

1882 – Thomas Edison lights the Wall Street District of New York City. As a result, Edison secured financial backing to create a unified lighting system that would empower small light bulbs in homes and businesses. By 1898, some 3000 power stations were lighting some 2 million bulbs across American.

Chinese Exclusion Act. In the last two decades of the century, nativism (a defensive and xenophobic nationalism) gave rise to organizations that attacked foreigners and Catholics. Such fears found their way into legislature. The Chinese Exclusion Act, a significant step in restricting immigration, banned the entry of Chinese laborers.

1883 – The Civil Service Act or Pendleton Act requires that some federal jobs be filled by competitive written examinations rather than by patronage. This significant civil service legislature was prompted by the assassination of Garfield (see 1881) and the continued growth of the federal government – from approximately 55,000 employees after the Civil War to approximately 165,000 by 1890.

Railroads, America's first big business, establish standard time zones. At this time, each town would set its own clock according to the sun. Because of this, New York and Boston were under twelve minutes apart by rail. Travelling could be very confusing, and each station needed separate clocks for the communities it served. Finally, without consulting the government or seeking its approval, the railroad companies divided the country into four time zones. Congress accepted their divisions officially in 1916.

Brooklyn Bridge opens. The Bridge took thirteen years to complete, claimed the lives of twenty workers (including designer John Roebling), and cost $15 million. Stretching for more than a mile across the East River, the Bridge was considered a technological wonder. Its cathedral-like arches have been featured in several paintings. See Joseph Stella's The Brooklyn Bridge in the center section of the anthology.

1884 – Grover Cleveland elected president in a narrow victory over James G. Blaine.

Mark Twain publishes Huckleberry Finn.

1885 – The Home Life Insurance Building, the world's first "skyscraper," is built in Chicago. Although only ten stories high, the building began a new era in urban architecture.

1886 – American Federation of Labor organized. Samuel Gompers, head of the AFL, agreed to the principals of capitalism, but wanted to secure for laborer's a greater share of capitalism's rewards. The AFL sought an eight-hour work day, higher wages, and safer working conditions. Most Americans worked a sixty-hour, six-day week

Haymarket Square bombing in Chicago. There was much tension at this time between labor and management; strikes, boycotts, and rallies were a more and more infrequent occurrence in cities around the nation. Labor and radical leaders called a meeting in the Haymarket Square to protest the police treatment of strikers at the McCormick Harvester Company. When the police ordered the crowd to disperse, someone threw a bomb at the police officers. The police officers fired at the protesters who fired back. By the end of the day, eleven (seven officers and four civilians) were dead and seventy others injured. As a result of the tragedy, people began to associate labor unions with radicalism.

Dawes Severalty Act. Known as the Dawes Act, this law took the ownership of land away from tribes and gave it to individual owners within the tribe. Intended, at least in part, as a way to assimilate Indians into the mainstream of American life, the law was a dismal failure. Indians were not prepared for this abrupt change which further undermined the communal structure and authority of tribes.

Statue of Liberty is dedicated.

1887 – Interstate Commerce Act passed. The law was intended to regulate the railroad industry and set up a five-man agency, the Interstate Commerce Commission, to administer its provisions.

1889 – James G. Blaine, Secretary of State, organizes first Pan-American Congress. The Congress was an effort to expand trade and American influence in Latin America.

Oklahoma opened to settlement. A land rush ensued as 2 million acres of Indian territory became available for claim. Approximately 100,000 "Boomers" gathered in present-day Oklahoma City for the land rush, while "Sooners" cheatingly hid in the wooded areas and leaped out to stake their claim at the appointed time – noon, April 22.

Jane Adams opens Hull House in Chicago. The Hull House, which became a model for other organizations in other cities, sought to help immigrant families adapt to the language and environment of their new country.

1890 – Ghost Dances and Wounded Knee. Many Indians began to find comfort in the past. In Nevada, a Paiute named Wovoka preached his vision that if Indians lived in harmony with one another that their dead ancestors would return to drive the whites from the continent. Frightened settlers referred to the Indian rituals as "Ghost Dances," which spread to the plains. In Wounded Knee, South Dakota, white agents on a Sioux reservation thought the Ghost Dances would lead to renewed hostilities. On December 29, the Seventh Cavalry (Custer's old regiment) tried to round up some 350 cold and starving, but resistant Sioux. Fighting broke out and about 40 white soldiers were killed and more than 300 Sioux died under the Cavalry's new machine guns.