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"United States Race relations History 18th century."
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The Patriots' Dilemma
'A masterly analysis of slavery and republicanism from the left. A stunning achievement' - Gerald Horne
Timely and controversial,
The Patriots' Dilemma confronts longstanding interpretations of U.S. history that emphasize a fundamental conflict between pro-slavery and anti-slavery interests. By 1776, influential American patriots acknowledged that slavery was incompatible with the ideals of the republic. But a republic for whom?
As Timothy Messer-Kruse argues, their real motivations have been misinterpreted for more than 200 years. The Framers were primarily concerned with the protection and betterment of the white community, not the liberation of enslaved black people. The conundrum was that slavery had to end because it created what they saw as a dangerous population, but it could not be abolished without endangering their (white) republic.
Their solutions included schemes to banish former slaves to the western frontier or overseas, to exclude them from the category of 'citizen', to make their emancipation gradual, and to tightly police African American communities.
eBook
Thirteen Clocks
In his celebrated account of the origins of American unity, John
Adams described July 1776 as the moment when thirteen clocks
managed to strike at the same time. So how did these American
colonies overcome long odds to create a durable union capable of
declaring independence from Britain? In this powerful new history
of the fifteen tense months that culminated in the Declaration of
Independence, Robert G. Parkinson provides a troubling answer:
racial fear. Tracing the circulation of information in the colonial
news systems that linked patriot leaders and average colonists,
Parkinson reveals how the system's participants constructed a
compelling drama featuring virtuous men who suddenly found
themselves threatened by ruthless Indians and defiant slaves acting
on behalf of the king. Parkinson argues that patriot leaders used
racial prejudices to persuade Americans to declare independence.
Between the Revolutionary War's start at Lexington and the
Declaration, they broadcast any news they could find about Native
Americans, enslaved Blacks, and Hessian mercenaries working with
their British enemies. American independence thus owed less to the
love of liberty than to the exploitation of colonial fears about
race. Thirteen Clocks offers an accessible history of the
Revolution that uncovers the uncomfortable origins of the republic
even as it speaks to our own moment.
eBook
Venture Smith and the Business of Slavery and Freedom
This book originated in the summer of 2006, in the burial ground of the First Church of Christ, Congregational, of East Haddam, Connecticut, where a team of forensic scientists began excavating the graves of two emancipated slaves, Venture Smith (d. 1805) and his wife, Marget (d. 1809). Those requesting this remarkable investigation were the Smiths’ direct descendants, members of the eighth, ninth, tenth, and eleventh generations, who were determined to honor the bicentennial of their founding ancestor’s death by discovering everything possible about his life. Opening burial plots in the hope of recovering DNA for genealogical tracing proved a compelling first step. But what began as a scientific inquiry into African origins rapidly evolved into an unparalleled interdisciplinary collaboration between historians, literary analysts, geographers, genealogists, anthropologists, political philosophers, genomic biologists, and, perhaps most revealingly, a poet. Their common goal has been to reconstruct the life of an extraordinary African American and to assay its implications for the sprawling, troubled eighteenthcentury world of racial exploitation over which he triumphed. This volume displays the rich results of that collaboration. A highly intelligent, deeply selfmotivated and immensely energetic slave transported from Africa, Venture Smith transformed himself through unstinting labor into a respectable Connecticut citizen, a successful entrepreneur, and the liberator of other enslaved African Americans. As James O. Horton emphasizes in his foreword to this volume, “Venture Smith’s saga is a gift to all who seek to understand the complex racial beginnings of America. It helps to connect the broad American story with the stories of many Americans whose lives illustrate the national struggle to live out the national ideals.” In addition to Horton and volume editor James Brewer Stewart, contributors include Cameron Blevins, Vincent Carretta, Anna Mae Duane, Robert P. Forbes, Anne L. Hiskes, Paul Lovejoy, Marilyn Nelson, David Richardson, Chandler B. Saint, Linda Strausbaugh, Kevin Tulimieri, and John Wood Sweet.
eBook
The fair sex : white women and racial patriarchy in the early American Republic
Choice Outstanding Academic Title 2002
Once the egalitarian passions of the American Revolution had dimmed, the new nation settled into a conservative period that saw the legal and social subordination of women and non-white men. Among the Founders who brought the fledgling government into being were those who sought to establish order through the reconstruction of racial and gender hierarchies. In this effort they enlisted “the fair sex,”&#—white women. Politicians, ministers, writers, husbands, fathers and brothers entreated Anglo-American women to assume responsibility for the nation's virtue. Thus, although disfranchised, they served an important national function, that of civilizing non-citizen. They were encouraged to consider themselves the moral and intellectual superiors to non-whites, unruly men, and children. These white women were empowered by race and ethnicity, and class, but limited by gender. And in seeking to maintain their advantages, they helped perpetuate the system of racial domination by refusing to support the liberation of others from literal slavery.
Schloesser examines the lives and writings of three female political intellectuals—;Mercy Otis Warren, Abigail Smith Adams, and Judith Sargent Murray—;each of whom was acutely aware of their tenuous position in the founding era of the republic. Carefully negotiating the gender and racial hierarchies of the nation, they at varying times asserted their rights and demurred to male governance. In their public and private actions they represented the paradigm of racial patriarchy at its most complex and its most conflicted.
eBook