Black politicians during the Reconstruction era played a critical role in the creation and development of the U.S. public ...

Though President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, issued on Jan. 1, 1863, did not free the enslaved people in Maryland, it allowed African Americans throughout the nation to serve in the Union ...

The authors say that the inclusion of birthright citizenship in the Constitution in 1868 has ramifications that apply in today's debate in Congress.