662 THE JOURNAL OF SOUTHERN HISTORY deliberated. European slave traders’ adherence to African customs, as well as their ability to manage their crew, often determined the outcome of the voyage. In the case of the Hare, Kelley shows the volatility of the slave trade by describing episodes like when some of the Hare’s crewmembers jumped ship for a longboat off the African coast, or when Captain Godfrey executed an African who had led an attack on a different slave-trading vessel. Kelley weaves together these examples of peril and violence with less dramatic, yet frustrating, everyday occurrences on the voyage, like when the ship’s stove caught fire during the journey back to North America. Scholars who research slavery in North America will appreciate Kelley’s microhistory because it examines the gritty details of slave trading within the context of the larger forces at play within the eighteenth-century Atlantic world. The strength of Kelley’s approach is that it concretizes the experience of both slave traders and those enslaved, and moves from detail to broader context effortlessly. In one passage, Kelley reconstructs life in “working Newport” with its “seamen, longshoremen, coopers, caulkers, glaziers, braziers, sailmakers, riggers, and porters,” and in another he sketches out the contours of British mercantilism (p. 18). Ultimately, Kelley’s well-researched exploration into the lives of Africans enslaved in British North America during the late eighteenth century is an indispensable study of the Atlantic slave trade. Clark University Ousmane K. Power-Greene The American Revolution, State Sovereignty, and the American Constitutional Settlement, 1765–1800. By Aaron N. Coleman. (Lanham, Md., and other cities: Lexington Books, 2016. Pp. xii, 259. $95.00, ISBN 978-1-49850062-3.) The American Revolution, State Sovereignty, and the American Constitutional Settlement, 1765–1800 offers itself as a revisionist history of the American Founding that corrects what author Aaron N. Coleman calls the “nationalist” conventional wisdom (p. 3). Scholars in thrall to this syllabus of errors, including major figures in the field, are said to have read their approval of later centralization back onto the Founding era. The nationalist interpretation has not adequately appreciated that state sovereignty was the basis of the Revolution and the Union, and that it endured throughout the Founding era, despite the contrary designs of Alexander Hamilton and his Federalist allies. This thesis is pursued through all the major events of the period: from the rationale for the separation from Britain through the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions. The argument is well grounded in primary sources and conversant with the vast literature on the subjects it addresses, and this book stands as a competent expression of the state-centered perspective on the Founding. A major theoretical pillar of Coleman’s argument, adopted from Michael Oakeshott by way of M. E. Bradford, is the distinction between a nomocratic and a teleocratic political order. A nomocratic order lays out processes and methods for addressing common concerns, for making decisions, and for The Journal of Southern History, Volume LXXXIII, No. 3, August 2017 BOOK REVIEWS 663 limiting power. A teleocratic order aims to achieve a specific philosophical objective or grand political project. This distinction is invoked throughout the book, though not in the depth of Oakeshott or Bradford. In practice, Federalists are condemned as teleocratic for wanting to centralize power in the federal government; Anti-Federalists and Jeffersonian Republicans are valorized for wanting the opposite. Sometimes (and without explanation) the former term is rendered as “teleological.” The reader is left to wonder whether this difference is intended to carry any meaning. Nevertheless, by use of this distinction, and by other indications, it is clear that the author has subtly but designedly aligned himself with Bradford’s version of traditionalist-localist constitutional conservatism. Thus the revolt of 1776 is tendentiously described as “secession from the British Empire”; similarly, New Hampshire’s ratification of the Constitution completed “the secession from the Articles of Confederation” (pp. 39, 127). Are we thus meant to regard that later and infamous attempted secession as just one more legitimate appeal to state sovereignty? Coleman offers a large clue in the conclusion’s statement that it was Abraham Lincoln and the “Federalist-cumRepublican vision of the sovereignty of national government that emerged triumphant during the Civil War, and became enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment” (p. 237). The Civil War resulted in the “second American constitutional settlement that governs America today” (p. 238). To suggest that our modern Leviathan derived from the Federalists and Lincoln, rather than the Progressives and their heirs in the New Deal and Great Society, is to misunderstand the foundation and salvation of limited republican government in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as the causes of its erosion in the twentieth century. It is quite debatable, often on the author’s own evidence, whether the “constitutional settlement” of the book’s title was ever truly settled. The book portrays Federalists as teleocratic backsliders, promise breakers on the topic of state sovereignty and the limits it was meant to impose on the federal government. But this interpretation overestimates the amount of theoretical clarity and agreement that existed. The desire for a stronger central government that could affect citizens directly and defend them adequately coexisted with the desire for limits on its reach in deference to the local authority of the states. Just how to balance these imperatives was not something agreed to once and for all and then deviously abandoned. It was worked out over time as the Constitution was interpreted and put into effect (two inseparable facets of the same process). Constitutional politics happened. Interests and principles clashed; institutions were designed on paper and then functioned in reality. In sum, this book gives us a rich redescription of the Founding from a convinced perspective, but it is skewed by insufficient appreciation that the action it reports was always a political contest over constitutional meaning—not apostasy by one group against the true faith retained by another. Finally, in this reviewer’s opinion the volume is marred by poor editing. Every few pages there are typographical errors, grammatical errors, missing words, or distracting malapropisms that undermine the expression of the author’s ideas and reflect poorly on the publisher. Georgia Southern University Johnathan O’Neill The Journal of Southern History, Volume LXXXIII, No. 3, August 2017 Copyright of Journal of Southern History is the property of Southern Historical Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. 370 • JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC (Summer 2017) This lack of engagement with prior prison history calls into question the book’s overall significance. If viewed as a synthetic work, however, Liberty’s Prisoners offers a powerful interpretation of the prison’s emergence and its role in constituting social and political power and status in the early republic. As hley Rub in is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Toronto. She is the author of multiple articles on penal reform, prisoners, and prison history, and is currently writing a monograph on the history of the Pennsylvania System of solitary confinement at Eastern State Penitentiary. The Founders and the Idea of a National University: Constituting the American Mind. By George Thomas. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Pp. 252. Cloth, $95.00.) Reviewed by Mark Boonshoft In 1795, George Washington famously pledged to donate $20,000 worth of stock in the Potomac River Company to fund a national university. As its title suggests, George Thomas’s The Founders and the Idea of a National University is about the broader vision that lay behind Washington’s donation and the widespread support for a national university among the founding generation. Benjamin Rush first proposed a national university in 1787. Later that year the Constitutional Convention considered the idea, but opted not to include it in the final document. The national university reappeared in most early republican plans for education reform and drew support from the first six presidents. Congress even considered the idea on a few occasions. The proposal lay dormant for a time, only to reemerge in the Regina G. Kunzel, Criminal Intimacy: Prison and the Uneven History of Modern American Sexuality (Chicago, 2008); Patricia O’Brien, The Promise of Punishment: Prisons in Nineteenth-Century France (Princeton, NJ, 1982); Allen Steinberg, “The Spirit of Litigation”: Private Prosecution and Criminal Justice in Nineteenth-century Philadelphia,” Journal of Social History 20 (Winter 1986), 231–49. ................. 19014$ CH13 04-20-17 13:10:56 PS PAGE 370 REVIEWS • 371 Reconstruction era. Yet it failed at every juncture. Though Thomas narrates this story well, it is not the focus of the book. Rather, as a political theorist, Thomas is interested in what the rationale for a national university tells us about the nature and limits of American constitutionalism. The national university is good fodder for this because supporters defended the institution as constitutionally necessary, even as it died on a series of constitutional objections. A preexisting people, the preamble’s “we the people,” created the Constitution. Paradoxically, though, the document also attempted to create that same sovereign, republican people, to transform an aspiration into something real. This is where the university came in. “As conceived by Washington”—who, for Thomas, is the quintessential supporter of the plan—“the national university might be understood as a supplement to the institutional structure brought forth in the Constitution” (3). By bringing elites from across the nation together and creating personal bonds that transcended geographical divides, the university would create “a political culture with shared beliefs and understandings—things the institutional structure of the Constitution did not provide” (3). Thomas’s book thus rounds out our understanding of how nationalists hoped to use federal power to draw together the young nation. Historians will situate Thomas’s analysis alongside work by Richard R. John on the post office and John Lauritz Larson on internal improvements. Indeed, it is telling that Washington invested shares in the Potomac River Company—an important internal improvement—to fund the proposed university. These projects were part of the same vision. Arguments for the national university, though, betrayed the weakness of the constitutional system it would bolster. Here, Thomas follows David Hendrickson and Peter Onuf in emphasizing that the Constitution primarily created a union, not a nation. “With some irony,” as Thomas astutely shows, “the very decentralized nature of the Constitution in this realm [national sentiments], which moved proponents of the national university to urge it as a necessary ‘institution of support’ in the constitutional scheme, also rendered it difficult to establish” (15). The university’s boosters failed to generate enough nationalistic enthusiasm from across the nation to overcome localism and constitutional objections to the plan. Historians will find particularly valuable chapter 2, in which Thomas analyzes the constitutional debates over the university in relation to other national institutions—including the Bank of the United States, West Point, and the Smithsonian Institute. ................. 19014$ CH13 04-20-17 13:10:57 PS PAGE 371 372 • JOURNAL OF THE EARLY REPUBLIC (Summer 2017) Thomas’s arguments about the university’s unique significance rest largely on comparisons he draws between plans for the national university and other colleges and academies. First of all, plans for the university accorded little importance to religion and less to theological education. “Measured against the backdrop of sectarian colleges where religious belief often defined the mission of education,” Thomas writes in chapter 3, the national university represented a radical departure (91). Thomas goes so far as to dismiss the first three colonial colleges—Harvard, William and Mary, and Yale—as “theocracies” (128). Columbia College and the University of the State of Pennsylvania provided models for a less theologically driven curriculum than the other colonial colleges or the denominational institutions founded in the early years of the republic. Nevertheless, Thomas maintains, regardless of their curriculum, even these schools were not national in scope. The national university, though, would be. Too often, Thomas leaves the reader with the impression that nationalists believed existing schools were not just inadequate, but were part of the problem of insufficient national cohesion. Yet around the same time that Washington pledged to support the national university, he also gave a similar donation of stock in the James River Company to the Liberty Hall Academy in Virginia (now Washington and Lee University). In fact, many supporters of the national university also helped build the academies and colleges that Thomas presents as foils to the national university. That they proliferated while the national university failed leads Thomas to conclude that, helped along by Federalist support for religious institutions, “Anti-Federalist understandings of education, rooted in local government and private organizations, won out in the early years of the nineteenth century” (152). But Federalists, National Republicans, and finally Whigs—not Anti-Federalists, Old Republicans, and Jacksonians—most fervently supported state-chartered local institutions for societal and moral improvement, especially colleges and academies. And they were not simply hedging their bets. Supporters may have defined and justified the national university differently than these other institutions. However, they did still consider them as part of the same project. Thomas gestures to this briefly in his discussion of Benjamin Rush’s support for Dickinson College. The book still leaves the reader wondering: If nationalists saw local schools and colleges as somewhat antithetical to the national university, how did they reconcile their support for both? ................. 19014$ CH13 04-20-17 13:10:57 PS PAGE 372 REVIEWS • 373 This criticism aside, the book is an important addition to the literatures on education and national improvement in the early republic. Thomas challenges scholars not only to think deeply about civic education’s historically uncertain place in American constitutionalism, but also the implications of that history for the present moment. Ma rk Bo ons hof t is a post-doctoral research fellow at the New York Public Library, where he works on the Early American Manuscripts Project. His current book manuscript examines the politics of education in early America. The First U.S. History Textbooks: Constructing and Disseminating the American Tale in the Nineteenth Century. By Barry Joyce. (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015. Pp. vii, 335. Cloth, $100. E-book, $99.99.) Reviewed by Johann N. Neem Barry Joyce has written a remarkable, timely, necessary, and fun book about early U.S. history textbooks. He has taken what might have been a boring slog through outdated texts and brought them to life. Packed full of evidence and insight, Joyce’s narrative helps us see how the American creation story came into being. He does for the American narrative what Jeffrey Pasley in The Tyranny of Printers: Newspaper Politics in the Early American Republic (Charlottesville, VA, 2001) did for political parties, looking closely at the often ignored textbook authors who, in ways that are sometimes less than pristine, assembled a national story that, in time, became The Story. Most contemporary scholars of American textbooks have tended to excoriate early U.S. history textbooks for their falsehoods. Not Joyce. If anything, he criticizes modern scholars for misunderstanding the purpose of public history. In his acknowledgements, Joyce thanks his “many friends among the American Southwest Indian cultures for inspiring me to value all creation stories everywhere” (vii). Drawing on the work of scholars of folklore and myth, Joyce argues that every tribe—and why should Americans be excluded, he wonders—needs a creation story that places its members into a larger framework of meaning. Most scholars would find themselves appalled by this idea. Previous ................. 19014$ CH13 04-20-17 13:10:58 PS PAGE 373 Copyright of Journal of the Early Republic is the property of University of Pennsylvania Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. 662 THE JOURNAL OF SOUTHERN HISTORY deliberated. European slave traders’ adherence to African customs, as well as their ability to manage their crew, often determined the outcome of the voyage. In the case of the Hare, Kelley shows the volatility of the slave trade by describing episodes like when some of the Hare’s crewmembers jumped ship for a longboat off the African coast, or when Captain Godfrey executed an African who had led an attack on a different slave-trading vessel. Kelley weaves together these examples of peril and violence with less dramatic, yet frustrating, everyday occurrences on the voyage, like when the ship’s stove caught fire during the journey back to North America. Scholars who research slavery in North America will appreciate Kelley’s microhistory because it examines the gritty details of slave trading within the context of the larger forces at play within the eighteenth-century Atlantic world. The strength of Kelley’s approach is that it concretizes the experience of both slave traders and those enslaved, and moves from detail to broader context effortlessly. In one passage, Kelley reconstructs life in “working Newport” with its “seamen, longshoremen, coopers, caulkers, glaziers, braziers, sailmakers, riggers, and porters,” and in another he sketches out the contours of British mercantilism (p. 18). Ultimately, Kelley’s well-researched exploration into the lives of Africans enslaved in British North America during the late eighteenth century is an indispensable study of the Atlantic slave trade. Clark University Ousmane K. Power-Greene The American Revolution, State Sovereignty, and the American Constitutional Settlement, 1765–1800. By Aaron N. Coleman. (Lanham, Md., and other cities: Lexington Books, 2016. Pp. xii, 259. $95.00, ISBN 978-1-49850062-3.) The American Revolution, State Sovereignty, and the American Constitutional Settlement, 1765–1800 offers itself as a revisionist history of the American Founding that corrects what author Aaron N. Coleman calls the “nationalist” conventional wisdom (p. 3). Scholars in thrall to this syllabus of errors, including major figures in the field, are said to have read their approval of later centralization back onto the Founding era. The nationalist interpretation has not adequately appreciated that state sovereignty was the basis of the Revolution and the Union, and that it endured throughout the Founding era, despite the contrary designs of Alexander Hamilton and his Federalist allies. This thesis is pursued through all the major events of the period: from the rationale for the separation from Britain through the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions. The argument is well grounded in primary sources and conversant with the vast literature on the subjects it addresses, and this book stands as a competent expression of the state-centered perspective on the Founding. A major theoretical pillar of Coleman’s argument, adopted from Michael Oakeshott by way of M. E. Bradford, is the distinction between a nomocratic and a teleocratic political order. A nomocratic order lays out processes and methods for addressing common concerns, for making decisions, and for The Journal of Southern History, Volume LXXXIII, No. 3, August 2017 BOOK REVIEWS 663 limiting power. A teleocratic order aims to achieve a specific philosophical objective or grand political project. This distinction is invoked throughout the book, though not in the depth of Oakeshott or Bradford. In practice, Federalists are condemned as teleocratic for wanting to centralize power in the federal government; Anti-Federalists and Jeffersonian Republicans are valorized for wanting the opposite. Sometimes (and without explanation) the former term is rendered as “teleological.” The reader is left to wonder whether this difference is intended to carry any meaning. Nevertheless, by use of this distinction, and by other indications, it is clear that the author has subtly but designedly aligned himself with Bradford’s version of traditionalist-localist constitutional conservatism. Thus the revolt of 1776 is tendentiously described as “secession from the British Empire”; similarly, New Hampshire’s ratification of the Constitution completed “the secession from the Articles of Confederation” (pp. 39, 127). Are we thus meant to regard that later and infamous attempted secession as just one more legitimate appeal to state sovereignty? Coleman offers a large clue in the conclusion’s statement that it was Abraham Lincoln and the “Federalist-cumRepublican vision of the sovereignty of national government that emerged triumphant during the Civil War, and became enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment” (p. 237). The Civil War resulted in the “second American constitutional settlement that governs America today” (p. 238). To suggest that our modern Leviathan derived from the Federalists and Lincoln, rather than the Progressives and their heirs in the New Deal and Great Society, is to misunderstand the foundation and salvation of limited republican government in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as the causes of its erosion in the twentieth century. It is quite debatable, often on the author’s own evidence, whether the “constitutional settlement” of the book’s title was ever truly settled. The book portrays Federalists as teleocratic backsliders, promise breakers on the topic of state sovereignty and the limits it was meant to impose on the federal government. But this interpretation overestimates the amount of theoretical clarity and agreement that existed. The desire for a stronger central government that could affect citizens directly and defend them adequately coexisted with the desire for limits on its reach in deference to the local authority of the states. Just how to balance these imperatives was not something agreed to once and for all and then deviously abandoned. It was worked out over time as the Constitution was interpreted and put into effect (two inseparable facets of the same process). Constitutional politics happened. Interests and principles clashed; institutions were designed on paper and then functioned in reality. In sum, this book gives us a rich redescription of the Founding from a convinced perspective, but it is skewed by insufficient appreciation that the action it reports was always a political contest over constitutional meaning—not apostasy by one group against the true faith retained by another. Finally, in this reviewer’s opinion the volume is marred by poor editing. Every few pages there are typographical errors, grammatical errors, missing words, or distracting malapropisms that undermine the expression of the author’s ideas and reflect poorly on the publisher. Georgia Southern University Johnathan O’Neill The Journal of Southern History, Volume LXXXIII, No. 3, August 2017 Copyright of Journal of Southern History is the property of Southern Historical Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. UNIT IV STUDY GUIDE Building a New Nation Course Learning Outcomes for Unit IV Upon completion of this unit, students should be able to: 6. Summarize the influence of political parties on American society, government, and culture. Reading Assignment In order to access the following resources, click the links below: Click here to view the Constitution Debate PowerPoint. (To view the PDF version, click here.) Fleming, T. (2015). From disagreements to the first divide. Financial History, (113), 16-38. Retrieved from https://libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direc t=true&db=31h&AN=102677153&site=ehost-live&scope=site Kapstein, E. (1997). Hamilton and the Jeffersonian myth. World Policy Journal, 14(1), 35-44. Retrieved from https://libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direc t=true&db=31h&AN=9706152111&site=ehost-live&scope=site Schwarz, M. (2013). The origins of Jeffersonian nationalism: Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the sovereignty question in the Anglo-American commercial dispute of the 1780s. Journal of Southern History, 79(3), 569-592. Retrieved from https://libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direc t=true&db=31h&AN=89592600&site=ehost-live&scope=site The articles cited in the unit lesson are required reading. You may be tested on your knowledge and understanding of that material as well as the information presented in the unit lesson. Unit Lesson During the war years, a mutual goal had been the galvanizing force that secured American unity, but now as a sovereign nation, with domestic and international responsibilities, there was a need to again rally support to ensure a stable government. The removal of the crown’s influence did ensure that a new government could form, but independence alone does not a government make. The process to create the modern constitutional republic the U.S. has today took multiple steps and revisions to become effective. A New Government In 1781, the Articles of Confederation, dubbed by many “America’s first constitution,” was put into place. This document, a set of agreements determining the powers and responsibilities of local and national government, is a representative look at the concerns of the American people as they separated from the crown. The Articles outlined strict limitations against the federal government while maintaining its responsibility to act as the unified voice of the new nation under the authority of a single congress of thirteen delegations. Regardless of size or population, each state had a single vote, but could send multiple delegates. The congressional responsibilities included diplomacy, foreign relations, trade regulation, and ensuring a working postal service. The overwhelming consensus by these early delegates was the need to avoid a powerful central (federal) government in order to ensure that a new monarch would never emerge. In a sense, this was an attempt for these rebels to ensure that they would not fall to the "dark side," as was perceived of the empire. HY 1110, American History I 1 What the congress was not granted were the essential tools to create this utopian nor the UNITgovernment, x STUDY GUIDE reasonable ability to amend the law enough to make these changes. Though currency Title was officially a federal requirement, each state had its own “pet” banks. Also, it was the state that taxed the citizen, not the federal government. For the federal government to be funded, it was the request of the congress for the states to determine which collections went to the federal and which to the state. What this caused was an unequal financial responsibility for an equal vote–more population meant more tax dollars, but still only one vote, and there was no repercussion if the state forbade the funding of a mutual government with state currency. Why is this a problem? Just like today, if the tax flow is inconsistent or short, the programs that depend on the money cannot operate. After the war, America owed France, Spain, and Holland loans back for their aid and support. All bills of this type must be paid by a recognized national or world currency; however, with little tax support, the continental dollar stalled, and the money in pet banks could not compensate as their inflation rates were constantly changing. Not only did this put the economy into dangerous waters, but it also brought negative attention to the nation’s claim of unity and status—its sovereignty. So, why not simply amend the law to fix this oversight? There were two issues: 1. Taxpayers did not trust a strong central government and were likely unwilling to support any powers of the state being transferred to the nation. Today, there is a general national culture across diverse regions, and most citizens would never see the national government in action. However, from the earliest local governments, the colonies/states saw themselves as independent entities with unique identities, needs, and cultures. This is partly why the attempts at quickly fostering a sense of nationalism were important as the war ended. 2. The original inception of the Articles needed to ensure that any laws or amendments must benefit the overwhelming majority of citizens. Depending on what the change was, it may have required seven, nine, or even all thirteen states to vote, which was very difficult as it was not always guaranteed to have full representation present, or even enough for quorum. Also, in the case of an amendment, one that fundamentally changed the way government functioned, it would require ratification from all state governments, and thus a high agreement across all states. An ironic, yet excellent, example of where getting necessary votes was a problem was with the holdout by Maryland on its ratification of the Articles. Until western borders for all states were defined, the voters of Maryland demanded its individuality, and the objections literally kept the remaining states divided in two. Problems with the Articles As a confederation, the states were once again locally governed first. Each state would write and ratify its own personal constitution, and whatever the size and shape, the government’s role was to appease the interests of that region, not the nation. Several states would include a bill of rights to outline the limitations of government. As can be expected, with the differences between regions and the power struggle between state and federal authority, there was soon to be a series of debates. The most glaring was arguably the debate over slavery, which would start in the states but quickly blossom into the national forum. Similar to the feelings over taxation, the local government was more likely to be visible to the common voter than the federal, which also meant that local government was more likely to hear the voice of the common voter—this was part of the expectation of true republicanism. Regarding who could vote and what rights they had would also differ by state. Property, gender, and age were common qualifications, though different states included different language. These credentials were reasoned as a way to judge how much the potential voter had actually seen the government work, and they were so common that they were not always spelled out. This segregation was considered as applicable to women and children as it was to the poor, as each were considered too out of touch with the government process to make the best decisions—a reasoning that would enrage some upper-class women to challenge this law, including future First Lady Abigail Adams. When these educated women discovered that some states just left women out of the discussion altogether, they came to the polls. These demonstrations prompted some of the first amendments to state constitutions in HY 1110, American History I 2 order to ensure the status quo. African Americans, too, had difficulty in voting.UNIT With xrare exception, most STUDY GUIDE states ensured that free African-American men had to take great leaps to ensure their rights, including taking Title cases to court. The Articles’ problems did not end with Maryland’s ratification. In only a few years’ time, the issues of debt (international and to America’s own people) and relationships on all sides became unavoidable pressures on the new nation. Soldiers had not been paid, citizens had not been recompensed, and those European nations who stepped in to sway the war’s outcome demanded America’s attention. The states, as a loose association, simply did not have the strength, finances, or unity to represent themselves as one economic entity. There needed to be a centralized national authority. The Final Straws Along with these pressures, the relationships with neighboring Native Americans were still relatively hostile after the war. The most pressing issues were land disputes between states and tribes, such as the events leading to the Treaty of Fort Stanwix. Soon, America would begin its controversial push to the western lands, starting with the Northwest Territory, and with that this relationship would suffer like never before. The rhetoric of good faith would not be enough to compensate those who would lose their rights and claims. Neither suffrage nor slavery would die after their first attempt at equality, and Native Americans would see that finding common ground with the American nation would prove difficult. Despite the protests of the majority of Americans, those with the power continued to refine the meanings of “freedom” and “citizenship.” As the debts began to pile and multiply, again and again, Congress would request taxation from the states to use in relation to foreign powers and individuals. States, though, were not filling their coffers each and every year, especially those that were landlocked. Making this even worse was the pattern of upper-class representation of the less wealthy, causing a lack of sympathy. With the common man being taxed to the breaking point, and quite often having not received due pay, chaos ensued. Shay’s Rebellion is a rather famous example of where the fallout of impossible demands by the state (Massachusetts) led to irritated citizens taking violent action against any authority they could. Actually a series of events taking place between 1786 and 1787, this rebellion is best remembered for its clash at the U.S. Armory in Springfield, Massachusetts. Leading the assault was a collection of poorer landowners and farmers, who, after several poor crop yields, were drowning in debt due to the high taxation by the state. Captain Daniel Shays, a former Continental officer, would be the leader of these “rebels,” and their revolt would force the leaders of the country to take note of the realities of the struggles that continued to harm the now-“free” nation. Even though this challenge was too small to significantly destabilize the Union, the fact that these rebels were willing to take up arms was a grave concern to the young nation, considering the rhetoric of the Revolution had centered on the rebellion against unfair taxation and poor government representation. A Convention It was clear that the Articles of Confederation were not working, and the dream republic was dying; a new government was necessary. In hope to amend these articles, leaders from the thirteen states were called to Annapolis in 1786, but only five delegations showed. Without quorum, the only decision made was to meet in Philadelphia in May of 1787, but this would prove to be the scene of a political revolution. This second attempt to address the flaws in the Articles successfully received representatives from twelve of the thirteen states, but there were some notable holdouts. Rhode Island sent no one but was not the only outlier, as New York retained only the outspoken and over-ambitious Alexander Hamilton, and the fiery Patrick Henry felt something amiss and refused to take part. Among those gathered in the Philadelphia courthouse were an unlikely sampling of the population. Each man was a highly educated, upper crust member of society, and (with few exclusions) from a generation raised in the ethos of revolution and the War for Independence. This gathering, however, was far different from the Sons of Liberty that had used physical assault and personal sacrifice to rally troops against the oppressive British. Instead, this was a snapshot of the America’s political future: highly dogmatic, well-bred, and masters of rhetoric. HY 1110, American History I 3 To set the scene for the convention, a collection of up to fiftyfive men met in agreed secrecy. It was the beginning of a sweltering summer, but the doors remained shut and the windows nailed down, as no discussion could be allowed to be overheard. The simplest misunderstanding outside could be enough to destroy confidence in the existing government. Within the halls, the stirring debate only increased the tension and temperature; a range of topics were brought forth to debate, ranging from state laws to federal offices. Questions such as what laws were subject to federal veto, repercussions to increasing federal power, the justification of the slave trade, questions about what a slave’s value in the census would be, and if a federal office should be voted on by the people were discussed at length. The primary dividing line, however, was the population debate. The states that had amassed both a large area and population, such as Virginia, felt that a single vote per state had been unfair to those they represented under the Articles of Confederation and suggested instead that population census dictate the number of votes given. States of smaller population, such as New Jersey, identified the disparity and argued how if one region was able to sway the vote, then their population was no longer represented at all. The two plans for government that emerged were aptly called the Virginia Plan and New Jersey Plan. UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title The U.S. in 1790, seen here with much of the territory away from the coast still heavily influenced by Britain, France, and other European immigrants. (Map of Territorial growth, 1790, n.d.) Virginia Plan 1. Votes given were based solely on population. 2. A bicameral Congress was proposed. 3. Congress can override states on matters. 4. Ratification of voting would be secured by popular vote. New Jersey Plan 1. Votes given were equally based per state. 2. A unicameral Congress was proposed. 3. Federal levels can require state action on matters. 4. Ratification of voting would be secured by state vote. After weeks of chaos, and on the verge of likely dissolution, both sides understood that they had to provide concessions, and from both plans emerged the Great Compromise, which is the foundation for the modern U.S. government structure. The compromise included the following: the office of the President moved from Congress into the executive office; a bicameral Congress was established with both a representative (House of Representatives) and equal (Senate) chamber, where the federal had the ability to weigh in on state laws except where protected; and a system of state primaries was created to determine a state-wide representative vote to ensure republican ideals. With the debates ended, the Constitution was signed by almost all, and sent for ratification. HY 1110, American History I 4 Ratification Fight UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title Nine states had to approve, but that in itself was going to be a fight. The Americans did not know that their government under the Articles of Confederation was expected to change and were still wary of a centralized (federal) entity, even if there were multiple branches. In the final days of the British colonies, it was both George III and Parliament that outwardly denied representation and leniency, which led to the revolt. With the common man having little role in politics, it was not hard to imagine this situation developing again. The people were, however, lucky because of the deepening rivalries within the political elite, and the fact that it was the people who voted in the state conventions, not the legislators. As the ratification trail began, some considered the point moot. Six states—New York, New Hampshire, Virginia, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Rhode Island—would not ratify the Constitution as it was. These states represented the largest populations or simply did not hold conventions. Either way, it mathematically stopped the potential for successful ratification. To vocalize and debate the intricate details of the proposed Constitution, two groups would emerge: the Federalists (proratification) and Antifederalists (anti-ratification). Pamphlets such as this quickly made their way around the new nation; the printing press proved to be an essential cog in politics. (Cover page from the Federalist, 1778) The immediate reaction to the mathematic problem caused the Federalists to emerge first. Their first action was to secure the states they could: Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Maryland, and South Carolina came first. All of these had their personal reasons for supporting a centralized authority. Surprisingly, Massachusetts, a largerpopulation state with reasons to support states’ rights, narrowly changed with the promise of amendments, and with eight for and only five against, there was a chance. With the change of heart by Massachusetts, the Antifederalists emerged and used the power of recent memory to illustrate the dangers of an overbearing central power. To be clear, though the two sides were near-polar opposites, the Antifederalists were not necessarily anti-central government. These supporters feared the potential for federal corruption because the rights of states were not clearly included in a bill of rights, such as those that several state constitutions had included to check their own powers. To appeal to the common people, these Antifederalists painted the Federalists as elitists trying to ensure that elitists kept power. They pointed out the problems with a distant representative, the mathematics of addressing individual concerns, and resurrected much of the same propaganda used by the Patriots against the British. On June 21, 1788, with the promise of twenty amendments being put on the ballot for a bill of rights, New Hampshire flipped. A small state with a smaller population, this was likely the last possible option for the Federalists as the rest could economically survive as an independent entity. To unite the nation, there was still work to be done, and to aid the campaigns, both sides began putting their platforms on paper in the Federalist Papers and Antifederalist Papers. In May 1790, Rhode Island, the last to hold out, finally ratified the proposal, and the young nation was again united. To calm the fears of these states, more than twenty proposed amendments and thirty changes were promised to go before Congress in their first session in hopes of building a bill of rights and securing the balance with states’ rights. This period in building the United States is sometimes forgotten in the wake of war and powerful first leaders, but creating the nation took years of tiring effort from some of the most educated and enlightened minds in history. From declaring independence in July of 1776 to the final ratification in May 1790, the new nation began with a rocky start, but strong leadership and determination saw it through. As the last of the old guard left, the still-divided younger generation came to maturity and to power. With their emergence, the nation would again divide and find itself on the brink of war with an old ally. HY 1110, American History I 5 A New Government UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title To clarify possible confusion, it is first important to note that after this paragraph, any mention of the term “President” in this course will reflect the context of the U.S. chief executive; however, the term “Office of the President” did not begin with George Washington. The modern U.S. government, as we know from this lesson, did not start in 1776. In the years 1774-1789, there were sixteen appointments to the position of President, each for a one-year term. These fourteen men (both Peyton Randolph and John Hancock would hold the position twice, nonsequentially) served as moderator and presiding officer of the Continental Congress. Appointed, and given little power, this was a largely ceremonial role, a way to help keep order in session but not to influence it. Similarly, one role of the modern Vice-President is to preside over the U.S. Senate, but with this position comes other responsibilities not granted to the President of the Continental Congress, including the potential ability to vote. “King” Washington? On April 30, 1789, with the ratification debate finally settled, the modern American government officially began with the inauguration of George Washington in 1789. The hero of American independence, Washington was the first chief executive unanimously elected by the Electoral Congress to the position of chief executive and Commander in Chief under the new government structure. Having successfully led the fight against Britain, Washington was easily the most recognized, respected, and legendary figure in the new nation; there was truly no other relevant choice to unite the people. His first term, however, was full of uncertainty. The 1790s would serve as a key turning point in the fate of the young nation. First of all, while leaders such as Washington, Jefferson, and Adams moved into new political employment, other Founding Fathers had passed on, perhaps most notable being Benjamin Franklin. As an entrepreneur, philosopher, abolitionist, political activist, diplomat, ambassador, and inventor, Franklin had truly been a Renaissance man at the heart of the new nation’s development. His death in 1790 drew the attention and respect of dignitaries on both sides of the Atlantic. Washington would also set the mold for the Cabinet. Not officially a mandated requirement, Washington knew that he needed his most trusted advisors in a closed session to balance his ability to govern a nation, and four such positions came together to create the first cabinet:     Secretary of State—Thomas Jefferson Secretary of the Treasury—Alexander Hamilton Secretary of War—Henry Knox Attorney General—Edmund Randolph HY 1110, American History I 6 UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title Washington’s cabinet. (National Archives, n.d.) None of these four men would successfully remain in these positions throughout the entirety of Washington’s two elected administrations, but he would quickly fill any holes with another qualified candidate. It can be assumed that part of the reason for the abdications was the classic idea of “familiarity breeding contempt.” With the new titles and responsibilities, and with the changing of the political guard from elder statesmen to younger, a new spirit began to emerge throughout the capitol. Starting with the Federalists, who no longer needed to plead their ratification rhetoric, their success granted not only political influence but also ambition. Best known as one of the Federalist Papers authors, Alexander Hamilton was perhaps the most aggressively vocal, to a point where his brash views irritated even his allies. His most stern opponent and fellow cabinet member, Thomas Jefferson, would bitterly fight over issues such as debt, foreign policy, and foreign matters. It was clear that these two, both gifted politicians, would find it nearly impossible to find common ground. Debate was not left in Washington’s study; however, even issues as trivial as the appropriate title for public gatherings was debated. Washington’s Vice President, John Adams, was especially vocal about implementing monarchical designations. Washington, however, remained steadfast about his anti-crown intentions and pushed for a less ornate title. As Vice President, Adams was not part of the cabinet and in fact was purposely separated from it, presumably to avoid the temptation of creating a pseudo prime minister, which was so familiar to the American leadership in the British style. Adams hated this position, saying: “My country has in its wisdom contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived.” Inalienable Rights Also in a new role would be James Madison. Now a congressional representative for his home state of Virginia and previously a co-author of the Federalist Papers, he was first and foremost responsible to his neighbors and peers. Like his fellow Virginian, Jefferson, Madison understood and preached agrarian values that superseded any previous rapport he had with pro-ratification leader Hamilton. This new view from Hamilton scared the former friend, causing him to declare Hamilton’s economic plans unsuitable to the American people’s needs. Even Hamilton’s most like-minded peers feared his ambition, such as Adams, who dismissed his influence as elitist and vengeful. There were clear battle lines being drawn among the most powerful men in America. It was a political powder keg, and the first divide in the new nation would only await the necessary opportunity to emerge. Just as Washington, the first executive, was having inaugural meetings, so was the first bi-cameral Congress. On their plate would be a topic of great passion and pressure: the Bill of Rights. To remind from the previous unit, ratification was only successful upon condition of this bill being passed; 80 possible amendments were suggested. In all, 12 amendments were debated, and only 10 would receive the necessary votes to pass. HY 1110, American History I 7 Several of these omitted amendments would eventually make their way into the Constitution, UNIT x STUDY however, GUIDE including the voting rights amendments. Title What is remarkable about these rights is not so much what they say, but when they were passed and their relevance even today. It is true that a few are a bit outdated, such as the freedom from giving quarter, but it is not too far of a stretch to consider if that would have been the case in even the last century during the nation’s darkest days. And there are others, of course, such as the right to gun ownership, which remain a constant debate—not so much for the spirit of the original bill, but on how it interprets today. The first eight amendments focus on personal freedoms—the Constitution had outlined the “inalienable rights” of all men, so these guaranteed the rights of citizens. The final two are sometimes overlooked, but may have been the most significant of the time. These established the boundary between state and federal powers and guaranteed that the federal government could not assume powers that were unexpected by this first congress. One of the more unlikely outcomes of this new set of rights involved women. Although this was a nation “by the people, for the people,” women were largely second-class citizens concerning the political day-to-day of the nation. This, in tandem with vast changes in agricultural and factory innovations, such as the cotton gin and new roads, would promote a renewed emphasis on male dominance in economics, politics, and society. Also, with a growing American population, the growing family size was clearly visible, which also left many women at home. A new ideal, however, did emerge, which some historians called “Republican Womanhood” or “Republican Motherhood.” This was essentially the role of the wife and mother to be educated, virtuous, and a strong teacher for the next generation of great Americans. One of the key names from this movement is Judith Sargent Murray. Her work, “On the Equality of the Sexes,” promoted this increase in education and ensured that it would not take away from the tradition and “sweetness” of women in the role of mother and wife. Women were expected to become champions of the public good—a source of political support in the home to reinforce the nationalistic causes taught in schools, workplaces, and among the political elite. Battle Lines Returning to the center of government, Hamilton, despite his abrasive nature, was very good at his job. He had a knack for understanding economic patterns, and his Report on Public Credit in 1790 showed how the nation that had struggled so mightily under the Articles of Confederation had quickly reversed its fortunes. Oddly enough, as smart as he was, he was often at a loss for practical convention. On the brink of ensuring financial security and repaying loans, Hamilton suggested the retention of a debt as a way of building equity and giving the richest of Americans and American institutions a stake in the success of the nation. He would suggest that the federal government take over state debts to individuals and handle federal debts to partner nations. He foresaw this as a way to increase spending, which would have caused the economy to keep working, not unlike a modern stimulus package, and allow individuals the means to take care of debts in the interim, much like modern credit. The next step was to establish a bank to create a common currency, and to ensure its use, to trump the size of local banks. It would be so large that the federal government would only control 20% of the assets, while the rest belonged to individual investors. As economically savvy as this was, to his doubters such as Madison, this was just asking for a small population to essentially take firm control over the government, which meant the likely dismissal of the voice of those without such means. Also, having the federal government taking over state debts could give the national government powers that the Bill of Rights was meant to protect. Despite his doubts, Madison could not stop the bank from emerging. Washington saw the potential in such a system and signed off on the bank in 1791. Jefferson and Madison did win one fight. A plan to increase manufacturing, which was heavily dominated in the North and very rare in the rich Southern growing fields, never even made it to the floor of Congress. Many of the representatives saw the fears associated with this as a gamble for the nation. Not surprisingly, Hamilton’s plan for financing these plans was specifically geared away from the wealthy elites he was expecting to support him. Instead, it landed on a product more common to agricultural communities: whiskey. After a few years’ time, uprisings such as the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794 quickly brought public attention to the growing political divide, not unlike the impact of Shays’ Rebellion. HY 1110, American History I 8 Washington’s Resignation UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title In 1792, after four prosperous years, Washington was reelected with the same confidence that earned him his first term. In his four years, he had administered great political changes, but also oversaw domestic pressures, including his diplomatic approach to Native Americans—most notably with the Creeks in the Southwest and the Ohio tribes. Internationally, Europe was heating up with issues ranging from conflicts on the continent, such as the festering relationships between crown and country in France, and off continent, such as rebellions on slave-dominated plantations of the Caribbean. When Britain and France went to war in 1793, American loyalties were first tested. Washington, hoping to stay out of the fray, passed the Neutrality Proclamation, which set the tone for the new nation to try and remain neutral in foreign affairs on future occasions, always ending in the fall towards war. Despite this, the French continued to benefit from American shipping while the British did not. Many Americans, still angry about how they were treated and the war’s effect on personal property and slave evacuations, were slow to support England. It was this international chaos which would finally spark that powder keg developing in Washington’s cabinet. Hamilton and British sympathizer John Jay were sent to negotiate with the British concerning the one-sided trade and American demands. Britain, with a strong influence in what is now Canada, remained a threat to the young nation. What he returned with only heightened emotions. A new treaty between the U.S. and Britain, Jay’s Treaty, gave the British their desired trade and ensured that American debts would be paid to England, with interest. The treaty did not account for any compensation for the many slaves taken or request expeditious removal of remaining British troops in America. These conditions were a direct blow to planters, Native Americans, and those of anti-British sentiment, none of whom were commonly Federalist supporters. The terms barely passed through Congress, even with a strong pro-Federalist stance, and the votes clearly showed a separation in ideals. The printing of the conditions for all Americans led to public burnings of the treaty and effigies of Jay throughout the nation. France would not take this agreement well, ending its alliance with the U.S. With that, the powder keg was lit, and even Washington could no longer keep the rival sides together. As the dust settled from Jay’s Treaty, the nation woke up to a new political divide. Those of the North who supported industry, Britain, and Hamilton’s fiscal plans would come together to form the Federalist Political Party (not to be confused with the ratification group of a decade prior). In response, those of agrarian means, who did not support Jay’s Treaty, and who saw the recent economic policies as a threat, merged under the leadership of Jefferson and Madison. In 1796, George Washington made a move that few believed he would. After two terms in office, he quietly and bloodlessly stepped down—a final sign of his faith in the republic he helped build. Washington’s Vice President, John Adams, technically a Federalist, but not a fan of Hamilton’s attitude or ambition or Jay’s negotiation, ran against his dear friend and political peer, Jefferson. 1796 Election Vying to take over for Washington in 1787 would be Washington’s Vice President, John Adams, and the man with whom he had waged a vocal campaign, former Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson. During his time in the cabinet, Jefferson and Hamilton had developed a deep rivalry, one that included significant international and domestic beliefs that countered each other. Jefferson saw that Washington and Hamilton were quite inseparable, and Adams also shared many of the same federalist (as in pro heavy federal government) beliefs, while Jefferson feared a big government. This would become the root of the first two-party system. Though very close with Hamilton and Adams, Washington remained publicly, feverishly anti-party, even warning of the dangers of “sectionalism” and “factionalism” within the nation. HY 1110, American History I 9 UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title Map of the U.S. showing the breakdown of how each state voted in the 1796 election. (Map of the Presidential Election of 1796, n.d.) Banking on the name recognition, Adams, Hamilton, John Jay, and other like-minded citizens would develop the first political party: the Federalists. On the other side, Jefferson, Madison, and like-minded compatriots would respond with directly opposing views on numerous issues: Federalists 1. Strong support of Jay’s Treaty and trade with Britain 2. Strong supporters of distant, centralized government 3. Proponent of wealthy elites influence in the government 4. Mainly Northeastern and urban support Democratic-Republicans 1. Remained loyal to the French whose influence helped win the war 2. Feared centrality would hurt the planter and farmer and advocated a local government 3. Feared the needs of the majority underclass would go unheard 4. Majority of support came from the planters and regular citizens By the midpoint of Washington’s second administration, the battle lines were set, and Washington’s fears were visibly coming to fruition. What had already been an unstable union was now directly divided down economic lines, with a heavy emphasis of higher class Northern industry supporting Adams and planters supporting Jefferson’s Republicans. Adams would win the most votes, Jefferson second, and the remaining candidates a distant third and fourth. With this, Adams moved into Washington’s shadow and Jefferson became Vice President, a very dangerous position of great power and little responsibility for the outspoken Republican leader. It is with this situation that the U.S. would face its first real crisis, one that nearly tore the nation in half. References Cover page from The Federalist, 1788 [Photograph]. (1778). Retrieved from http://www.public-domaincontent.com/pictures/Political_History_Images/thumbnail66.shtml Map of territorial growth, 1790. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.public-domaincontent.com/pictures/Political_History_Images/thumbnail73.shtml HY 1110, American History I 10 Map of the Presidential Election of 1796. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.public-domainUNIT x STUDY GUIDE content.com/pictures/Political_History_Images/thumbnail89.shtml Title Washington's Cabinet [Photograph]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1994/spring/george-washington-4.html Learning Activities (Non-Graded) Flash cards For a review of the key terms of the unit, click here to access the interactive Unit IV Flashcards in PowerPoint form. (Click here to access a PDF version.) Non-graded Learning Activities are provided to aid students in their course of study. You do not have to submit them. If you have questions, contact your instructor for further guidance and information. HY 1110, American History I 11 
Purchase answer to see full attachment