Editing Reconstruction era (section)

==Dating==
The Reconstruction era has typically been dated from the end of the [[American Civil War]] in 1865 until the withdrawal of the final remaining federal troops stationed in the [[Southern United States]] in 1877, though a few other periodization schemes have also been proposed by historians.{{Sfnp|Parfait|2009|pp=440–441, 441n1}} In the twentieth century, most scholars of the Reconstruction era began their review in 1865, with the end of formal hostilities between the North and South. However, in his landmark 1988 monograph ''[[Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877|Reconstruction]]'', historian [[Eric Foner]] proposed 1863, starting with the [[Emancipation Proclamation]], [[Port Royal Experiment]], and the earnest debate of Reconstruction policies during the Civil War.{{sfnp|Foner|1988|p=xxv}}<ref name=":3">{{Cite journal|last1=Stazak|first1=Luke|last2=Masur|first2=Kate|last3=Williams|first3=Heather Andrea|last4=Downs|first4=Gregory P.|last5=Glymph|first5=Thavolia|last6=Hahn|first6=Steven|last7=Foner|first7=Eric|author-link7=Eric Foner|date=January 2015|title=Eric Foner's 'Reconstruction' at Twenty-five|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/43903055|journal=[[The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era]]|publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]]|location=Cambridge, England|volume=14|issue=1|pages=13–27|doi=10.1017/S1537781414000516|jstor=43903055|s2cid=162391933|quote=''Reconstruction'' is almost literally a landmark. It defines the territory.|access-date=January 18, 2022|archive-date=January 18, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220118215245/https://www.jstor.org/stable/43903055|url-status=live}}</ref> By 2017, among scholars it was "widely understood" in the words of Luke Harlow, that Reconstruction started in either "1863 with the Emancipation Proclamation or 1865 with the end of the war".<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Harlow |first=Luke E. |date=March 2017 |title=The Future of Reconstruction Studies |url=https://www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/forum-the-future-of-reconstruction-studies/ |url-status=live |journal=Journal of the Civil War Era |location=Chapel Hill, North Carolina |publisher=[[University of North Carolina Press]] |volume=7 |issue=1 |pages=3–6 |doi=10.1353/cwe.2017.0001 |issn=2159-9807 |jstor=26070478 |s2cid=164628161 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220118061534/https://www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/forum-the-future-of-reconstruction-studies/ |archive-date=January 18, 2022 |access-date=January 18, 2022}}</ref>

The [[Reconstruction Era National Historical Park]] proposed 1861 as a starting date, interpreting Reconstruction as beginning "as soon as the Union captured territory in the Confederacy" at [[Fort Monroe]] in Virginia and in the [[Sea Islands|Sea Islands of South Carolina]]. According to historians Downs and Masur, "Reconstruction began when the first US soldiers arrived in slaveholding territory, and enslaved people escaped from plantations and farms, some of them fleeing into free states, and others trying to find safety with US forces." Soon afterwards, early discourse and experimentation began in earnest regarding Reconstruction policies. The Reconstruction policies provided opportunities to enslaved [[Gullah]] populations in the Sea Islands who became free overnight on November 7, 1861, after the [[Battle of Port Royal]] when all the white residents and slaveholders fled the area after the arrival of the Union. After the Battle of Port Royal, reconstruction policies were implemented under the [[Port Royal Experiment]] which were [[Freedmen's schools|education]], [[Black land loss in the United States|landownership]], and labor reform. This transition to a free society was called "Rehearsal for Reconstruction."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Downs |first1=Gregory |url=http://www.npshistory.com/publications/nhl/theme-studies/reconstruction-era.pdf |title=The Reconstruction Era 1861–1900 |last2=Masur |first2=Kate |publisher=National Park Service: The National Historic Landmarks Program |year=2017 |pages=3–4, 91}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Nov. 7, 1861: The Port Royal Experiment Initiated |url=https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/port-royal-experiment-initiated/ |website=Zinn Education Project |access-date=24 January 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Reconstruction Era National Historical Park |url=http://npshistory.com/publications/reer/index.htm |access-date=24 January 2024 |website=National Park Service History Electronic Library & Archive}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{Cite journal|last=Brundage|first=Fitzhugh|date=March 2017|title=Reconstruction in the South|url=https://www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/forum-the-future-of-reconstruction-studies/reconstruction-in-the-south/|journal=Journal of the Civil War Era|publisher=[[University of North Carolina Press]]|location=Chapel Hill, North Carolina|volume=7|issue=1|doi=10.1353/cwe.2017.0002|s2cid=159753820|access-date=January 18, 2022|archive-date=January 18, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220118061556/https://www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/forum-the-future-of-reconstruction-studies/reconstruction-in-the-south/|url-status=live}}</ref>

The conventional end of Reconstruction is 1877, when the federal government withdrew the last troops stationed in the South as part of the Compromise of 1877.<ref name=":0" /> Later dates have also been suggested. Fritzhugh Brundage proposed in 2017 that Reconstruction ended in 1890, when Republicans failed to pass the [[Lodge Bill]] to secure voting rights for Black Americans in the South.<ref name=":1" /> [[Heather Cox Richardson]] argued that same year for a periodization from 1865 until 1920, when the election of [[Warren G. Harding]] to the presidency marked the end of a national sentiment in favor of using government power to promote equality.{{Sfnp|Richardson|2017|pp=12, 18–19}} In 2024, [[Manisha Sinha]] periodized Reconstruction from 1860—when [[Abraham Lincoln]] won office as a president opposed to slavery—until 1920, when America ratified the [[Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution]] affirming the right of women to vote, which Sinha called "the last Reconstruction amendment" because it drew upon a Reconstruction belief that the government could protect [[civil and political rights]].{{Sfnp|Sinha|2024|pp=xvii, 5, 425}}