The Ruling Race

James Oakes. The Ruling Race: A History of American Slaveholders. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1982.

James Oakes argues that in order to understand slavery it is necessary not only to understand the experience of the enslaved, but also of those who enslaved them. The slaveholding class he describes differs from the commonly accepted image of a conservative, stable gentry ruling over plantations—he notes that while most slaves lived on large plantations, most slaveowners were not plantation masters—they were small or middling owners of far fewer slaves. They were also far more attuned to the dynamic capitalist market and the aggressive, confident democratic American political culture than the conservative plantation aristocracy which dominate the periphery along the Chesapeake, Carolina Lowcountry, Gulf coast, southern Louisiana, and near Natchez in the Mississippi Delta.

This slaveholding class was overlooked in most historical studies because they were less visible—the most conservative, larger slaveholders held larger numbers of slaves and they also dominated the production of intellectual arguments in favor of slavery. What Oakes demonstrates is that many of the “positive good” arguments which historians have studied were produced by this conservative minority, who were also opposed to the continued expansion and development of the Southern economy and the South as a geographic entity.

This is a work of social history, so in making his argument, Oakes relied heavily on census data for a representative sampling (10 counties) of slaveholders. He supplemented this information with excerpts from letters, journals, and periodicals—although he cautions in the Introduction that these must be read with caution and a healthy dose of skepticism; he argues that historians had accepted these slaveholder accounts much less critically than they had the testimonies and narratives of former slaves.

Oakes is wrote this book at a time when Eugene Genovese’s Roll Jordan Roll held a dominating place in the historiography of the slaveholding class. Oakes is respectful but not deferential to Genovese, whom he credits with delineating much of the current understanding of the planter class, including the concept of “paternalism.” But Oakes disagrees with the nature of how the slaveholding class fulfilled and lived up to the paternal ideal. Oakes’ slaveholders are much more dynamic, much more market-oriented, and far less traditionalist than the grand old paternalists Genovese described (and increasingly empathized with as his politics shifted to the right).

Oakes is telling a story which is very much of the 19th century; it would be interesting, however, to compare his picture of upwardly-mobile middling slaveholders to more Northern-focused studies of the Market Revolution and the development of Jacksonian democracy.

In many ways, this book is both a good example of the strengths of social history when applied to an appropriate subject—in this case, a social and economic class with easily defined parameters—as well as an illustration of the ultimate shortcomings of the field which led to its demise as the cutting edge of the profession. The book reveals a lot but leaves the reader wondering how the world Oakes describes fits into the larger picture of American culture at large.

Furthermore, while this is a study of slaveholders, the complete absence of non-slaveholding white Southerners leaves Oakes without an “other” to contrast with. I would have appreciated a better sense of how typical—or not—the slaveholding class was compared to the broader Southern society.

William Cooper's Town

Alan Taylor. William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic. Vintage Books, 1995.

Before it became the home of the Baseball Hall of Fame, before it became known as the place where Abner Doubleday almost certainly did not invent baseball itself, Cooperstown, NY was known as the place James Fenimore Cooper immortalized in some of his novels; most notably in his early work The Pioneers. Best known now for introducing the seminal American character of Natty Bumppo, the novel was originally something of a wish-fulfillment reclamation of a lost patrimony by the son of the town's founder and namesake--William Cooper.

William Cooper was a man who worked his way up from a humble beginning as a wheelwright in late colonial society towards being a landlord of means in the new Republic. He did so through measures which were often bold, occasionally reckless, and all too often at odds with the wishes and best interests of his patrons--members of the old elite whom Cooper wanted to impress and eventually count himself among. Cooper proved quite adept--and very lucky--at taking advantage of the disruptions to established social and economic norms in the wake of the upheaval of the Revolution. Soon, he found himself in possession of thousands of acres of upstate New York land, and the status as landlord and patron to a new community.

Cooper never attained the gentility to go with his wealth that he desired, but neither did he embrace the politics of Republicanism that his humble origins and his own life story might have naturally inclined him towards. Rather, Cooper became a staunch Federalist and never wavered from this affiliation, even in the wake of the decline of Federalism in the years after Jefferson's election as President, as Republicans took power at all levels of state government in New York.

His downfall would come not only from the decline of Federalism but from ongoing economic and demographic changes which both challenged his control of his original holdings in the Cooperstown area, and overwhelmed his ability to maintain payments on his ever-growing debts. Cooper, dazzled by his own early success, sought to replicate it elsewhere in New York, to no avail. He over-extended himself, and tangled his estate even further into a web of debts, dubious property claims, and conflicting obligations.

He never resolved those issues, but rather passed them on in a will that was more generous and lucrative towards his heirs on paper than it was in reality. The Cooper children soon discovered that their inheritance was mortgaged to the hilt, and over the next decade and a half (roughly) creditors took it all away. Neither Cooper nor most of his offspring lived to see the final decimation of his once-impressive holdings, but his youngest son James did.

James Cooper (he added the "Fenimore" in his 30's not long before embarking on his wildly successful writing career--the only profession he ever succeeded at) sought to recast the history of his father and his hometown in ways which both restored the family fortune but also restored the ideal of social harmony and deference to betters which both he and his father believed in, despite the relentless tide of democratic leveling the country was going through. Read that way, The Pioneers is an idealized history of the early American republic which pointed the way towards a peaceful, stable, harmonious future which only existed in the dreams of Federalists like William Cooper and in the bestselling books written by his son.

The Market Revolution

Charles Sellers. The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815-1846.

Oxford University Press, 1991.

Sellers's book was a major reevaluation of the period when first published a quarter-century ago; it's still an important survey of the period. Sellers covers a lot of ground--each chapter is somewhat thematic in approach, even as they very slowly move the chronology forward--but largely keeps focused on a single, broadly-defined arena. He argues that this era saw the negotiation of power between capitalism and democracy in the early phase the growth of the market economy unleashed in the wake of the conclusion of the War of 1812. Carries out in the fields of politics, religion, and social change, the overriding conflict involved the tension between the imperatives of the forces of the market versus the political fact of an increasingly empowered electorate which included many groups which were either leery of the market or sought to tame it or redirect it in accordance with their values and interests. 

Sellers locates much of this tension in the conflict between two very different religious impulses: arminianism and antinomianism. The distinction between the two reflected two different moral economies (my phrase, not Sellers') which ultimately needed to accommodate each other in the new democratic capitalist orthodoxy--one which, at the conclusion of this period, still contained the fatal contradiction of slavery. The tension over slavery would be push the polity to the breaking point in the wake of James Polk's recklessly successful efforts to annex new lands for expansion while ignoring the niceties of sectional balance. 

Sealed with Blood

Sarah J. Purcell. Sealed with Blood: War, Sacrifice, and Memory in Revolutionary America.
Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002

This books takes a subject which on first glance may seem limited--the ways in which public remembrance of Revolutionary War heroes changed in the first half-century of American history. However, Purcell explains in the Introduction that "To understand how the Revolutionary War contributed to the earliest formation of national identity is to understand something crucial and long lasting about American political culture." (10) The subsequent chapters support that statement. By tracing how American chose to remember and honor those who had suffered--and especially, particularly in earlier years, those who had died--in the Revolutionary War, Purcell is able to illustrate how early American nationalism was increasingly contested between elite-oriented Republican ideals and emerging democratic norms.

The book is divided into five chapters, covering the era in chronological order. According to Purcell, remembrance went through discrete stages during different periods; first, during the war itself; then, during the Articles of Confederation era; changed again during the Federalist era; evolved towards more democratic norms from 1801 to 1819; and then what was left of the unitary nature of Revolutionary commemoration fractured from 1800 to 1825, on the verge of the Jacksonian period.

In general, the movement was towards greater democratization--in the early chapters, Purcell argues that it was widely accepted by most Americans that it was fitting that elite officers who died in battle should be commemorated in the interests of the greater Republican good. The idea of honoring ordinary soldiers never came up, and would have been regarded as counter-productive; deference was still an important social value during the Revolutionary period. (22)

But while ordinary Americans were not at first fit subjects for commemoration, they had an important role to play in these rituals--the widespread participation of Americans of different strata of society, including women, was both expected and indeed necessary in order for society to be united and proper national feeling derived from such ceremonies, writings, and memorials.

Later, however, events would force the sacrifices and experiences of ordinary Americans to the forefront, and increasingly both the memoirs of middling and working-class participants in the Revolutions, as well as memorials dedicated to the collective sacrifice of ordinary soldiers, would be seen as proper and even necessary functions of national collective remembrance. As a second war with Britain loomed on the horizon in the early 19th century, there was also a new focus on the naval experience in the Revolution. This ultimately led to a recognition of the suffering of American prisoners on British prison ships--a powerful parallel to what impressed sailors were going through as the War of 1812 drew near.

Finally, the return of the Marquis de Lafayette to America allowed for surviving veterans to take a place in the very public, and very national, spectacle of Lafayette's return. The elderly French hero was very welcoming to all former veterans--even, on some very notable occasions, to African-American veterans who otherwise had been written out of the evolving orthodox narrative.

By this point, not only had the deference to great leaders as emblematic of the entire national experience passed, but also the notion that there was one, unified national memory that all Americans could agree on and rally around was little more than a comforting illusion. Americans North and South would continue to insist that the Revolution held a special meaning, but they would disagree more and more strongly about what that meaning was.

Tom Paine's America

Seth Cotlar. Tom Paine's America: The Rise and Fall of Radicalism in the Early Republic.
Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2011.

Cotlar’s provocatively titled book begins with a moving, and slightly pathetic, account of Tom Paine’s less-than-triumphant return to the United States, in 1802. The former bard of Democracy and Revolution was reduced to hoofing it from tavern to tavern in Baltimore looking for one which would provide lodging to a man now widely reviled as an atheist and a “Jacobin.” The contrast between this ignominious episode, and the reference to “Tom Paine’s America” in the title is striking. Thomas Paine found Americans in the early 1800s to be largely either hostile or indifferent to his return and his person, a situation which—as the Epilogue makes clear—would largely continue to this death, and beyond. So what, exactly, was the “America” which Cotlar claims was his, and what happened to it?

The intervening five chapters illuminate the rise and fall of that now largely forgotten America; one which embraced a trans-Atlantic, radical democracy as its ultimate goal. The ‘Paineites’ in Cotlar’s narrative held a view of democracy which was more expansive, all-encompassing, and radical than the purely suffrage-based model we are more familiar with. They considered themselves part of a larger democratic movement, one which took inspiration from other countries as well as crediting Americans for doing the same; devotees of Paine’s teachings saw democratic revolution as a truly universal phenomenon, one which was defined neither by American exceptionalism, nor by a limitation to what is now considered the “political” sphere.

Indeed, the very notion of what was “political” was contested in the early years of the republic, just as what “democracy” meant was. In both cases, the Paineites advocated a broader conception of those concepts; in both cases, their interpretations—which were influential and important during the Revolutionary era—would eventually be discredited by a new, more moderate consensus.

But Paineites did not give up without a fight; for some time after Tom Paine himself left America for France, his followers continued to advocate his ideals; one of Cotlar’s arguments is that Paineites existed in a much more intense and active dialogue with—and understanding of—liberal democratic activism in Europe. It was easy for them to tie their own cause, whether it took shape in nascent working-class activism or in the many Democratic-Republican Societies, to the fate of similar groups espousing similar goals in Great Britain and France. And for a while, this position was both popular and broadly acceptable to many Americans. So while there was always a conservative opposition to Paineite ideology, conservatives such as John Adams felt obligated either to criticize radical democrats obliquely, or in private.

That would change, however; the rise of Jacobin violence in France, and the supposed influence of the Democratic-Republican Societies on the Whiskey Rebellion, began to put Paineites on the defensive. More and more, they were forced to explain their support for movements which seemed to threaten good government, the new Constitution, and social harmony.

The Painites would continue to have a place in the anti-Federalist opposition for some time, but ironically it was the victory of Jefferson and the Republicans in 1800 which sounded the death knell for Paine’s followers as a vital and formidable political force. Jefferson and his followers quickly disassociated themselves from the radical democrats—now routinely disparaged by “respectable” Republicans as well as Federalists as ‘Jacobins’—who had helped them gain power; the Federalist establishment returned the favor by acknowledging that Jefferson and his Republican coalition were much more respectable than the Jacobin rabble. Property was safe, as was respectable political leadership by sober, respectable men. Questions about leveling, ending slavery, and so forth could be safely forgotten. In the end, America was able to avoid the trauma of the French Revolution by taming and restricting the scope of what “democracy” meant and how far it should go.

Paine himself died a nearly forgotten man, spending his days with a tiny, dwindling band of like-minded artisan deists and radicals, all of whom would strive to keep the flame of radical democracy flickering for future generations to rediscover.

The Rise of American Democracy

Sean Wilentz. The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln. New York: W.W. Norton, 2005.

Wilentz has written a history of the development and evolution of the American ideal of democracy over the course of several decades that simultaneously covers a lot of ground while in same ways remaining narrow in focus. The time span is implied in the subtitle--From the rise of Thomas Jefferson the election and inauguration of Abraham Lincoln.

After a brief consideration of the Federalist period immediately after ratification of the Constitution, the focus shifts to the Jefferson administration and how the Jeffersonian Republicans coped with their own ideological assumptions--forged in political battles with the Federalists and the conservative hierarchies they represented--as well as with the lingering "country" and "city" democracies which had been stirred up by the Revolution and which continued to flare up from time to time in response to political shifts. The book traces this democratic heritage through the decline of the Federalists, the split between "Democratic" and "National" Republicans, and onto the rise of the Jacksonian Democracy. 

Jackson looms large in this book, which in some ways appears to be Wilentz’s attempt to defend and update Schlesinger’s Age of Jackson for the 21^st century. Although Wilentz is sympathetic to the racial (and, to a much lesser degree, gender) inequities inherent in Jacksonian Democracy, he spends a lot more time defending Jackson’s legacy than in critiquing it, and Old Hickory and his political heirs (Martin Van Buren could not complain too much about his treatment here) generally get the benefit of the doubt in any political battle or ideological conflict.

That said, Wilentz does give the Whigs a more sympathetic hearing than he afforded the Federalists, and acknowledges that the Jacksonians managed to neither fully encompass the democratic yearnings of their era nor address the logical inconsistencies in some of their actions and beliefs.

Hovering over all of this was the institution of slavery and the questions it raised about the meaning and the limits of American democracy. Those contradictions and challenges would ultimately destroy the Whig party completely and split the Democracy in two.

If not already clear, it should be noted that the way in which this hefty study is narrow in focus is this—Wilentz has written an unapologetically political history of the period, which means that it is top-down in focus and pays little mind to the broader tapestry of social and cultural history. While perhaps unfashionable, this is appropriate given Wilentz’s assertion that 19^th century Americans located the center of their social and cultural arguments within the political realm. Politics were central to questions of what it meant to be American. It was a different world than the one we live in, and we can only begin to understand it if we try to see it as contemporaries did.