Bruce Levine
retired Professor of History
Bruce Levine is the J. G. Randall Distinguished Professor of History Emeritus at the University of Illinois. He previously taught at the University of Cincinnati and then at the University of California at Santa Cruz. He has published five books on the Civil War era, including The Fall of the House of Dixie: The Civil War and the Social Revolution that Transformed the South (2013) and Thaddeus Stevens: Civil War Revolutionary and Fighter for Racial Justice (2021). His essay entitled “‘The Vital Element in the Republican Party’: Antislavery, Nativism, and Abraham Lincoln” appeared in the Journal of the Civil War Era in December 2011.
April 8, 2025
Meet Thaddeus Stevens: The Original Civil Rights Advocate
Thaddeus Stevens was a titan of American history, and as one of the fiercest opponents of slavery, he played a pivotal role in shaping key amendments and policies during the Civil War and Reconstruction. You might be surprised to learn he’s often dubbed the "father of the 14th Amendment" and was a …