LINCOLN'S WAR and Republican Reconstruction turned the South into an economic and political colony of the new, supreme, indivisible Federal Government. With the death of real States Rights Southerners became the North's political slaves. * * * Ronald and Donald Kennedy have written more good and original history than the lifetime product of most professional historians. Put this Reconstruction book along side their Punished with Poverty and Yankee Empire and you have a persuasive and original interpretation not just of Southern history but American history. -Dr. Clyde N. Wilson This book picks up where the War for Southern Independence left off . An accomplished authority on Southern history, Mr. Kennedy vividly describes the Reconstruction Era, state by state, as the United States shifted from a Constitutional Republic to a despotic empire. For the downtrodden South, in some ways, Reconstruction was worse than the war. With painstakingly accurate research and great writing, Kennedy brilliantly puts the entire era into context. If the reader wants a single volume to accurately describe Reconstruction, this is it. -Dr. Sandy Mitcham This powerful book is a must-read to understand how Northern politicians wreaked havoc on race relations in the South. Ron Kennedy explains how Reconstruction began and has continued into the present day. -Teresa Roane, Historian