AP® United States History review sheet from Aim for Five (aimforfive.com/us-history/units/5/5-12)
Unit 5 · Topic 5.12
5.12 Comparison in Period 5
This skill topic asks you to compare developments across Period 5, such as the Northern free-labor economy and the Southern slave economy, Lincoln's, Johnson's and Congress's plans for Reconstruction, and the goals of different groups. Comparison means explaining similarities and differences and the reasons behind them.
Key terms
- comparison
- free labor vs. slave labor
- Presidential vs. Radical Reconstruction
- national identity
How comparison works in Period 5
Comparison asks how two or more developments were alike and different, and why. Period 5 offers many natural pairs: North and South, Union and Confederacy, the competing plans for Reconstruction, and the goals of freedpeople versus former slaveholders.
Pick a clear category (economy, politics, ideology, war strategy), discuss both sides in it, and explain the reason for the difference. Use comparison language: 'both', 'whereas', 'in contrast', 'similarly'.
Comparing the sections before the war
Both regions were still mostly rural and agricultural, both were tied to the cotton economy (the North through textile mills, shipping and banking), and both were mostly Protestant and committed to white supremacy. But the North relied on free wage labor, attracted most immigrants, and built more factories, cities and railroads, while the South invested its wealth in land and enslaved people. These economic differences produced different ideologies: free labor in the North and proslavery 'positive good' arguments in the South.
Comparing plans for Reconstruction
| Plan | Readmission terms | Treatment of former Confederates | Rights for freedpeople |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan (1863) | 10% of 1860 voters swear loyalty; accept emancipation | Pardons for most | Emancipation; little else required |
| Johnson's plan (1865) | Abolish slavery, repudiate secession and Confederate debts | Many pardons; former leaders returned to power | Black Codes allowed |
| Congressional (Radical) Reconstruction (1867) | Military districts; new constitutions; ratify the Fourteenth Amendment | Some barred from office | Black male suffrage; federal protection of citizenship rights |
Comparing goals and experiences
- Freedpeople wanted land, education, family security, political rights and independence from white control. Former planters wanted to restore their control over Black labor and Southern politics.
- Northern Republicans differed among themselves: Radicals wanted to transform Southern society, while moderates mainly wanted to secure the Union and protect basic rights.
- Union and Confederate governments both expanded central power during the war, with drafts, taxes and limits on civil liberties, though the Confederacy, founded on states' rights, faced more resistance from its own state governors.
Comparing across periods
You can also compare Period 5 with earlier periods. The sectional crises of the 1850s echo the Missouri crisis of 1819–1820 and the Nullification Crisis of 1832: each time, Southern leaders claimed states' rights to protect slavery or Southern interests. The difference is that in 1820 and 1833 Congress found a compromise that held, while in the 1850s every compromise failed. A strong explanation for the difference is that by the 1850s the national parties had broken apart along sectional lines, so no party could hold Northern and Southern voters together.
Another useful pair is the two Reconstruction-era ideas of freedom. For freedpeople, freedom meant land, family, education and the vote. For many Northern Republicans, it meant mainly the right to work for wages and sign contracts, which helps explain why land redistribution never happened.
Worked examples
Try each one yourself first, then open the solution.
- Example 1
A comparison thesis
Write a thesis for this prompt: Compare the goals of freedpeople and white Southern Democrats in the period 1865 to 1877.
Show the solutionHide the solution
- Step 1: Name each group's main goals.
- Step 2: Include a similarity if one exists, and the key difference.
- Step 3: Explain why their goals clashed.
Answer: Model thesis: Both freedpeople and white Southern Democrats wanted economic security and control over their own labor and land after the Civil War, but while freedpeople sought land ownership, education and political rights to make emancipation meaningful, white Southern Democrats sought to restore white political control and a dependent Black labor force through Black Codes, sharecropping and violence, because their economic power and social status rested on the racial hierarchy that slavery had created.
Common mistakes
- Writing two separate descriptions without connecting them. Each point should address both sides.
- Ignoring similarities between the North and South. Recognizing shared racism or shared economic ties shows complexity.
- Confusing Lincoln's plan with Johnson's. Lincoln's was lenient but he was moving toward Black suffrage before his death; Johnson's allowed the Black Codes.
On the exam
- Comparison questions in Period 5 often use a table or chart (population, railroads, factories) as the source. Explain what the data reveal about each side's strengths.
- A thesis that states a similarity, a difference and the reason for the difference shows strong reasoning.
Connected topics
Videos
Check yourself
4 questions on 5.12 Comparison in Period 5. Pick an answer to see if you got it, and why.
Compared with President Andrew Johnson's plan for Reconstruction, the plan of the Radical Republicans in Congress
Historian 1: Reconstruction was overthrown from within the South. Across the region, the Ku Klux Klan and later armed groups like the White League and the Red Shirts assassinated Black officeholders, broke up Republican meetings and drove voters from the polls. Federal enforcement crushed the first Klan for a time, but as federal prosecutions and troop numbers dwindled, terror campaigns in the mid-1870s let Democrats, calling themselves Redeemers, take back one state government after another.
Historian 2: Reconstruction ended because the North gave up on it. After the Panic of 1873, Northern voters cared more about jobs and money than about the rights of Black Southerners, and Democrats won control of the House in 1874. Many Republicans came to see federal intervention in the South as costly and corrupt. By the time of the disputed 1876 election, party leaders were willing to trade away the last federal protection for the presidency.
Source: Passages written for this practice set, summarizing interpretations found in historians' work on Reconstruction.
Both historians would most likely agree that
"We are now far into the fifth year, since a policy was initiated, with the avowed object, and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation. Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only, not ceased, but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, it will not cease, until a crisis shall have been reached, and passed."
"'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery, will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new—North as well as South."
Source: Abraham Lincoln, speech accepting the Illinois Republican Party's nomination for the U.S. Senate, Springfield, Illinois, June 16, 1858.
Lincoln's position in the speech differed most from that of his opponent, Stephen Douglas, who
| Resource (about 1861) | Union states | Confederate states |
|---|---|---|
| Population | About 22 million | About 9 million, including about 3.5 million enslaved people |
| Miles of railroad | About 22,000 | About 9,000 |
| Share of the nation's manufacturing output | About 90 percent | About 10 percent |
Source: Approximate figures based on the 1860 census, rounded, as commonly cited by historians. The Union states include the border slave states that stayed in the Union.
The difference in resources shown in the table most directly helps explain which contrast between the two home fronts?
0 of 4 answered