As the expanding United States grappled with the question of how to determine the boundaries of slavery; politicians proposed popular sovereignty as a means of entrusting the issue to citizens of new territories. Christopher Childers now uses popular sovereignty as a lens for viewing the radicalization of southern states' rights politics; demonstrating how this misbegotten offspring of slavery and Manifest Destiny; though intended to assuage passions; instead worsened sectional differences; radicalized southerners; and paved the way for secession.In this first major history of popular sovereignty; Childers explores the triangular relationship among the extension of slavery; southern politics; and territorial governance. He shows how; as politicians from North and South redesigned popular sovereignty to lessen sectional tensions and remove slavery from the national political discourse; the doctrine instead made sectional divisions intractable; placed the territorial issue at the center of national politics; and gave voice to an increasingly radical states' rights interpretation of the federal compact.Childers explains how politicians offered the idea of local control over slavery as a way to appease the South-or at least as a compromise that would not offend the states' rights constitutional scruples of southerners. In the end; that strategy backfired by transforming the South into a rigid sectional bloc dedicated to the protection and perpetuation of slavery—a political time bomb that eventually exploded into Civil War. Tracing the doctrine of popular sovereignty back to its roots in the early American republic; Childers describes the dichotomy between believers in local control in the territories and national control as first embodied in the 1787 Northwest Ordinance. Noting that the slavery extension issue had surfaced before but obviously not been resolved; he shows how the debate over this issue played out over time; complicated the relationship between the federal government and the territories; and radicalized sectional politics. He also provides new insight into such topics as Arkansas and Florida statehood; the early phases of California's statehood bid; and the emergence of John C. Calhoun's common property doctrine.Laced with new insights; Childers's study offers a coherent narrative of the formative moments in the slavery debate that have been seen heretofore as discrete events. His work stands at the intersection of political; intellectual; and constitutional history; unfolding the formative moments in the slavery debate to expand our understanding of the peculiar institution in the early republic.
#1063633 in Books University Press of Kansas 1997-04-02Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.08 x .58 x 6.10l; .83 #File Name: 0700614214244 pages
Review
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. "the horrors of war more than counterbalance the glory"By Kerry WaltersSo writes Pennsylvanian Jacob Heffelfinger after his first battle in the Civil War. Heffelfinger is one of the dozens of veterans whose letters and memoirs Hess examined to write this study of the Union soldier under fire. His chapters examine the visual; auditory; olfactory; and tactile experience of battle; strategies for coping with battle-fear before; during; and after the shooting; and the ways in which combat veterans in the Civil War remembered their experiences (this; in the final chapter; may be the book's single most important contribution).Unhappily; the book is fundamentally flawed by Hess' strange claim that the Civil War veteran was a victor over his dreadful experiences rather than a victim; and so he seems to appreciate neither the poignancy of the firsthand accounts he cites or the horrific post-war psychological and physical damage endured by the veterans. A book published the same year Hess's appeared; Eric T. Dean's _Shook Over Hell: Post-Traumatic Stress; Vietnam; and the Civil War_; is a more sensitive study; as is Gerald Linderman's _Embattled Courage: The Experience of Combat in the American Civil War_ (1987); a deservedly classic treatment with which Hess explicitly disagrees. In short; Hess deserves our gratitude for the wealth of firsthand testimony he cites. But his analysis of its significance falls short.0 of 3 people found the following review helpful. Three StarsBy Walter W. TeskeNot quite what I expected0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. An excellent account of the how the Union solider viewed the ...By michael N.An excellent account of the how the Union solider viewed the war as it was happening. Hess's writing is clear; concise and very informative. An excellent companion to the book Marching Home by Brian Jordan. Read this one first.
