In the troubled years leading up to the Civil War, newspapers in the North and South presented the arguments for and against slavery, debated the right to secede, and disputed the Dred Scott decision, denouncing opposing viewpoints with imagination and vigor. Although it is impossible to determine the precise effect of the newspapers on their readers, there is no question that they took the temperature of their communities and recorded the rising local agitations, unifying opinions, raising alarms, and cementing prejudices. Now in paperback for the first time, Lorman A. Ratner and Dwight...
In the troubled years leading up to the Civil War, newspapers in the North and South presented the arguments for and against slavery, debated the righ...
Andrew Jackson and those Tennesseans who, along with him, were a major force in Tennessee and American political life can best be understood by examining the political culture they all shared. The ten men studied here were the children or grandchildren of immigrants from either the Scottish lowlands or the north of Ireland. All experienced the rise from the yeoman/artisan class to that of landed gentry, and all displayed in their adult lives the influence of that move from one socioeconomic class to another. This view of Jackson and his closest friends suggests a view of these men's...
Andrew Jackson and those Tennesseans who, along with him, were a major force in Tennessee and American political life can best be understood by exa...
For many decades after the American Revolution, the image of the Republic shaped people's thinking and influenced events. Yet the simple republic and a growing, increasingly complex, capitalist America represented a clear paradox in American thinking. James Kirke Paulding was at one pole of that paradox. The first American writer to devote his career to describing America and Americans, to social commentary and social criticism, Paulding came to his subject as a crusader, his cause being the defense of the republic as a way of life, an economic and social system, and an ethical code....
For many decades after the American Revolution, the image of the Republic shaped people's thinking and influenced events. Yet the simple republic a...
