eric foner

February 17, 2022 - A recent report from the Zinn Education Project comprehensively assesses educational standards for the teaching of Reconstruction history in all 50 states and finds vast room for improvement. The study urges policymakers, teachers, parents, and students to press for more attention to this history in grades K–12 as the era has assumed greater relevance amid ongoing fights for racial justice and historical accuracy.

October 11, 2018 - After the Civil War, new state constitutions drafted with the help of freedmen required former Confederate states to establish their first public school systems. But 150 years later, education advocates are still fighting to ensure that Southern states live up to their mandate to offer every student a decent education.

September 13, 2018 - In 1868, Southern states held constitutional conventions in which recently freed black men helped eliminate vestiges of the Confederacy and draft progressive blueprints for state government. While some of the provisions survived Jim Crow, conservative politicians today are chipping away at Reconstruction's radical legacy.

January 28, 2016 - Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's remarks at a town hall this week seemed to revive the old, discredited idea that post-Civil War Reconstruction was a mistake. Her campaign has since issued a clarification, but the controversy shows that the debate over Reconstruction is far from over.