The United States presidential election of 1864

The 1864 presidential election was held in the immediate postwar period, as Reconstruction was beginning. As such, the Republican candidate William Henry Seward swept the North, promising punishment for the planters and the Southern state governments who had began the war. The Constitutional Union's candidate, Robert E. Lee, was popular with Southern voters, and was able to secure a significant share of the electoral vote, whereas the Democratic candidate Thomas Hendricks only won his home state, Illinois, and the eastern border states.