Reconstruction, defined as the decade or so after the end of the Civil War, proved to be a rebirth of sorts for the United States. With the passage of the Reconstruction amendments to the Constitution, the "new" United States sought to guarantee life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness to African Americans for the first time. This lecture will detail the challenges in putting a nation back together after a war that cost over 600,000 American lives, the initial successes in ensuring true freedom for the African-American population, along with how and why Reconstruction ended. (Limit 35)