Map of the United States showing railroads in 1890 (The maps showing the railroads are from Johnson and Van Metre, Principles of Railroad Transportation, by courtesy of the publishers, D. Appleton & Co.) Financial operations, 1875 to 1897, in millions of dollars Total silver coinage, 1878 to 1894, in millions of dollars Net gold in the treasury, by months, January, 1893, to February, 1896, in millions of dollars The presidential election of 1896 The Philippines The Spanish-American War in the West Indies Campaign about Santiago The chief foreign elements in the population of the United States The cost of food, 1900 to 1912 Morgan-Hill railroads as listed shortly after 1900 Daily newspaper circulation, 1918 Election of 1904 by counties Caribbean interests of the United States Election of 1916 by counties The Western Front Strength of the American Expeditionary Force, July 1, 1917, to November 1, 1918 The United States--1920 The cost of food, January, 1913, to January, 1920 CHAPTER I RECONSTRUCTION AND ITS AFTERMATH Abraham Lincoln in the presidential chair was regarded by many of the politicians of his party as an "unutterable calamity"; and while the news of Lincoln's assassination was received with expressions of genuine grief, the accession of Vice-President Andrew Johnson was looked upon as a "Godsend to the country." As the Civil War came to a close, Lincoln opposed severe punishments for the leaders of the Confederacy; he urged respect for the rights of the southern people; he desired to recognize the existence of a Union element in the South, to restore the states to their usual relations with as little ill-feeling as possible, and in the restoration process to interfere but little with the normal powers of the states. Johnson, on the contrary, "breathed fire and hemp." "Treason," he asserted over and again, "should be made odious, and traitors must be punished and impoverished. Their great plantations must be seized, and divided into small farms and sold to honest, industrious men." For a time it seemed that the curtain would go down on the tragedy of Civil War only to rise immediately on the execution of the Confederate leaders and the confiscation of their property. A large and active group of Washington politicians believed in the necessity of a stern accounting with the "rebels." Lincoln's gentleness seemed to these bitter northerners like a calamity; Johnson's vindictiveness like a Godsend to the country. In the conflict between the policy of clemency and the policy of severity is to be found the beginning of the period of reconstruction.