Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905102
W. Hoffer
{"title":"The Man Who Understood Democracy: The Life of Alexis De Tocqueville by Olivier Zunz (review)","authors":"W. Hoffer","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905102","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905102","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42494626","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905103
Katherine D. Johnston
tocratic.” None of these conclusions are accurate, but de Tocqueville was wedded to them despite his empirical observations to the contrary. In his political career, he demonstrated the same naiveté concerning the practice of politics. An excellent theorist, one would surmise, would be able to apply those ideas to the building of political co ali tions around much needed reforms. Unfortunately, just as his Democracy in Amer i ca and theoretical work missed the dirty work of politics in the details, so de Tocqueville was unable to work the room in France’s national legislature or make much of an impact on the Second Republic’s constitution or in his brief stint as foreign minister. Despite his legal training and early work in the courts, de Tocqueville also seems to have not fully appreciated the English legal inheritance for Amer i ca’s national experiment, nor the defects in the federal system. He was committed to his dying day to the need to avoid centralization in order to preserve local traditions. With French democracy having succumbed to Bonapartism for the second time, the U.S. on the verge of civil conflict, and 1848 a lost cause, he might well have wondered whether he had made any contribution at all. He should not have worried about that. Though Zunz could have done more to show de Tocqueville’s lasting legacy in the social sciences, political theory, as a key primary source on Jacksonian democracy, and as an analyst of the origins of the French Revolution, this biography stands as a testament to a remarkable thinker and observer of a critical period in both French and American history.
{"title":"Necropolis: Disease, Power, and Capitalism in the Cotton Kingdom by Kathryn Olivarius (review)","authors":"Katherine D. Johnston","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905103","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905103","url":null,"abstract":"tocratic.” None of these conclusions are accurate, but de Tocqueville was wedded to them despite his empirical observations to the contrary. In his political career, he demonstrated the same naiveté concerning the practice of politics. An excellent theorist, one would surmise, would be able to apply those ideas to the building of political co ali tions around much needed reforms. Unfortunately, just as his Democracy in Amer i ca and theoretical work missed the dirty work of politics in the details, so de Tocqueville was unable to work the room in France’s national legislature or make much of an impact on the Second Republic’s constitution or in his brief stint as foreign minister. Despite his legal training and early work in the courts, de Tocqueville also seems to have not fully appreciated the English legal inheritance for Amer i ca’s national experiment, nor the defects in the federal system. He was committed to his dying day to the need to avoid centralization in order to preserve local traditions. With French democracy having succumbed to Bonapartism for the second time, the U.S. on the verge of civil conflict, and 1848 a lost cause, he might well have wondered whether he had made any contribution at all. He should not have worried about that. Though Zunz could have done more to show de Tocqueville’s lasting legacy in the social sciences, political theory, as a key primary source on Jacksonian democracy, and as an analyst of the origins of the French Revolution, this biography stands as a testament to a remarkable thinker and observer of a critical period in both French and American history.","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41863168","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905106
Eric Herschthal
{"title":"The Nature of Slavery: Environment and Plantation Labor in the Anglo–Atlantic World by Katherine Johnston (review)","authors":"Eric Herschthal","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905106","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905106","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44902563","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905096
Mark L. Young
Abstract:In the decades following the Revolution, American culture enthusiastically embraced the classical-republican ideals of equality and personal freedom from domination. But as nascent industrialism took hold in America, a wage-labor paradigm began to emerge which conflicted violently with these principles. Supported by a legal framework, transferred from England's feudal past, known as the doctrine of master and servant, wage labor demanded inequality, subordination, and fostered dependency. The most dramatic conflict, however, arose from the doctrine's disciplinary cornerstone—the sanctioning of brutal corporal punishment to enforce employer authority. This created a crisis of legitimation for the wage system. And because the doctrine of master and servant was clearly at odds with republican ideology, wage labor's crisis became law's crisis. This article argues that the abandonment of corporal punishment in favor of more subtle forms of coercion was accompanied by a legal discourse that contributed to the legitimation of an emerging wage-labor regime. This discourse transcended its legal origins to support a broader legal-moral ideology of opportunity that rationalized and, paradoxically, underpinned domination, dependency, and inequality amid strenuous assertions of justice.
{"title":"Equality and Corporal Punishment: Wage Labor's Crisis of Legitimation, 1795–1835","authors":"Mark L. Young","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905096","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905096","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:In the decades following the Revolution, American culture enthusiastically embraced the classical-republican ideals of equality and personal freedom from domination. But as nascent industrialism took hold in America, a wage-labor paradigm began to emerge which conflicted violently with these principles. Supported by a legal framework, transferred from England's feudal past, known as the doctrine of master and servant, wage labor demanded inequality, subordination, and fostered dependency. The most dramatic conflict, however, arose from the doctrine's disciplinary cornerstone—the sanctioning of brutal corporal punishment to enforce employer authority. This created a crisis of legitimation for the wage system. And because the doctrine of master and servant was clearly at odds with republican ideology, wage labor's crisis became law's crisis. This article argues that the abandonment of corporal punishment in favor of more subtle forms of coercion was accompanied by a legal discourse that contributed to the legitimation of an emerging wage-labor regime. This discourse transcended its legal origins to support a broader legal-moral ideology of opportunity that rationalized and, paradoxically, underpinned domination, dependency, and inequality amid strenuous assertions of justice.","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45320646","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905099
M. Schwartz
spotty. For example, when Taylor argues that historians need to take seriously colonists’ fear that they were being misrepresented to the metropole, is Taylor’s explanation really so diff er ent from Bernard Bailyn’s argument, that fears of misrepre sen ta tion and conspiracy formed the ideological basis of the American Revolution?3 Deeper consideration of imperial histories that have dealt with governors, kings, ministers, legislatures, and petitions might have added heft and complexity to Taylor argument about misrepre sen ta tion and mediation during the imperial crisis. Sustained engagement with works about the growing partisanship of early republic newspapers, Sedition Act, and the XYZ Affair, such as Pasley’s Tyranny of Printers, might have helped Taylor make clearer to his readers the significance of his work, particularly his analy sis of citations and his thoughtful comparisons between Amer i ca, British Canada, and Spanish Louisiana.4 All in all, Misinformation Nation is a welcome addition to the lit er a ture on eighteenthcentury communications. Taylor’s transatlantic perspective informed by continental comparisons enriches our understanding of the period.
{"title":"Women in George Washington's World ed. by Charlene M. Boyer Lewis and George W. Boudreau (review)","authors":"M. Schwartz","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905099","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905099","url":null,"abstract":"spotty. For example, when Taylor argues that historians need to take seriously colonists’ fear that they were being misrepresented to the metropole, is Taylor’s explanation really so diff er ent from Bernard Bailyn’s argument, that fears of misrepre sen ta tion and conspiracy formed the ideological basis of the American Revolution?3 Deeper consideration of imperial histories that have dealt with governors, kings, ministers, legislatures, and petitions might have added heft and complexity to Taylor argument about misrepre sen ta tion and mediation during the imperial crisis. Sustained engagement with works about the growing partisanship of early republic newspapers, Sedition Act, and the XYZ Affair, such as Pasley’s Tyranny of Printers, might have helped Taylor make clearer to his readers the significance of his work, particularly his analy sis of citations and his thoughtful comparisons between Amer i ca, British Canada, and Spanish Louisiana.4 All in all, Misinformation Nation is a welcome addition to the lit er a ture on eighteenthcentury communications. Taylor’s transatlantic perspective informed by continental comparisons enriches our understanding of the period.","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43671622","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905111
A. Hall
ground in the West, both political and violent, Suval strips away the sense of the inevitability of secession and war that often hangs over portrayals of the 1850s. Old characterizations resurfaced in new guises during debates over slavery in the western territories. Stephen Douglas echoed Jacksonians of the past when he championed the rights of squatters to shape the social institutions of their new territories. They were not escaping civilization and citizenship but instead were extending the blessings of settled society to the wilderness. Who better to determine the fate of slavery in a territory than those who pushed forward first? Southern Democrats emphasized the transitory nature of early settlers when rejecting the concept of “squatter sovereignty.” Calhoun thought popular sovereignty “was reckless and frankly ridicu lous . . . given that the ‘first halfdozen of squatters would become the sovereigns, with full dominion’ ” (102). Opposing the bill to accept Oregon as a free territory, Calhoun called the inhabitants “ ‘mere trespassers . . . without title and without the authority of law’ ” (198). Like the Whigs a decade or two earlier, southern politicians portrayed squatters as disrupters and obstacles to the kind of propertied settlers who might champion slaveholders’ rights. Unlike the Democrats and Whigs of old, politicians like Douglas and Calhoun found no common ground to reconcile the growing divide between North and South. Suval has written an impor tant and engaging book that makes a strong case for the need to follow the paths of squatters to understand the political divisions over western territory, first over control and owner ship of public land and then over the fate of slavery in the West.
{"title":"Gray Gold: Lead Mining and Its Impact on the Natural and Cultural Environment, 1700–1840 by Mark C. Chambers (review)","authors":"A. Hall","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905111","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905111","url":null,"abstract":"ground in the West, both political and violent, Suval strips away the sense of the inevitability of secession and war that often hangs over portrayals of the 1850s. Old characterizations resurfaced in new guises during debates over slavery in the western territories. Stephen Douglas echoed Jacksonians of the past when he championed the rights of squatters to shape the social institutions of their new territories. They were not escaping civilization and citizenship but instead were extending the blessings of settled society to the wilderness. Who better to determine the fate of slavery in a territory than those who pushed forward first? Southern Democrats emphasized the transitory nature of early settlers when rejecting the concept of “squatter sovereignty.” Calhoun thought popular sovereignty “was reckless and frankly ridicu lous . . . given that the ‘first halfdozen of squatters would become the sovereigns, with full dominion’ ” (102). Opposing the bill to accept Oregon as a free territory, Calhoun called the inhabitants “ ‘mere trespassers . . . without title and without the authority of law’ ” (198). Like the Whigs a decade or two earlier, southern politicians portrayed squatters as disrupters and obstacles to the kind of propertied settlers who might champion slaveholders’ rights. Unlike the Democrats and Whigs of old, politicians like Douglas and Calhoun found no common ground to reconcile the growing divide between North and South. Suval has written an impor tant and engaging book that makes a strong case for the need to follow the paths of squatters to understand the political divisions over western territory, first over control and owner ship of public land and then over the fate of slavery in the West.","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48034745","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905108
Emily West
{"title":"Bonds of Womanhood: Slavery and the Decline of a Kentucky Plantation by Susanna Delfino (review)","authors":"Emily West","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905108","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905108","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47621877","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905100
Mark Boonshoft
{"title":"Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitution's Framers by Andrew H. Browning (review)","authors":"Mark Boonshoft","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905100","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905100","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46180517","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905097
J. Sturgeon
Abstract:This article corrects major historiographical flaws concerning Louisiana's early relationship with the United States and argues the federal tariff was the most critical factor influencing state reconciliation. Leading Louisiana historians like Peter Kastor concur that slavery inspired French-speaking Creole planters to embrace U.S. citizenship. Their consensus further holds that Creole commitment to slavery crystalized their national cultural acceptance. However, Creole planters shared far more with Caribbean slaveholders than those in the American South. Throughout Louisiana's early territorial and statehood years, slavery bolstered animosity between Anglo-Americans and Creoles. The former viewed Creoles through a racist lens and remained wary of their slave-related cultural practices, like openly acknowledging mixed-race relationships. The latter feared that English-speaking migrants would undermine their legal hegemony and inspire insurrection. Though slavery impeded Louisiana unity, the federal tariff did more than anything else to foster it. Throughout the 1820s, Creole planters became reliant on federal sugar protections to alleviate competition. Thus, the tariff gave Creoles a considerable incentive to embrace national political identities.Louisiana's redoubtable statesman Edward Livingston was particularly instrumental in promoting reconciliation on both sides. Before becoming Andrew Jackson's Secretary of State, the exiled New Yorker spent decades representing his adopted state's culturally divergent Creoles. When South Carolina triggered the Nullification Crisis in 1832-1833, Livingston spoke with Louisiana's unique perspective and eloquently guided Jackson's response which deftly balanced federalism's necessities with states' rights concerns. Thus, through the tariff, Louisiana not only embraced its new American identity, but the government employed Louisiana's voice to preserve the Union.
{"title":"Edward Livingston, Nullification, and Louisiana's Political Transformation","authors":"J. Sturgeon","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905097","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905097","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This article corrects major historiographical flaws concerning Louisiana's early relationship with the United States and argues the federal tariff was the most critical factor influencing state reconciliation. Leading Louisiana historians like Peter Kastor concur that slavery inspired French-speaking Creole planters to embrace U.S. citizenship. Their consensus further holds that Creole commitment to slavery crystalized their national cultural acceptance. However, Creole planters shared far more with Caribbean slaveholders than those in the American South. Throughout Louisiana's early territorial and statehood years, slavery bolstered animosity between Anglo-Americans and Creoles. The former viewed Creoles through a racist lens and remained wary of their slave-related cultural practices, like openly acknowledging mixed-race relationships. The latter feared that English-speaking migrants would undermine their legal hegemony and inspire insurrection. Though slavery impeded Louisiana unity, the federal tariff did more than anything else to foster it. Throughout the 1820s, Creole planters became reliant on federal sugar protections to alleviate competition. Thus, the tariff gave Creoles a considerable incentive to embrace national political identities.Louisiana's redoubtable statesman Edward Livingston was particularly instrumental in promoting reconciliation on both sides. Before becoming Andrew Jackson's Secretary of State, the exiled New Yorker spent decades representing his adopted state's culturally divergent Creoles. When South Carolina triggered the Nullification Crisis in 1832-1833, Livingston spoke with Louisiana's unique perspective and eloquently guided Jackson's response which deftly balanced federalism's necessities with states' rights concerns. Thus, through the tariff, Louisiana not only embraced its new American identity, but the government employed Louisiana's voice to preserve the Union.","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47279831","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-26DOI: 10.1353/jer.2023.a905107
Nicholas Garcia
{"title":"The Education of Betsey Stockton: An Odyssey of Slavery and Freedom by Gregory Nobles (review)","authors":"Nicholas Garcia","doi":"10.1353/jer.2023.a905107","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2023.a905107","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45213,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41888721","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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