Description First published in 1978, Claude F. Oubre's Forty Acres and a Mule has since become a definitive study in the history of American Reconstruction. Drawing on a vast collection of government records and newspapers, Oubre examines what he sees as the crucial question of Reconstruction: Why were the far majority of freed slaves denied the opportunity to own land during the Reconstruction era, leaving them vulnerable to a persecution that strongly resembled slavery? Oubre recounts the struggle of black families to acquire land and how the U.S. government agency Freedmen's Bureau both served and obstructed them. This groundbreaking book offers an indispensable resource for anyone eager to understand the evolution of slavery studies. About the author Claude F. Oubre (1937--2011) was a professor of history and political science at Louisiana State University at Eunice and coauthor of Creoles of Color in the Bayou Country. Katherine C. Mooney is a historian of the nineteenth-century United States. She holds degrees from Amherst College and Yale University. She teaches history at Loyola University in New Orleans.