How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution

Eric Foner, CC'63, GSAS'69
DeWitt Clinton Professor Emeritus of History
Pulitzer Prize winner in History

Our Constitution as originally written represented a series of compromises necessary in 1787 to unite 13 Colonies with disparate populations, economies, and ways of life. Included in its Preamble is the statement "We the People ... in Order to … secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution ...". To win an agreement, the founders left unresolved fundamental issues about the continuation of slavery and the rights and status of blacks, which begs the question, who among “our Posterity” have been secured the blessings of liberty?

How the 13th,14th, and 15th Amendments addressed those questions fundamentally altered our legal framework. Their origins, how they have been applied, continue to evolve and affect our lives are the subject of Prof. Eric Foner’s masterful new book, The Second Founding: How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution, and of our 2021 annual Hamilton Lecture.

ColumbiaDC is honored to invite you to this historic lecture by Prof. Eric Foner, America’s pre-eminent scholar on Reconstruction. It will include a discussion of the three Constitutional provisions relating to “persons in servitude,” and Hamilton’s and the Founding Fathers’ expectations with respect to the continuation of slavery. Prof. Foner's remarks will be followed by Q&A.