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Civil War Study Guide
Election of 1860 and First Inaugural Address
1. How did Lincoln win? (Electoral college, Democratic Party)
2. What were the platforms of the various parties involved in the election
(What were their political goals? What did they believe about slavery?)
3. What is secession? Why did the southern states begin to secede from the
Union after Lincoln’s election?
4. What were Lincoln’s goals in his first inaugural address? How did he achieve
the goals (be able to cite specific language/passages)?
5. How did Lincoln try to unify the country with this speech? How did he
address the Border States (what are the Border States? Why are they
strategically and politically important?)? How did Lincoln address the
South—or the states in secession?
6. Does Lincoln appeal to abolitionists and/or Free Soilers in the speech? How
so?
7. What, in Lincoln’s view, is his job as President? What rules must he follow?
How does Lincoln interpret the Constitution? What does he understand
about the Constitution’s relationship to slavery?
Fort Sumter
What happened?
What was Lincoln’s dilemma?
How did the public, or various parts of the public, react to the firing on Ft. Sumter?
What is significant about Ft. Sumter as the opening to the Civil War?
Emancipation Proclamation and Battle of Antietam
1. Why does Lincoln issue the Proclamation after the battle of Antietam?
2. What is significant militarily an/or strategically about the Battle Antietam?
3. Who is freed by the Emancipation Proclamation and why? Be specific in your
understanding of Lincoln’s careful language that indicates the impact of the
Proclamation.
4. How is the Emancipation Proclamation a step toward justice? How is the
Proclamation insufficient as a step toward justice? (see the last paragraph)
5. Why does Lincoln believe he has the power to issue the EP? What argument
does he use to issue the EP?
6. What is important about Lincoln using this EP as a tactic in winning the war?
7. What is the meaning behind Lincoln’s urging “people so declared to be free to
abstain from violence… [and to] labor faithfully for reasonable wages.” Who
is this message for? What is the subtext of this message?
Battle of Gettysburg and Gettysburg Address
1. Where is Gettysburg, and how is its location important or relevant?
2. Why do historians argue that Gettysburg was a turning point in the war? Be
specific about the reasons—think about the battle as a military turning point and
the speech as a symbolic turning point, and how those two are related.
3. Who were the two generals, (one for the Union and one for the Confederacy) and
what is each remembered for? How were those generals perceived before and
after the battle?
4. What “facts” about the numbers of casualties required that the nation
acknowledge the carnage?
5. What specific language in the Gettysburg Address changes the meaning of the
war? How does Lincoln accomplish this without mentioning the word “slavery”?
6. How does Lincoln alter the meaning of the Declaration of Independence?
7. Who is the "we" in Lincoln's speech?
Sherman's March, The Election of 1864, and Lincoln's Second Inaugural
Address
1. What tactics did General Sherman use that were new to the Civil War?
2. What cities did Sherman capture? When? How is the geographical location of these
cities significant?
3. What impact did Sherman's successes have upon the election of 1864?
4. Who was Lincoln's vice presidential running mate in the election of 1864, and what
did that shift from Hannibal Hamlin say about Lincoln's goals for after the war?
5. Who was Lincoln's opponent in the election of 1864, and what platform did he run on?
6. What was one of the most significant voting blocs that supported Lincoln in the
election?
7. What are the key ideas in Lincoln's speech?
8. How is Lincoln's second inaugural address similar to/different from his first inaugural
address and his Gettysburg address?
The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, As Well As
Reconstruction
1. What changes to the Constitution do the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments make?
2. When were these amendments ratified? What proportion of the state legislatures'
approval was required in order to ratify the amendment?
3. What were some of the limitations of these amendments, in terms of how they were
written and in terms of how they were enforced in the South?
4. When and by whom was President Lincoln assassinated?
5. How did the nation respond to Lincoln's assassination? What happened to the
conspirators and his assassin?
6. What were some of the challenges that freed slaves faced after the Civil War?
7. How did the version of Reconstruction implemented by the largely Republican
Congress differ from Lincoln's vision of Reconstruction?