北方联盟在内战时期击败南方之后，政治家开始面对如何重组分裂的国家的任务。当时对于是否应针对前南方联盟各州脱离中央的行为予以严惩，曾经引起相当热烈的辩论。在林肯总统于1865年遇刺之后，接纳敌人的工作就交给继任的强森 (Andrew
Johnson) 总统。1867年通过的重建法案 (The
Reconstruction Act) 提出了南方各州重新添加联邦的相关程序。1868年通过的宪法第14修正案也正式给予奴隶国家公民的身份。后来在1870年通过的第15项修正案里，又赋予黑人男性投票的权利。不过，这些都只是重建这个分裂国家的初步行动罢了。
After the North defeated the South in the Civil War, politicians faced the task of putting the divided country back together. There was great debate about how severely the former Confederate states should be punished for leaving the Union. With the assassination of President Lincoln in 1865, it was up to President Andrew Johnson to try to reunite former enemies. The Reconstruction Acts of 1867 laid out the process for readmitting Southern states into the Union. The Fourteenth Amendment (1868) provided former slaves with national citizenship, and the Fifteenth Amendment (1870) granted black men the right to vote. These were only the first steps, however, toward reconstructing the fragmented nation.
