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E N C Y C L O P E D I A
O F T H E
New American Nation

Editorial Board
Paul Finkelman
College of Law, University of Tulsa
Jan Ellen Lewis

Department of History, Rutgers University
Peter S. Onuf
Department of History, University of Virginia
Jeffrey L. Pasley
Department of History, University of Missouri
John Stagg
Department of History, University of Virginia
Michael Zuckerman
Department of History, University of Pennsylvania
E N C Y C L O P E D I A
New American Nation

O F T H E
The Emergence of the United States,

1754-1829 2
FAIRS to
POVERTY
PAUL FINKELMAN, EDITOR IN CHIEF

Encyclopedia of the New American Nation
The Emergence of the United States, 1754–1829
Paul Finkelman
© 2006 Thomson Gale, a part of the Thomson This publication is a creative work fully Since this page cannot legibly accommo-
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1. United States—History—Colonial period, ca. 1600–1775—Encyclopedias. 2. United
States—History—Revolution, 1775–1783—Encyclopedias. 3. United States—History—
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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
F In September 1811 Elkanah Watson organized
FAIRS Agricultural fairs were a minor part of ag- and established the first true farmers’ fair at Pitts-
riculture and rural life in the early Republic. But their field, Massachusetts. Watson was a promoter and
rise and fall from 1811 to 1830 marked the begin- entrepreneur who had begun to raise merino sheep,
ning of farmers’ commitment to improve agriculture an imported breed noted for fine wool. He understood
through such techniques as selective livestock breed- that the existing organizations dedicated to improv-
ing, crop selection, fertilization, and crop rotation. ing agriculture appealed only to urban elites, gentle-
men farmers, and amateur scientists. Watson be-
The first agricultural societies and fairs appealed lieved that the message of improvement would be
to elites. In 1785 educated gentleman farmers and more palatable to working farmers if accompanied
planters organized societies in Philadelphia and by entertainment and camaraderie. Fairs needed to
Charleston, South Carolina, to discuss the applica- feature enough pageantry to “seize upon the far-
tion of science to agriculture. Members included mer’s heart” as well as his mind. The 1811 event
merchants and professionals as well as such promi- began with a parade of members of the society
nent citizens as Benjamin Franklin and George adorned with wheat cockades in their hats, livestock,
Washington. These societies offered premiums for and a band. Exhibits consisted of livestock along with
the best essays on fattening cattle and the best experi- field and orchard crops, and the Berkshire Agricul-
ments in wheat growing and pumping water. The tural Society presented certificates, ribbons, and en-
city of Washington established a series of market graved silver pieces as awards. Over the next few
fairs in 1804 and 1805. Organizers awarded premi- years, Watson broadened the appeal of the fair by ad-
ums to the best examples of each type of livestock ding competitions for domestic manufacturers, a
sold. In 1809 Washington-area residents organized church service, and an Agricultural Ball.
the Columbian Agricultural Society, which held reg- The blend of education and entertainment ac-
ular fairs and awarded prizes for the best livestock counted for the popularity of agricultural fairs into
exhibited rather than sold. The agricultural societies the 1820s. Watson even wrote a book to promote his
and fairs of the early 1800s, however, were not pop- vision, History of Agricultural Societies on the Modern
ular with the majority of people who actually raised Berkshire System (1820). Visitors observed the differ-
most of America’s crops and livestock. ence between common livestock and improved
1
FALLEN TIMBERS, BATTLE OF
breeds. Exhibitors displayed sheep with heavier and ———. “The American Agricultural Fair: Time and Place.”
finer fleeces, stronger oxen, more prodigious hogs, Annals of the Association of American Geographers 41
cows noted for producing rich milk in large quanti- (1951): 42–57.
ty, and prolific bulls. They wanted to attract those Mastromarino, Mark A. “Cattle Aplenty and Other Things in
Proportion: The Agricultural Society and Fair of Frank-
who wished to purchase breeding stock. Exhibits of
lin County, Massachusetts.” UCLA Historical Journal 5
domestic manufactures were common by the mid- (1984): 50–75.
1810s, reflecting the importance of homemade tex-
———. “Elkanah Watson and Early Agricultural Fairs,
tiles in the years before factory cloth dominated. This 1790–1860.” Historical Journal of Massachusetts 17
new style of fair, dedicated to experiencing improve- (1989): 104–118.
ment rather than merely discussing it, appealed to McNall, Neil Adams. An Agricultural History of the Genesee
farm families, especially those with access to New Valley, 1790–1860. Philadelphia: University of Pennsyl-
York City and urban markets in New England. Orga- vania Press, 1952.
nizers in Fredericksburg, Virginia, conducted that Neely, Wayne Caldwell. The Agricultural Fair. New York: Co-
state’s first fair in 1823. lumbia University Press, 1935.
The message of improvement was powerful Turner, Charles W. “Virginia State Agricultural Societies,
enough to convince some state legislatures to appro- 1811–1860.” Agricultural History 38 (1964): 167–177.
priate funds to support county agricultural societies J. L. Anderson
and their fairs. In 1819 the New York legislature au-
thorized payments to Allegany and Genesee Counties
to support agricultural societies. Two years later the
legislature appropriated money for Livingston and
Monroe Counties. Each county was responsible for
providing matching funds to be used for fair premi- FALLEN TIMBERS, BATTLE OF By 1794, the
ums. In 1819 the Massachusetts assembly provided northwestern Indian policy of the Washington ad-
an annual payment of two hundred dollars to be ministration was in crisis. Insisting upon the Ohio
used for premiums to every incorporated society in River as the southern boundary of their territory, In-
the state with capital stock of one thousand dollars dians under the Miami chieftain Little Turtle routed
that served a county of twenty-five thousand people. expeditions led by Generals Josiah Harmar and Ar-
thur St. Clair in 1790 and 1791, respectively. With
In the late 1820s the popularity of agricultural
the credibility of his administration at stake, Wash-
societies and fairs waned. Increasing production
ington selected Anthony Wayne to command a third
through improved livestock breeding, crop selection,
and final strike against the Indians.
and cultivation practices was difficult for farmers to
accept during a period of low commodity prices. Having spent the better part of two years raising
Most agricultural societies in Pennsylvania and Con- and training his Legion of the United States, Wayne
necticut disbanded after 1825 and only one society faced a delicate situation as he began his advance in
remained by 1830 in New York, the home of the July 1794. Not only were the Indians determined to
most societies and fairs. State legislatures also with- resist, but they were armed and encouraged by Brit-
drew financial support. While a few agricultural so- ish officials who operated out of Detroit and other
cieties sponsored fairs in the 1830s, only the return posts that were supposed to have been abandoned to
of agricultural prosperity in the 1840s contributed the United States under the terms of the Treaty of
to a new interest in forming agricultural societies Paris (1783). Now, Wayne discovered that the Brit-
and conducting fairs following Watson’s Berkshire ish had recently rebuilt and garrisoned Fort Miami at
plan. the Maumee rapids, near present-day Toledo, a site
that Wayne had targeted for his attack upon the In-
See also Agriculture; Livestock Production. dians. To further complicate matters, John Jay was
in London attempting to reach an agreement to avert
the apparently inevitable war, resulting in Secretary
BIBLIOGRAPHY of War Henry Knox’s instructions to Wayne to avoid
Kelly, Catherine E. “‘The Consummation of Rural Prosperity conflict with the British if at all possible.
and Happiness’: New England Agricultural Fairs and the
Construction of Class and Gender, 1810–1860.” Ameri- On 20 August, Wayne’s legion was attacked by
can Quarterly 49 (1997): 574–602. the Miami Indians at a clearing called Fallen Timbers
Kniffen, Fred. “The American Agricultural Fair: The Pattern.” (because a tornado had uprooted many trees, leaving
Annals of the Association of American Geographers 39 the wreckage scattered over the area), near Fort
(1949): 264–282. Miami. In a battle of only forty minutes, the legion
2 E N C Y C L O P E D I A O F T H E N E W A M E R I C A N N A T I O N
FAME AND REPUTATION
launched a bayonet charge that dispersed the Indians equivalents. While today fame connotes little more
in disorder. Though both sides suffered about 150 than notoriety, in the early national period it encom-
casualties, the confidence of the Indians was broken. passed an entire ethic. Similarly, reputation meant
Even more dispiriting was the refusal of the British more than one’s public image; an almost tangible
to allow refuge to the fleeing Indians inside Fort possession, it encompassed a person’s entire identity
Miami or to offer any resistance at all as Wayne de- and sense of self.
stroyed the Indian fields surrounding the fort. The concept of fame had particular power
The British had built Fort Miami at the Maumee among the early national political elite, though its
rapids, a strategically important site. Fearing the im- roots reached back to the beginnings of western civi-
minence of war with the United States, the British lization; Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans, by Plu-
had used the fort as a base from which to arm the In- tarch (c. 46–after 119 A.D.) was a literal guide to
dians and encourage attacks upon the frontier. They gathering fame, describing and ranking a spectrum
gave every indication that they would fulfill their of heroes who had achieved immortal fame—the
promises to support the Indians against attack by highest of goals. In the early American Republic,
United States forces. Circumstances changed this sit- young gentlemen schooled to find models of personal
uation, however, just at the time of Wayne’s ad- behavior in Plutarch and other classical texts imbibed
vance. With John Jay in London and the prospects this idea from a young age. As Alexander Hamilton
strong for a peaceful resolution to the diplomatic cri- put it in The Federalist No. 72 (1788), “the love of
sis, British officials ordered the detachment at Fort fame” was the “ruling passion of the noblest minds.”
Miami to avoid military conflict unless directly at-
As suggested by Plutarch’s panoply of great
tacked (similar orders had been given to Wayne by
men, a man earned fame by doing great deeds for the
Secretary of War Henry Knox). Thus, despite their
state—an assumption that evokes fame’s aristocratic
promises to the Indians and provocative actions on
cast. Francis Bacon (1561–1626) mapped out a hier-
Wayne’s part, the British refused any assistance to
archy of such acts in his widely read Essayes (1625),
the defeated Indians.
assigning fame to “fathers of their country” who
With British credibility shaken, the Indians had reigned justly; “champions of the empire” who de-
little choice but to come to terms with Wayne. In the fended or expanded territories; “saviors of empire”
Treaty of Greenville of 3 August 1795, the Shawnee, who surmounted national crises; lawgivers who
Delaware, and Miami tribes ceded three-fourths of governed posterity through their laws; and—highest
modern Ohio and northeastern Indiana to the United of all—“founders of states and commonwealths.”
States. This treaty, along with the final evacuation For early national leaders engaged in the creation of
of British posts in the Northwest, as mandated by a new nation, this sensibility infused their political
Jay’s Treaty (1794), opened that region, particularly efforts with a sense of lofty purpose as well as deep
Ohio, to a flood of American settlement. personal meaning. Seekers of fame wanted to make
See also American Indians: American Indian history and leave their mark on the world. America’s
Resistance to White Expansion; American founding generation assumed that they were doing
Indians: Old Northwest; Northwest; Ohio; just that. “We live in an important era and in a new-
Treaty of Paris. country,” Benjamin Rush observed in 1788. “Much
good may be done by individuals and that too in a
short time.”
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Gaff, Alan D. Bayonets in the Wilderness: Anthony Wayne’s Le- Fame was considered a noble passion because it
gion in the Old Northwest. Norman: University of Okla- transformed ambition and self-interest into a desire
homa Press, 2004. to achieve great goals that served the public good.
Nelson, Paul David. Anthony Wayne: Soldier of the Early Re- Even as fame fueled and inspired a man’s ambitions,
public. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985. it reined them in; one could only achieve everlasting
Daniel McDonough fame through public service. In essence, fame was a
selfish virtue, enabling leaders to be simultaneously
self-serving and public-minded; in a sense, it human-
ized the seemingly lofty and unreachable ideal of
community-minded republican virtue.
FAME AND REPUTATION Early national con- Reputation was equally important, but to a
cepts of fame and reputation differ greatly from broader range of people. Men and women of all ranks
their late-twentieth and early-twenty-first-century had a reputation, though its precise meaning differed
E N C Y C L O P E D I A O F T H E N E W A M E R I C A N N A T I O N 3
FAMILY LIFE
from group to group. For artisans, farmers, or mer- make himself in another. In such a constantly
chants—people of business or productivity—it con- changing world, even simple notoriety was a note-
noted reliability and honesty. For women, it was tied worthy accomplishment. Over time, this more dem-
to concepts of personal virtue. For political leaders, ocratic notion of fame grew to replace its more aris-
it represented their political currency, gaining them tocratic forebear.
office and influence; particularly before political par-
See also Classical Heritage and American
ties were acceptable, it was reputation that won a
Politics.
man power and office.
There were many dimensions to the concept of BIBLIOGRAPHY
reputation. Fame, rank, credit, character, name, and Adair, Douglass. “Fame and the Founding Fathers.” In Fame
honor all played a role. Rank was a somewhat imper- and the Founding Fathers: Essays. Edited by Trevor Col-
sonal way of referring to a person’s place within the bourn. New York: Norton, 1974. Reprint, Indianapolis,
social order. Credit was more personalized, encom- Ind.: Liberty Fund, 1998.
passing a person’s social and financial worth; people Braudy, Leo. The Frenzy of Renown: Fame and Its History. New
with good credit were trustworthy enough to merit York: Vintage Books, 1997.
financial risks. Character was personality with a Freeman, Joanne B. Affairs of Honor: National Politics in the
moral dimension, referring to the mixture of traits, New Republic. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press,
2001.
vices, and virtues that determined a person’s social
worth. Taken together, these qualities formed a McNamara, Peter, ed. The Noblest Minds: Fame, Honor, and the
American Founding. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Little-
name or reputation—an identity as determined by field, 1999.
others. Reputation was not unlike honor, and indeed,
early Americans often used those words inter- Joanne Freeman
changeably. Honor was reputation with a moral di-
mension. A person of good reputation was respected
and esteemed; an honorable person was notably vir-
tuous.
FAMILY LIFE See Domestic Life.
Although concepts of fame and reputation had
a long-standing historical past, different cultures
shaded and altered their meanings. In early national
America, the gradual democratization of politics
subtly altered their significance. Traditionally, Euro- FARM MAKING In all regions, despite their dif-
pean leaders worried about their honor and reputa- ferences, most colonists established farms from the
tion among their peers. Increasingly concerned with beginning of settlement. Colonial settlers faced sever-
gaining popular political approval, American leaders al obstacles as they acquired land for farms. Once
looked to a broader audience. A prime example of this land was obtained, either through a fee simple or
was the American practice of advertising political quitrent process, farmers cleared it and determined
duels in newspapers. By publishing detailed accounts how much would be in crops. Many farmers found
of their encounters—signed by name, despite duel- the Indian method of slash-and-burn to be the easiest
ing’s illegality—leaders attempted to prove their method to clear the land. Land was cleared of plants
qualities of leadership to the public and gain political and small foliage and the undergrowth was then
support. “Europeans must read such publications burned. This method made the land available for
with astonishment,” gasped a writer in an 1803 planting corn and other non-row crops in the Native
issue of The Balance (Hudson, N.Y.). American style. Farmers also removed trees by gir-
Eventually, the increasingly shifting and dling their trunks. Using this method meant it took
changeable nature of American society had its im- time for a tree to die, but over time, settlers would
pact. Urbanization and the rise of manufacturing be able to clear their land for crops.
made cities and towns ever larger, more complex, In the Northeast, colonists encountered rocky,
and anonymous. It is no accident that the early nine- acidic, clay soil that proved difficult to clear easily.
teenth century marks the rise of the “confidence Farmers spent years removing glacier rocks and
man” or “con man,” a person who relied on his very other debris from the ground. These farmers estab-
lack of reputation for personal gain. Winning confi- lished small-scale, general farms in which they raised
dence through his genteel appearance and manners, a variety of crops and livestock. Wheat, rye, barley,
he could cheat people in one town or city, then re- corn, and other crops along with cattle, hogs, chick-
FARM MAKING
Sheep Shearing. This woodcut of a farm family shearing sheep illustrated the chapter covering the month of May in an
American almanac published around 1810. © BETTMANN/CORBIS.
ens, and sheep were common across the region. By mained an important commercial commodity, al-
the end of the colonial period, however, farming had though most farmers raised corn for family and local
begun to decline in the upper Northeast. Lumber and consumption. The raising of livestock in Maryland
naval stores as well as financial and manufacturing and other locales became an important industry in
operations continued to be important in the nine- places where tobacco was no longer planted.
teenth century. Farm size varied from state to state, In the southern states, commercial agriculture
but most farmers had fewer than two hundred acres. drove the economy and society from the start. Colo-
By the nineteenth century, agriculture in the North- nial settlers planted tobacco, hemp, rice, indigo, and
east had ceased to be the only occupation as farm other crops for export. Tobacco farming expanded
families fell to roughly two-thirds of the population. quickly across Virginia during the colonial period.
In the nineteenth century, New England became a The development of the Carolinas and Georgia saw
center for sheep production. At the same time that the emergence of rice, sugar, hemp, and indigo pro-
the South started to emerge as a center for cotton duction. Southern crops, however, depleted the soil,
production, the New England states began exporting and planters and farmers found it necessary to use
large quantities of wool each year to Britain and field rotation practices. Planters ran large operations,
other manufacturing hubs. while family farms remained small, with farmers
In the mid-Atlantic states, agriculture developed placing only a portion of their land into staple pro-
around livestock raising and dairy and grain produc- duction while the remainder was used to sustain self-
tion. In the colonial period, Chesapeake Bay farmers sufficiency. Planters gained large land grants from
raised tobacco for the British market, with produc- headrights and generous grants from colonial gov-
tion concentrated in Virginia rather than Maryland. ernments. Initially, labor was performed by inden-
Quickly dubbed the breadbasket of the colonies, tured servants, but by the 1680s slavery had spread
Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and later Maryland pro- across the South. Originally used to farm tobacco,
duced wheat and raised livestock. During this time, rice, hemp, and indigo and to raise livestock, slaves
farmers began to move from the dual purpose cow in the nineteenth century were concentrated on cot-
and started distinguishing between those that pro- ton plantations. The development of the cotton gin
duced large quantities of milk and those that were changed the structure of farms across the South.
best for providing beef. The production of butter and When farmers migrated to the new western
cheese allowed farm women to sell their surplus in states, they found a different climate, topography,
the Philadelphia and international markets. In pro- and soil. As New England and mid-Atlantic farmers
prietary colonies, farmers acquired land subject to moved to the Old Northwest, the land flattened out
quitrents, with an average-size farm at 135 acres. In and the soil became more productive. Crops that
the nineteenth century, mid-Atlantic farmers con- could no longer be grown in the East, such as wheat,
tinued to improve and clear their lands. Wheat re- flourished in what would later be called the Middle
FASHION
West. Settlers found that clearing land required

breaking the prairie. While this was time-consuming
and costly, once it was broken, farmers did not spend
years clearing and rebreaking the soil. In the nine-
teenth century, the Middle West became a region not
just for wheat and other crops, but also for livestock
raising and feedlots. European immigrants from
northern and central Europe joined settlers from
New England, the mid-Atlantic, and the Upper South
in the Midwest after 1820.
See also Agriculture; Cotton; Livestock
Production.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Drache, Hiram M. History of U.S. Agriculture and Its Relevance
to Today. Danville, Ill.: Interstate Publishers, 1996.
Hurt, R. Douglas. American Agriculture: A Brief History. Ames:
Iowa State University Press, 1994.
Stephanie A. Carpenter
FASHION Both as a concept and a changing array

of consumer goods and cultural practices, fashion Alice Lawrason Riggs. Cephas Thompson painted this
portrait of a fashionable American woman around 1815.
served as an important means of social communica-
The sitter, the wife of a prominent Baltimore merchant,
tion in eighteenth-century British America. Com- wears a high-waisted Empire-style gown. THE MARYLAND
posed not only of objects and styles, but also of be- HISTORICAL SOCIETY, BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.
haviors and the arenas in which such items and
actions were displayed, fashion provided for connec-
tion as well as personal distinction. It possessed in- and the consumer appetites for novelty that chang-
tensely local significance as a tool for distinguishing ing fashions fed. As social critic Bernard Mandeville
among and within social groups, yet also expressed (1670–1733) observed, fashion was a “strange,
participation in a cosmopolitan Atlantic world. ridic’lous vice” that nonetheless “turned the trade.”
While most inhabitants of the colonies recognized This trade reached across the Atlantic and into the
the symbols of power that fashion conveyed, they heart of North America, as diplomatic and social re-
did not necessarily regard or respond to those mark- lations on the frontier created amalgams of Indian,
ers in the same ways. Thus, fashion was a primary Anglo, and French fashions.
register of cultural and political contest. In contrast to more recent cycles, fashions in
For Anglo colonists, England was the locus and dress changed slowly during the eighteenth century,
source of all things fashionable, although many indicated by seasonal variety in fabrics and more gla-
modes actually originated in France. A burgeoning cial shifts in the widths of hoop-supported skirts or
Atlantic trade made the adoption of European fash- the cuts of sleeves—changes subtle enough to be ac-
ions, from fabrics and fans to teapots, possible, while knowledged and adopted by the people “of fashion.”
waves of immigrants, many trained in the fashion Likewise, the display of fashionable practices, from
trades, also spurred the transmission of modes. dancing the minuet to drinking tea, the imperial
Newspaper advertisements for imports regularly de- good par excellence, and the social spaces in which
ployed the adjective “fashionable” as a powerful sell- those occurred (and in which fashionable dress could
ing point for the rising volume and selection of items be displayed to great advantage) signified high status
that suffused even middling colonial households by and participation in the empire. While fashion’s ap-
the middle of the eighteenth century. Indeed, the propriation and refashioning by slaves, servants, and
British Empire’s smooth operation depended on con- other “lower sorts” due to theft and an underground
sumption of fashionable goods in colonial outposts trade in stolen and secondhand goods made it an un-
FASHION
and furnishings grew more restrained. By 1764,

when Britain’s Parliament moved to diminish its war
debt by collecting taxes on items such as sugar and
French fabrics, the climate was ripe for calls to reject
imports and the fashions they expressed. In response
to the following year’s Stamp Act, which levied a
one-pence duty on all paper and paper transactions,
merchants in the northern port cities of Boston, New
York, and Philadelphia pledged not to import goods
until the bill was repealed, and outraged colonists
swore not to consume such articles. Supporters used
the public prints to enforce the boycotts, promoting
the virtuous behaviors of genteel “people of fashion”
while attempting to create new “American” fashions,
namely homespun cloth, domestic tea, and minimal-
ist mourning garb. Yet after the Stamp Act’s much-
celebrated repeal, colonists jettisoned the new modes,
never widely adopted but symbolically important
nonetheless.
With Parliament’s passage of the Townshend
Act of 1767, designed to raise revenue through the
assiduous collection of duties on certain items, in-
cluding beloved tea, some colonists revisited boy-
cotts. Resistance leaders called upon Anglo women in
particular to discipline their appetites and thus prove
Benjamin Franklin (1794). Franklin donned the persona themselves good female patriots, foregoing fashion’s
of a rustic American, along with the beaver hat and cultural power while gaining a new kind of visibility,
homespun suit that conveyed it, when appearing before yet also scrutiny. Extravagant display, from the
the French court at Versailles to plead for French
assistance. GETTY IMAGES.
form-fitting macaroni mode for men to high, orna-
mented hairstyles for women, characterized the peri-
od between the repeal of all Townshend duties except
stable marker of rank, other forms of social distinc- the tea tax in 1770 and 1773, demonstrating that
tion, such as speech and carriage, countered fash- many colonists had little use for asceticism and un-
ion’s democratizing potential. Thus was the very derstatement. The Tea Act of 1773, which gave Brit-
idea of fashion rife with contradiction: desirable as an ain’s East India Company a monopoly on the sale of
expression of high rank, yet disdained as the province tea to the colonies, defined tea, once the hallmark of
of mere pretenders to status; displaced onto consum- female-orchestrated gentility and participation in the
ing women, but avidly pursued by both sexes; con- empire, as a symbol of subjugation, and the colonists
nected to other celebrated concepts such as gentility, who consumed it complicit in a despotic, tyrannical
taste, and refinement, yet also suggesting luxury, regime. In 1774 the First Continental Congress’s As-
appetite, and effeminacy; and fueling commerce sociation enacted colonywide nonimportation and
through consumption, but creating a potentially un- nonconsumption resolutions, clamping down on ap-
easy dependence on markets. petites for all things fashionable in language that de-
cried forms of “extravagance and dissipation,” which
undermined professed American values of virtue,
FASHIONING A REVOLUTION simplicity, and sacrifice. Such regulation persisted
Due to its considerable influence, fashion served as a through the onset of hostilities between Britain and
flashpoint for cultural and political contests during the colonies in 1775, as hunting shirts and leather
the revolutionary era. By the end of the Seven Years’ breeches joined traditional military uniforms. Benja-
War in 1763, some Anglo colonists and Indians alike, min Franklin himself donned the persona of rustic
facing ailing postwar economies after more than a American, along with the beaver hat and homespun
decade of increasing consumption, called for re- suit that conveyed it, when appearing before the
trenchment and a lessening of dependence on foreign French court at Versailles to plead for French assis-
“luxuries,” even as English bourgeois styles in dress tance. Yet the American Revolution resolved little in
FEDERALISM
the battle over fashion, which shaped the contest not cade for long trousers and somber cloth, while the
only between England and the newly created United high-waisted, corset-free Empire dress for women
States of America, but between Whigs (Patriots) and persisted into the 1810s. Indeed, men’s and women’s
Tories (Loyalists), merchants and artisans, slaves and “fashionable” garb steadily diverged throughout the
masters, men and women—all competing to see who latter half of the eighteenth century, mirroring the
would define fashion for the new nation. rise of an ideology of separate “male” and “female”
bourgeois spheres of influence as white men aban-
doned obvious ornamentation in favor of other rep-
THE NEW NATION resentations of power available to them alone.
Revolutionary leaders had cast fashion as a threat to
See also Clothing; Consumerism and
the Republic while promoting an American antifash-
Consumption.
ion stance that was itself a fashion, one that they
often failed to adopt. The new nation and its leaders
needed to appear legitimate in the eyes of the world, BIBLIOGRAPHY
and European modes retained their ability to com- Baumgarten, Linda. What Clothes Reveal: The Language of
Clothing in Colonial and Federal America, the Colonial Wil-
municate power and status, locally and internation-
liamsburg Collection. Williamsburg, Va.: Colonial Wil-
ally. Many Anglo Americans continued to regard Eu- liamsburg Foundation, 2002.
rope as the seat of the mode (the fashionable) as goods Breen, T. H. The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Poli-
flooded an American confederation of states power- tics Shaped American Independence. New York: Oxford
less to enact national commercial policy in the mid- University Press, 2004.
1780s. Social critics pinned the Republic’s potential Bushman, Richard L. The Refinement of America: Persons,
demise on appetites for fashionable “gewgaws.” Houses, Cities. New York: Knopf, 1992.
Fortunately for Americans faced with the dilem- Carson, Cary, Ronald Hoffman, and Peter Albert, eds. Of Con-
ma of signifying both prestige and virtue, European suming Interests: The Style of Life in the Eighteenth Century.
fashions themselves grew more understated in the Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1994.
final decades of the eighteenth century, the so-called Haulman, Catherine Anna. “The Empire’s New Clothes: The
age of democratic revolutions. The Empire-style Politics of Fashion in Eighteenth Century British Ameri-
ca.” Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, 2002.
gown that became popular in the 1790s served the
Shannon, Timothy J. “Dressing for Success on the Mohawk
image of American, republican simplicity well, pro-
Frontier: Hendrick, William Johnson and the Indian
jecting it onto white women clad in simple white Fashion.” William and Mary Quarterly, third series, 53
gowns, standard-bearers of virtue, if not rights. (1996): 13–42.
Meanwhile, the displacement of Indians beyond the Shields, David S. Civil Tongues and Polite Letters in British
literal and figurative borders of the nation made the America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
interpretation of Indian-influenced frontier dress as 1997.
an American folk form possible, and unthreatening.
Kate Haulman
With the emergence of partisan politics in the
1790s, Democratic Republicans used fashion to at-
tack ostensibly foppish, elitist Federalists. Whereas
George Washington had donned a suit of homespun
for his 1789 inauguration, in 1793 he appeared in
velvet. The cut and cloth of a man’s breeches, and the FEDERALISM As a form of government, ”feder-
color of one’s cockade—ribbons worn during the alism” describes a system of divided powers, each
French Revolution—signified political allegiance, in sovereign within its limited realm but concerned
fact, created it. The influx of refugees from the slave with different spheres—one general, the other local.
revolt in Saint Domingue to cities such as Charleston The federal system created by the United States Con-
and Philadelphia helped create a distinct African stitution is the first specimen of this type, though
American style that recalled the French Revolution’s many other states have subsequently adopted federal
contagion of social upheaval. With Thomas Jeffer- forms.
son’s election to the presidency in 1800, the fashion Over time, federalism has come to convey a vari-
of genteel understatement triumphed; Jefferson ety of meanings, some of them contradictory. At the
would famously greet guests donned in a banyan (a beginning of the twenty-first century, the meaning
robelike garment), the height of genteel fashion for of federalism—like its related terms, federative sys-
the learned, leisurely set. Into the nineteenth century, tem, federal union, federal state—is difficult to disas-
Anglo American men traded knee breeches and bro- sociate from a strong central government within a
FEDERALISM
single nation-state. In its eighteenth-century signifi- dress the deficiencies of the Articles of Confederation,
cation, however, a federal relationship meant com- they had to find a solution that somehow avoided the
pact, alliance, or treaty among independent sover- extremes of “anarchy” and “consolidation”—what
eignties seeking a cooperative relationship. The the Virginian James Madison termed “a perfect sepa-
federative power, as the seventeenth-century philos- ration and a perfect incorporation, of the 13 States.”
opher John Locke defined it, concerned those powers Neither alternative found significant support within
of war and peace, of treaty and alliance that com- the convention. As James Wilson noted in his impor-
monwealths had need of in their transactions with tant explication of the new Constitution, “consolida-
other states. The formal compacts among equal par- tion” would demand “a system of the most unquali-
ties resulting from the exercise of this power— fied and unremitted despotism,” whereas separation
written constitutions, treaties, alliances—were into “a number of separate states, continuous in sit-
things to which the adjective “federal” might apply. uation, unconnected and disunited in government”
European publicists could speak of the “federal con- would make the states “at one time, the prey of for-
stitution” of Europe as actually existing, and meant eign force, foreign influence, and foreign intrigue; at
by the term the web of treaties, laws, and restraints another, the victims of mutual rage, rancor, and re-
that was to govern the relations of civilized states. venge.”
THE FEDERAL PRINCIPLE CONSTITUTIONAL INNOVATION

At the root of the federal principle was the idea of a As an experiment in federal government, the U.S.
covenant or foedus (its etymological root). This and Constitution was unique in creating a general gov-
“synonymous ideas of promise, commitment, un- ernment that could carry its laws into execution
dertaking, or obligating, vowing and plighting one’s through a regular executive and judicial establish-
word,” as S. Rufus Davis has suggested in The Federal ment, one that did not depend on requisitions or
Principle (1978), were joined together with two other edicts to the states to do its legitimate business. Con-
things: “the idea of cooperation, reciprocity, mutual- scious that the states would have to give up some of
ity,” and “the need for some measure of predictabili- their sovereignty, and conscious, too, of the impossi-
ty, expectation, constancy, and reliability in human bility of legislating for communities as opposed to
relations” (p. 3). As important as each of these three individuals, the framers brought forth a new politi-
concepts—commitment, reciprocity, predictability— cal edifice devoted to federal objects yet fashioned on
is to human relations generally, when states and the norms and institutions of constitutional govern-
peoples had need of such values they made use of the ment existing within the American states. Unlike the
term “federal.” state governments, which generally claimed a plena-
European colonists perched on the eastern rim of ry authority over the lives and liberties of their citi-
North America were not in fact the first inhabitants zens, the federal government was one of enumerated
of the continent to make use of ideas recognizably and limited powers. The powers so granted, as James
“federal.” A recognition that strength lay in union Madison emphasized during the ratification debates,
and danger in discord; a pledge of perpetual peace were “few and defined” and would be exercised “prin-
within, and of concerted action toward enemies cipally on external objects, as war, peace, negotia-
without; an understanding of how individuality tion, and foreign commerce.” Supremacy was ac-
might be preserved by common action; the vital sig- corded neither to the federal government nor the
nificance attached to sworn oaths and plighted state governments but to the Constitution itself,
faith—all these hallmarks of the federal principle though the more perfect union was justified by Fed-
were reflected in the institutions and norms of vari- eralists as being an indispensable means to the pres-
ous Indian confederacies, especially the great league ervation of both states and nation.
of the Iroquois or Six Nations. What were the limits of the powers respectively
Such a constellation of ideas was also central to given to the federal government and the states under
the Articles of Confederation formed among the the Constitution? And where was the authority
American states in the aftermath of their 1776 Dec- lodged to decide this delicate question? Those ques-
laration of Independence from Great Britain. The ex- tions arose immediately with the formation of the
perience of the Revolutionary War, however, showed new government in 1789 and remained of key im-
how difficult it was for states to cooperate in an en- portance.
terprise they all regarded as vital. When the framers The controversy pit “nationalists” like Alexander
of the Constitution met in Philadelphia in 1787 to ad- Hamilton, the first secretary of the Treasury, against
FEDERALISM
“State rights” or “compact” theorists like Thomas patently unconstitutional. But they also believed
Jefferson, a clash that achieved its first great expres- that the theory of implied powers was equally de-
sion in the contrary opinions of Hamilton and Jeffer- structive of the constitutional order, a position taken
son over the constitutionality of a national bank in by James Madison. Despite these differences, the
1791. Hamilton took an expansive view of the im- moderates were united in the conviction that to push
plied powers vested in the national government by either national or state powers too far would destroy
the Constitution, a view later unfolded eloquently the constitutional order, which they saw as a vital
and authoritatively in a Supreme Court opinion of barrier against powerful tendencies toward anarchy
1819, McCulloch v. Maryland. Chief Justice John or despotism.
Marshall acknowledged that the powers of the na-
tional government were limited and enumerated but
nevertheless found that Congress enjoyed “the right PRINCIPLE AND POLITICS
to legislate on that vast mass of incidental powers It is customary to associate the clash between na-
which must be involved in the constitution, if that tional sovereignty and the compact school with
instrument be not a splendid bauble.” Marshall con- North and South, but in the period from 1789 to
tinued, “Let the end be legitimate, let it be within the 1829 the picture is more complicated. After Jefferson
scope of the constitution, and all means which are became president in 1801, his administration accept-
appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, ed a more expansive conception of federal power. By
which are not prohibited, but consist with the letter the same token, many northern Federalists brought
and spirit of the constitution, are constitutional.” against his administration the same charge of un-
The contrary position of the “compact school,” constitutionality that Republicans had made against
by contrast, held that the federal Constitution was a the Federalists in the 1790s. The acquisition of Loui-
creature of the states, each of whom enjoyed the siana in 1803, they argued, went far beyond the im-
right to accede or not to the compact, and who, as plied powers claimed by the administrations of
the original parties, must ultimately retain the right George Washington and John Adams from 1789 to
to interpret the extent to which the compact was ful- 1801. They also claimed unconstitutional usurpa-
filled. In cases not within the compact, wrote Thom- tion against Jefferson’s Embargo of 1807–1809 and
as Jefferson in his draft of the Kentucky resolutions, later against “Mr. Madison’s War” of 1812, when
the pretended legislation of Congress was “void, and several New England states refused to heed the presi-
of no force.” Some, like John C. Calhoun, insisted dent’s call to mobilize their militia for national ser-
that each state enjoyed a right to nullify a federal law vice. From 1815 to 1830, similar flip-flops occurred
within its jurisdiction that, in its judgment, was un- over the issues of internal improvements, the nation-
constitutional; others who subscribed to the com- al bank, and the protective tariff, with leading politi-
pact theory, like John Randolph, were content with cal figures sometimes reversing their previous judg-
affirming a constitutional right of secession. Accord- ments of what was constitutional. The most
ing to this view, the national judiciary did not enjoy contentious issue, temporarily put to rest by the
the ultimate authority to decide the line of partition Missouri Compromise, concerned the extension of
created by the Constitution. That power instead lay slavery.
with the original contracting parties, the people of The elapse of three decades from the establish-
the states. ment of the federal government did not bring a great-
In between these rival understandings of the er consensus on the fundamentals, but rather a drift
Constitution lay a third view, one which was proba- toward constitutional doctrines mutually antago-
bly more expressive of the general consensus from nistic and irreconcilable. This lack of consensus re-
1789 to 1829 than either of the two extreme alterna- garding the basics of American federalism—the
tives. The moderates saw a “partly national, and sense, as the statesman Henry Clay put it, “that we
partly federal” system, though they were not always are as much afloat at sea as the day when the Consti-
in agreement among themselves. Some carved out an tution went into operation”—was felt to be pro-
ample dominion for federal power while also believ- foundly threatening to the sustenance of the consti-
ing that it would be utterly contrary to the spirit of tutional order. Thirteen years after Marshall’s
the constitution to preserve the Union by force, a po- confident opinion in McCulloch he wrote despairingly
sition adopted by constitutional commentator Wil- to a close friend that his hopes for the Union were
liam Rawle in 1825. Other moderates, by contrast, nearly at an end. “The union has been prolonged thus
chastised secessionists for counseling action that was far by miracles; I fear they cannot continue.”
FEDERALIST PAPERS
See also Anti-Federalists; Articles of convention who favored ratification, rural New
Confederation; Bank of the United States; Yorkers were suspicious, and the final makeup of the
Federalist Papers; Federalist Party; state convention had a clear majority opposed to rat-
Federalists; Hamilton, Alexander; ification. Hamilton and his supporters eventually
Jefferson, Thomas; Madison, James; wore down the opposition, though, and New York
McCulloch v. Maryland; Missouri became the eleventh state to ratify the Constitution
Compromise; War of 1812. on 26 July 1788. Despite failing to influence many
New York voters, The Federalist had a major impact
BIBLIOGRAPHY beyond New York. The essays were reprinted
Beer, Samuel H. To Make a Nation: The Rediscovery of American throughout the states and served almost as a debat-
Federalism. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University er’s handbook for the forces in favor of ratification
Press, 1993. at other state conventions.
Berger, Raoul. Federalism: The Founders’ Design. Norman and
London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1987.
The Federalist examined a number of major is-
sues, such as the flaws in the Articles of Confedera-
Davis, S. Rufus. The Federal Principle: A Journey through Time
in Quest of a Meaning. Berkeley: University of California tion (which governed the United States of America
Press, 1978. until the Constitution was ratified), the nature of
Hendrickson, David. Peace Pact: The Lost World of the Ameri- federalism with its division of power between a na-
can Founding. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, tional and state governments, and the powers of the
2003. various branches of government as well as why
Onuf, Peter S., ed. The Federal Constitution. Vol. 5 of New those powers were necessary. Although The Federal-
American Nation, 1776–1820. New York: Garland, 1991. ist does contain some innovative political philosophy
Rakove, Jack N., ed. Interpreting the Constitution : The Debate (most famously, Madison’s Federalist No. 10, with its
over Original Intent. Boston: Northeastern University novel argument that a republican government is
Press, 1990. safer in a large, not small, republic), it focuses mostly
David C. Hendrickson on practical considerations of how government
should function. In this, the authors exhibit what
would become a distinctly American, pragmatic atti-
tude. Because nearly all agreed that America should
have a republican government, the writers ignored
many of the philosophical questions that had en-
FEDERALIST PAPERS The Federalist (also gaged Western political philosophy up to that time.
known as the “Federalist Papers”) is a collection of
eighty-five essays on the U.S. Constitution written The Federalist also served an extremely important
under the pseudonym Publius by Alexander Hamil- rhetorical function. The moment for such an ambi-
ton, James Madison, and John Jay. Hamilton con- tious series of political essays was brief. A few dec-
ceived of the project as a means of countering anti- ades after 1787–1788, the essays would probably
Federalists, opponents of the Constitution who were not have had a significant impact because of the ex-
busily writing their own essays warning of the dan- plosion of newspapers. The essays themselves fos-
gerous powers given to the proposed national gov- tered a tone of civility in the debate and contributed
ernment. Madison and Hamilton eventually wrote to the larger discursive framework that the authors
all but five of the essays, which appeared serially in were attempting to establish. The well-wrought,
New York City newspapers between October 1787 carefully reasoned political essays became virtual en-
and August 1788. They were also published in book actments of the kind of deliberation the authors
form in 1788. hoped the national government would foster.
Although the procedure for ratification required The Federalist almost never mentioned specific
only nine states to approve the proposed Constitu- anti-Federalist writers or essays, even though those
tion, New York’s support was crucial both because attacks shaped the project. The invisibility of the
of the centrality of the state and because of its impor- anti-Federalists within the essays was part of Publi-
tance as a center of trade. If New York had voted us’s rhetorical strategy to establish himself as a neu-
against ratification, the Constitution would likely tral commentator offering an unbiased overview,
not have gone into effect, even with the necessary rather than as a partisan responding to specific
nine votes elsewhere. Ironically, The Federalist had charges. These tactics reinforced the overall thrust of
little impact on ratification in New York. Although The Federalist. Instead of trying to score every possi-
New York City elected representatives to the special ble debating point, the authors attempted to shift the
FEDERALIST PARTY
entire realm of the debate away from considerations in opposition to their bitter rivals, the Jeffersonian
of competing interests to considerations of the public Republicans, or Democratic Republicans, Federalists
good, as they defined it. either tried to imitate and mirror their opponents or
They also argued themselves into a more reason- devolved into stinging and increasingly self-
able position. Both Hamilton and Madison had ar- defeating attacks. But the Federalist Party had a sig-
gued vigorously for an even more powerful national nificant if brief moment during the 1790s and helped
government during the Constitutional Convention. to set the agenda for early American politics and gov-
Now called upon to defend the Constitution to people ernment.
suspicious even of the powers that were given, they
offered a moderate view of what the national gov-
EMERGENCE OF PARTIES
ernment would actually be empowered to do.
The first federal elections of 1788–1789 were not
Hamilton and Madison had read widely in politi- conducted along party lines. Members of Congress
cal philosophy and drew upon a large range of his- were elected, much as representatives had long been
torical and political writings in articulating their chosen, based on reputation and renown. Since they
understanding of the Constitution. Perhaps most im- were now the officers of the new federal government
portant, David Hume, the Scottish enlightenment and since the great majority had supported the ratifi-
thinker, influenced both men on a number of impor- cation of the new Constitution of 1787, these men
tant issues. appropriated the term Federalist to indicate their sup-
The Federalist continues to have a significant role port for the Constitution and the new regime. But
in the American political tradition. Not only do polit- party identities and identification were weak in the
ical scientists still turn to it as the most authoritative early Republic. Not until 1792 was there a clear op-
guide to the U.S. Constitution, but legislators, presi- position group in place to challenge the policies of the
dents, and U.S. Supreme Court justices continue to administration and its allies in Congress. Further-
study its pronouncements in their efforts to under- more, attitudes toward parties were still negative and
stand the Constitution. neither side claimed to be one. Rather, Federalists
considered themselves “the government” or “the na-
See also Anti-Federalists; Constitution, Ratifi-
tion” and branded their opponents as a “faction,” a
cation of; Constitutional Convention.
term that had unhealthy, unrepublican connota-
tions. The Democratic Republicans also denied that
BIBLIOGRAPHY they were a party and claimed instead to be protect-
Adair, Douglass. Fame and the Founding Fathers: Essays. Ed- ing the Constitution from the depredations of the
ited by Trevor Colbourn. New York: Norton, 1974.
Federalist “party” faction that had improperly seized
Furtwangler, Albert. The Authority of Publius: A Reading of the
control of the government. Scholars have debated
Federalist Papers. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press,
1984.
whether it is proper to speak of Federalists and Dem-
ocratic Republicans as full-fledged parties or merely
Wills, Garry. Explaining America: The Federalist. New York:
Penguin Books, 1982. as loose alliances or proto-parties. No matter where
one falls out on this question, it is clear that the com-
Andrew S. Trees petition between the two entities—whatever we may
choose to call them—was as intense as any ever seen
in American political history and reflected two radi-
cally different visions for the future of the nation.
FEDERALIST PARTY One of the first two U.S.

political parties, the Federalists came into being, iron- LEADERS AND FOLLOWERS
ically, in the anti-party years of the early 1790s, The Federalists coalesced in the first several national
when parties were thought to be dangerous factions Congresses and were comprised of a group of repre-
undermining the Republic. Federalism had consider- sentatives and senators who supported the legislative
able early success, many significant achievements, initiatives of the administration of George Washing-
and fleeting popular support. Federalists won the ton. Although President Washington and Vice Presi-
first three presidential elections, controlled Congress dent John Adams headed the administration, the
for most of the 1790s, established the new national party’s intellectual and political leader was Alexan-
government, and kept the nation at peace. Over time, der Hamilton, who began his tenure as secretary of
however, the Federalists lost their popular support the Treasury in September 1789 and cultivated allies
and with it, their grip on power. Out of power and in Congress. Hamilton’s ambitious program—
FEDERALIST PARTY
creation of a national bank, assumption of state abashed elitism that defined the party at least as
debts from the Revolution, imposition of an excise much as its policies and programs. That elitism did
tax, the establishment of public credit, and encour- much to undermine the Federalists in their day and
agement of manufactures—sparked heated opposi- to stigmatize them in historical treatments since.
tion and touched off the first party conflict. Federalists generally subscribed to an older concep-
Federalism appealed to merchants, many large tion of politics that stressed deference by the people
landowners, those engaged in commerce, and the to their leaders. Federalists believed that once the tiny
wealthy more generally. Federalists were concentrat- electorate had selected its duly chosen leaders (the
ed in urban port towns (especially in the Northeast), “constituted authorities,” in a favorite Federalist
in New England, and in parts of Virginia and the Car- phrase), the public’s responsibility between elections
olinas (especially Charleston). In addition to Wash- was to defer to the judgment of those leaders, not to
ington, Adams, and Hamilton, key party leaders in- try to influence officials toward alternative positions.
cluded John Jay (New York), Fisher Ames The party was unprepared to operate in any system
(Massachusetts), John Marshall (Virginia), Rufus not premised on deference, since it lacked a grass-
King (New York), Charles Cotesworth Pinckney roots (or even top-down) political organization.
(South Carolina), and Thomas Pinckney (South Car- These beliefs led Federalists—most prominently
olina), along with newspaper editors such as Noah George Washington himself—to vehemently de-
Webster, John Fenno, and Benjamin Russell. nounce the Democratic Societies (popular clubs
which met to discuss topical political issues and
sometimes produced addresses and resolutions) as
PROGRAMS AND ISSUES
dangerous, extraconstitutional bodies of great po-
Federalists favored a strong central government and
tential mischief and to mock them as “self-created
an activist state, stressing the energy and primacy of
the executive branch. They favored a foreign policy societies.” This attitude did much to explain both the
of neutrality that would keep the United States out party’s conception of governing and politics and its
of the persistent conflict between Great Britain and eventual downfall as these sentiments grew increas-
France, though many Federalists sympathized with ingly anachronistic in a democratizing society.
the British. Commercially, the Federalists sought to This attitude was also reflected in the political
expand their trade networks with England and ex- culture of the Federalists. The party centered its cele-
tend their shipping to other markets as well. Federal- brations around Washington, especially his birthday
ists also favored a loose construction of the Constitu- of 22 February, which became the highest holy day
tion, believing that whatever was not expressly of the Federalist calendar. The day was marked
forbidden could be fully legitimate and constitution- throughout the nation with parades, the firing of
al. Federalists seized on this interpretation to enact a cannon, and dinners, toasts, and processions, all of
powerful and sweeping vision of the United States, which served to solidify in the public mind the link
one that foresaw the country emerging under cen- between Washington, the administration and its pol-
tralized authority as an industrial, financial, and icies, and the Federalist Party. While Washington
military power to rival Britain. tried to remain above politics and party and govern
These views were exemplified by Federalist ac- as a disinterested national leader, he increasingly
tions on some of the major policy debates of the sided with Hamilton over Jefferson on political mat-
1790s. In the Neutrality crisis of 1793, Federalists re- ters and behaved more like a partisan. By the end of
jected Republican calls to aid France in favor of a his second term, Washington was acting as (and was
strict impartiality so as not to antagonize Great Brit- seen by his opponents) as a strong Federalist despite
ain. In 1794, Federalists called out troops to suppress his Farewell Address of 1796, which warned against
the Whiskey Rebellion among western Pennsylvania domestic political divisions.
farmers angered over an excise tax. The next year the Federalist political culture mirrored its ideology
Federalist-controlled Senate approved the unpopular by promoting deference. But despite their reserva-
Jay’s Treaty, a commercial agreement with England tions and ambivalence, Federalists at times practiced
that—for all of its shortcomings—maintained the
popular politics and mobilized public opinion effec-
peace between the two nations.
tively on behalf of their measures. Federalists consis-
tently and explicitly linked Washington’s incompa-
IDEOLOGY AND CULTURE rable stature to support for party policy. By framing
Beyond programs and issues, the Federalist Party issues as a choice between supporting Washington
also was marked by an attitude or an ideology of un- and legitimate government or supporting some for-
FEDERALIST PARTY
eign or radical element (be it Citizen Genêt, the Whis- Pinckney, this time against James Madison. Federal-
key rebels, the Democratic Societies, or opponents of ist fortunes revived only briefly due to the unpopu-
Jay’s Treaty), Federalists regularly rallied the public larity of Jefferson’s embargo of 1807, which was de-
to their side. Federalists utilized newspapers, petition signed to hurt Britain but which seemed to do the
drives, sometimes even door-to-door campaigning to most damage to the American commercial economy.
press their points and produce the desired results. Even with this issue handed to them by the Jefferso-
Even though many Federalists were troubled by the nians, Federalists could do little better in 1808. Pinck-
use of such tactics, the party often wielded them to ney again ran strongly in New England, where oppo-
great effect, frustrating and defeating their opposition to the embargo was strongest and carried
nents. Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New
Hampshire, and Delaware plus scattered electors
from Maryland and North Carolina. Despite making
DECLINE a stronger showing than four years earlier, Pinckney
Difficulties under Adams. The Federalists began to nonetheless lost decisively, carrying just 47 electoral
lose their popular touch when Vice President John votes to Madison’s 122.
Adams succeeded Washington in 1797. Far less pop-
ular than Washington and much less adroit political- Election of 1812. The closest the Federalists came to
ly, Adams was also plagued by a disloyal cabinet and winning the presidency was in 1812 as a significant
by a fierce division in Federalist ranks between those antiwar sentiment hindered Madison’s reelection.
loyal to the president and those who took their Federalists tried to make common cause with anti-
marching orders from Hamilton, out of office but war Republicans and ran a fusion ticket that, while
still highly influential. The party also lost its once- potentially adding new members to their base, also
sharp political touch. In an ill-advised effort to stamp ran the risk of upsetting many Federalists who wor-
out the Democratic Republicans and their partisans ried that an alliance with Republicans would under-
in the press (all of whom Federalists considered ille- mine the party’s independence and legitimacy. New
gitimate anyway), the Federalist Congress passed in York City mayor De Witt Clinton was nominated for
1798 the Alien and Sedition Acts, which were de- the presidency with Pennsylvania’s Jared Ingersoll as
signed to curb the influence of recent immigrants and the vice presidential nominee. In the end, Madison
make criticism of government leaders or policies ille- prevailed by only 128 electoral votes to 89 for Clin-
gal. But these efforts backfired disastrously. Rather ton. Pennsylvania proved to be the key as Madison
than destroying the opposition, the acts and the carried its 25 electoral votes. Had Clinton carried
high-handed, arbitrary way they were carried out them, he would have won the election by a narrow
invigorated and revived the Republicans, especially margin.
the party newspapers. When he stood for reelection
Hartford Convention. Now thoroughly routed, losers
in 1800, Adams presided over a badly divided party
of four consecutive presidential elections and increas-
and faced a furious and revived opposition. Matched
ingly becoming a regional party only, Federalists
against Jefferson and Aaron Burr, Adams lost the
struggled with their future as the War of 1812
contest, winning sixty-five electoral votes to seven-
raged. In December 1814 and January 1815, dele-
ty-three each for his Republican rivals. After a pro-
gates representing each of the New England states
tracted process, the House of Representatives ulti-
met at Hartford, Connecticut, to discuss their griev-
mately selected Jefferson as president. When Adams
ances. Some delegates urged secession of the New En-
returned to Massachusetts in a bitter fury, no one
gland states from the union. That proposal was de-
could know that the Federalists had had their last
feated and the convention issued a moderate set of
taste of the presidency.
proposals (such as opposition to the three-fifths
Elections of 1804 and 1808. After Adams’s narrow clause in the Constitution and to territorial expan-
loss in 1800, younger Federalists in particular tried sion) designed to strengthen the power of the states
to regroup by appropriating the organizational tac- and restoring the influence of New England Federal-
tics and campaign methods of the Republicans to ism. The Hartford Convention became, at best, irrele-
build a national political party organization. Despite vant and, at worst, in the eyes of some, a near-
such efforts, Federalists never again came close to traitorous gathering as news of the resounding vic-
winning the presidency. Jefferson was reelected by a tory of the Battle of New Orleans (8 January 1815)
162 to 14 margin in the electoral college in 1804, de- arrived and with it the prospect of peace. By merely
feating Charles C. Pinckney, who carried only Con- discussing secession at Hartford, the Federalists fin-
necticut and Delaware. In 1808 Federalists again ran ished themselves as a viable political party in many
FEDERALISTS
minds. Rufus King was nominated for the presidency Waldstreicher, David. In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes: The Mak-
against James Monroe in 1816 but he lost badly, 183 ing of American Nationalism, 1776–1820. Chapel Hill:
electoral votes to just 34, as King carried only Con- University of North Carolina Press, 1997.
necticut, Delaware, and Massachusetts. The 1816 Todd Estes
election marked the effective end of the Federalist
Party at the national level. The party lingered for
awhile in New England but never again nominated
a presidential candidate. Some Federalists retreated
into literary endeavors, hoping to redirect culture FEDERALISTS The American Revolution, a
and society—a political project carried on by other struggle against encroaching British authority, left
means. most Americans deeply distrustful of centralized
power. Yet between 1787 and 1790 the Federalists
The Hartford Convention, the presidential elec-
achieved what had once seemed impossible: the fu-
tion defeats, and the slow evaporation to extinction
sion of thirteen disparate former colonies into a po-
as a party stood in stark contrast to and marked a sad
tentially powerful national union.
end to what had once been a visionary and vibrant
party with many achievements to its credit. Federal-
NATIONALISM IN 1787
ists, it can be argued, served the nation well in their
time but ultimately were too much at odds with the During the 1780s, despite American mistrust of
direction of the nation’s political development to sur- strong central government, many concluded that
vive as a party. Congress’s powers were inadequate under the Arti-
cles of Confederation. Faced with economic depres-
See also Adams, John; Alien and Sedition Acts; sion throughout the decade, many states were un-
Democratic Republicans; Election of 1796; able to deal with their Revolutionary War debts. The
Election of 1800; Hamilton, Alexander; lack of a national commercial policy fueled a trade
Hartford Convention; Jay’s Treaty; imbalance with Britain; consumer debt soared, leav-
Jefferson, Thomas; Newspapers; ing merchants vulnerable to creditors; debt and high
Washington, George; Whiskey Rebellion. state taxes threatened farmers with foreclosure.
America’s feeble diplomatic credibility, with diplo-
mats such as John Adams and John Jay repeatedly
BIBLIOGRAPHY humiliated by their vague and uncertain authority,
Banner, James M., Jr. To The Hartford Convention: The Federal- made it nearly impossible to secure favorable treaties
ists and the Origins of Party Politics in Massachusetts, or trade concessions.
1789–1815. New York: Knopf, 1970.
Americans were increasingly divided between
Ben-Atar, Doron, and Barbara B. Oberg, eds. Federalists Re-
what historians have labeled “cosmopolitans” and
considered. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia,
1998. “localists.” The former mostly included those with
Elkins, Stanley, and Eric McKitrick. The Age of Federalism.
broad economic and social contacts—merchants,
New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. urban artisans, commercial farmers including
Estes, Todd. “Shaping the Politics of Public Opinion: Federal- southern planters—who wanted energetic state and
ists and the Jay Treaty Debate.” Journal of the Early Re- continental governments to promote trade, stabilize
public 20, no. 3 (Fall 2000): 393–422. the currency, and pay public debts. Localists, includ-
Fischer, David Hackett. The Revolution of American Conserva- ing farmers and rural artisans, wanted government
tism: The Federalist Party in the Era of Jeffersonian Democ- kept small, seeking state debtor relief and paper
racy. New York: Harper & Row, 1965. money to depreciate individual debts and tax bur-
Foletta, Marshall. Coming to Terms with Democracy: Federalist dens.
Intellectuals and the Shaping of an American Culture.
Localists generally dominated state govern-
Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2001.
ments. Cosmopolitans looked to the central govern-
Kerber, Linda K. Federalists in Dissent: Imagery and Ideology in
ment, but the Confederation Congress was nearly
Jeffersonian America. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University
Press, 1970. impotent. With no taxation power, Congress failed
to raise much revenue through requisitions upon the
Newman, Simon P. Parades and the Politics of the Street: Fes-
tive Culture in the Early American Republic. Philadelphia: states; dangerous sectional divisions and separate
University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997. state interests undermined foreign policy. Increas-
Slaughter, Thomas P. The Whiskey Rebellion: Frontier Epilogue ingly, cosmopolitans pondered a new national gov-
to the American Revolution. New York: Oxford University ernment to institute a single national trade policy
Press, 1986. and tariff and to block inflationary paper money.
FEDERALISTS
George Washington’s 1785 call for a conference of those who now began to call themselves “Federal-
between Virginia and Maryland, bypassing Congress ists.”
to settle a dispute over the Potomac River, inspired
former congressman James Madison of Virginia to
call for a broader convention on trade at Annapolis. FEDERALIST CONSTITUENCIES AND THEIR
PRIORITIES
There, in September 1786, Alexander Hamilton of
New York, once a distinguished officer on Washing- The framers’ decision to submit the Constitution to
ton’s staff, urged that a general convention meet in popularly elected state conventions transformed rat-
Philadelphia the following May to revise the Articles ification into a broad public debate. The pro-
and strengthen the union. Shays’s Rebellion in Mas- Constitution stand of Washington and Benjamin
sachusetts and similar popular outbursts sparked by Franklin, arguably the two most eminent men in
debt and taxes encouraged responses to Hamilton’s America, helped sway opinion, but only to a point:
call, especially when the Continental government Americans were wary of mere appeals to authority.
proved unable to defend its Springfield arsenal from The pro- and anti-constitutional schism resem-
the Shaysite rebels. Perhaps most important, the dis- bled the prior divide between cosmopolitans and lo-
orders persuaded Washington himself to chair the calists. Federalists tended to be people with broader
convention. Congress endorsed the plan in February connections and interests: merchants, lawyers, and
1787, and every state but Rhode Island agreed to at- other educated professionals; clergy; and commercial
tend. farmers and planters. They found themselves faced
mainly by yeoman farmers and rural leaders with
mainly local connections, who feared broad new
THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION AND THE powers exercised by a distant elite. Those with en-
EMERGENCE OF FEDERALISM trenched interests in existing state powers were also
The Constitutional Convention was divided between frequently hostile. The Federalists branded their op-
those who wished merely to strengthen the Articles, ponents “anti-Federalists,” shrewdly tarring them
and those who wished to replace them with a new with the stigma of a purely negative agenda.
national government. Leaders of the centralizing In general, Federalists were concentrated in the
group included Madison, Hamilton, James Wilson, east. Coastal areas, dependent on trade, linked eco-
Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, and Rufus King nomically, culturally, and intellectually to other
of Massachusetts, all delegates from large states with states and other countries, favored a revitalized gov-
broad economic ties. Their main proposal was Madi- ernment that looked beyond their immediate locali-
son’s, calling for a bicameral legislature, with both ties. They viewed their generally inland, western op-
houses proportional to population, that would ponents as ignorant backcountry rustics supported
choose a national executive and judiciary and have a by self-interested state politicians.
veto over state laws. When the small states objected,
Federalists enjoyed a key advantage in their over-
the nationalists adjusted, accepting a compromise
whelming enlistment of printers, most of whom
that preserved equal state representation in the Sen-
were eastern, commercially oriented, and cosmopoli-
ate and dropping the veto on state laws. But federal
tan. A concerted Federalist campaign was mobilized
laws were declared supreme, and the courts were ex-
in newspapers and pamphlets, where the “Federalist”
pected to strike down incompatible state statutes.
label first emerged in print. Once a term for oppo-
The centralizers achieved a genuine national govern-
nents of the nationalists, it was now used to invoke
ment in federal balance with the states—the key,
the layered system and emphasis on balanced powers
they believed, to preserving the republican legacy of
that had emerged at Philadelphia. Federalist writers
the Revolution.
stressed the Constitution’s preservation of popular
Despite some historians’ long-standing argu- sovereignty through the electoral delegation of au-
ments that the Convention was a virtual conspiracy thority and its steady equilibrium of powers. A piv-
to promote a particular economic interest, a remark- otal argument, developed by Madison in the influen-
ably heterogeneous group ultimately supported the tial Federalist Papers, contradicted the traditional
new constitution. Of fifty-five delegates, four left in assumption that republics could function only on a
protest and three refused to sign the final document. small scale. Such republics, Madison observed, had
At least forty-five, from large states and small, invariably failed when factions achieved a majority
backed ratification. The ability of this compromise and became tyrannical. In a large-scale government,
system to unite a wide range of viewpoints, back- the diversity of local interests would make control by
grounds, and private interests was the key strength a single majority interest impossible.
FEDERALISTS
Anti-Federalists accused the Federalists of an elit- the rural backcountry could mobilize. But ratifica-
ist plot to remove power from ordinary citizens and tion was increasingly faced with an articulate anti-
create a moneyed aristocracy, a claim echoed by Federalist opposition. The Federalist charge that the
some modern historians. But the Federalists firmly anti-Federalists lacked a positive agenda had some
defined themselves as the saviors of the Revolution validity; the Constitution’s foes knew what they op-
and republicanism. The 1780s had, they believed, posed but were weak on specific alternatives—
shown that myriad weak, local governments were though most acknowledged the Articles were inade-
undermining the achievements of 1776. Believing quate as they stood. But a key anti-Federalist objec-
that a people as well as their government required tion to the Constitution, the absence of a bill of
checks and balances, the Federalists defended a care- rights, resonated with many. Federalists denied the
ful delegation of authority to the best-known and need, noting that the federal government would have
ablest men, who would in turn be checked by their only those powers specifically granted by the Consti-
balanced constitutional powers. Yet the Constitution tution and warning that enumerating some rights
imposed no property qualifications for officeholding, could undermine others. But the issue persisted.
and it was in fact the anti-Federalists who sought to
restrict offices to professing Christians. And of Rufus King and other Federalist leaders faced
course, anti-Federalists were often highly supportive troubles in Massachusetts. Anti-Federalists had a
of local elites. clear majority, although their most experienced and
articulate leaders were actually from coastal areas
The Federalists, however, were never monolithic.
with Federalist majorities and thus were not elected
The Constitution’s compromise nature attracted a
to the ratifying convention. The anti-Federalists
wide range of supporters, giving the Federalists their
wanted the convention to ratify only on the condi-
strength and adaptability. But parties to a compro-
tion that a bill of rights was added to the Constitu-
mise are likely to interpret it according to their own
tion. Faced with defeat, the Federalists proposed that
desires: different Federalists inevitably understood
recommendatory rather than conditional amend-
the new system differently. Indeed, they did differ on
ments accompany ratification. The convention, they
the nature and role of elites. Some believed merit
suggested, should ratify the Constitution and at the
would rise; others assumed the socially prominent
same time recommend amendments, on the under-
should govern; Hamilton stressed the interrelation of
standing that the Federalists would then help to pass
government with moneyed interests; others, such
the amendments in the new Congress. Again, com-
as Madison, were more concerned with the broad
promise succeeded in broadening Federalist support.
voice of the people, refined but preserved through
John Hancock and Samuel Adams, influential local
constitutional delegation. The ratification struggle
politicians who were uneasy about the Constitution,
subsumed such differences. In time they would re-
were reluctantly won over. Delegates from the coast-
emerge.
al areas remained heavily Federalist, and the pro-
posed amendments secured enough inland votes to
FEDERALIST STRATEGIES FOR RATIFICATION
narrowly win ratification.
The Federalists enjoyed an initial wave of easy victo- Although the anti-Federalists, encouraged by
ries, with anti-Federalists stifled by the very localism, their strength in the large states, were growing in-
lesser education, and lack of broad connections that creasingly organized, this new Federalist strategy of
helped define them. Small states, mollified by equali- recommendatory amendments began to undercut
ty in the Senate and eager to supplant the high- the opposition’s main argument. In Virginia the
handed commercial policies of the large port states, heavily Federalist Tidewater region was faced with
rallied as Federalist strongholds. Delaware, New Jer- an overwhelmingly anti-Federalist majority in the
sey, Georgia (eager for federal aid in protecting its rest of the state. Unlike in the North, where urban
border), and Connecticut quickly and easily ratified. areas challenged the rural interior, here both sides
Later, Maryland and South Carolina would follow— were agrarian: in the virtual absence of cities, coastal
though New Hampshire deadlocked, swayed by sus- planters with broad ties and interests faced inland
picion of the South and the fear of non-Christian of- farmers determined to preserve their independence.
ficeholders, and Rhode Island refused even to call a Madison skillfully led the Federalist minority in the
convention. state convention, urging recommendatory amend-
Federalists realized the key battles would come in ments and stressing the lack of concrete anti-
the large states. In Pennsylvania the Federalists, led Federalist proposals. Governor Edmund Randolph,
by James Wilson, pushed ratification through before who had refused to sign the Constitution in Philadel-
FEDERALISTS
phia, wavered back to reluctant support. New the latter two states—extremely close in New York—
Hampshire’s second attempt at ratification had narrowly prevented anti-Federalist majorities. Even
meanwhile succeeded: the nine states officially re- Federalist representatives did not forget the misgiv-
quired to ratify the Constitution had adopted it. Fed- ings of their constituents. As the first federal con-
eralists now warned that if Virginia rejected, the gress divided into blocs for and against the Washing-
union itself might crumble. Enough inland votes ton administration, anti-Federalists unanimously
were swayed to narrowly pass ratification. went anti-administration—but many Federalist rep-
Federalists were likewise a clear minority in New resentatives from antiratification districts also joined
York, but again their opponents failed to offer clear the anti-administration party.
alternatives. After Virginia ratified, Hamilton, With the anti-Federalists in retreat but by no
backed by Madison, cautioned that the anti- means gone, the need to pass a bill of rights was ur-
Federalist plan to ratify on condition of future gent. Madison, elected to the House from Virginia,
amendments might leave New York out of the led the fight; he had come to see genuine advantages
union. Pragmatism, coupled with renewed Federalist in properly framed amendments and also knew they
assurances that a bill of rights would follow, again were a political necessity to complete the Federalist
secured a slim majority for ratification. victory. He and his supporters acknowledged that a
bill of rights could enhance the Constitution’s safe-
guards against governmental abuses without re-
THE LAST FEDERALIST CHALLENGE turning important federal powers to the states, but
It was by no means obvious that eleven ratifications they also knew how many influential men had
signaled the end of the Federalists’ struggle. All backed ratification on the understanding that such
along, anti-Federalists had energetically sought a amendments would follow. Even after Congress had
second constitutional convention, a scheme Federal- passed the amendments, Virginia’s anti-Federalist
ists feared would unleash chaos. Yet important New senators continued to press for a second convention.
York Federalists, courting anti-Federalist votes, had Most had been willing to wait and see what the new
dismayed their own allies by endorsing a second con- Congress would do, and after the Bill of Rights was
vention to consider amendments. Some feared even added most anti-Federalists were willing to work
a limited convention might go dangerously far, un- within the new system. But had Congress repudiated
dermining federal authority and throwing power the promises made in so many key conventions, a re-
back to the states. Now North Carolina, one of the invigorated anti-Federalist movement might con-
final two holdouts, adopted a scheme once proposed ceivably have yet toppled the new Constitution, de-
by Thomas Jefferson (who had meanwhile been per- stroying everything the Federalists had worked to
suaded by recommendatory amendments to back the achieve.
Constitution): after most states had ratified, the re- As it was, North Carolina conceded in late 1789
mainder should hold out until a bill of rights was (though two of the five representatives it now elected
added. North Carolina’s Tidewater Federalists were were anti-Federalists), and Rhode Island, threatened
heavily outnumbered. The anti-Federalists kept con- with secession by its own coastal merchants, nar-
trol, refused to ratify, and demanded a second con- rowly ratified in 1790. But as the Federalist majority
vention. turned to the actual business of setting up the new
The call for a new convention proved abortive, government and instituting policy, the compromise
but Federalists knew the climate could yet change. coalition inevitably began to come apart. The mer-
Madison and others also feared anti-Federalist at- cantile, monetary elitism of Hamilton and his back-
tempts to elect a Congress that would annihilate it- ers drove them apart from Madison and many oth-
self and the Constitution. Such ideas certainly exist- ers, with their greater emphasis on popular
ed, and failed less decisively than is sometimes participation and their suspicion of control by a
imagined. In the new Senate, twenty-four Federalists moneyed interest. There was no neat transformation
were in undisputed control, but the anti-Federalist of Federalists into the Federalist Party of the 1790s,
legislature of powerful Virginia sent two firmly anti- or anti-Federalists into Democratic Republicans. The
Federalist senators. In the House, fifty-one Federalists diverging Federalists contributed constituencies and
outnumbered fourteen anti-Federalists. But two of leadership to both parties.
eight representatives from Massachusetts, three of
five from South Carolina, three of ten from Virginia, See also Adams, John; Articles of Con-
two of eight from Pennsylvania, and two of six from federation; Bill of Rights; Congress;
New York were anti-Federalist, and close elections in Constitution, Ratification of;
FICTION
Constitutional Convention; for printers than producing new works of fiction by

Constitutionalism; Federalist Papers; American authors. Only about ninety American
Federalist Party; Founding Fathers; works of fiction were printed between 1789 and
Franklin, Benjamin; Government: 1820, and few of these made a profit. No American
Overview; Hamilton, Alexander; Jefferson, author was able to make a living from writing until
Thomas; Madison, James; Popular the 1820s, although certainly Susanna Rowson
Sovereignty; Presidency, The: George (1762–1824) and Charles Brockden Brown (1771–
Washington; Shays’s Rebellion; 1810) tried.
Washington, George. Despite these facts, other scholars make the case
for an American literature that emerged in the period
BIBLIOGRAPHY of the ratification of the Constitution. These scholars
Bailyn, Bernard, ed. The Debate on the Constitution: Federalist believe that the early American novel, while it may
and Antifederalist Speeches, Articles, and Letters during the not live up to some hard-to-define literary standards,
Struggle over Ratification. 2 vols. New York: Library of
was very American, reflecting the anxieties of nation
America, 1993.
building. The American Revolution (1775–1783) led
Farrand, Max, ed. The Records of the Federal Convention of
to social, political, and cultural upheaval. Because of
1787. Rev. ed. 4 vols. New Haven, Conn.: Yale Universi-
ty Press, 1966. this, they argue, the genre of American literature
was far from stable because it was reflective of an
Jensen, Merrill. The New Nation: A History of the United States
during the Confederation, 1781–1789. New York: Knopf, unstable society. While the form was British, the
1958; Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1981. messages, scattered as they may have been, were
Main, Jackson Turner. Political Parties before the Constitution. American. These early novels grappled with the
Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1973; question of what it meant to be a citizen of the newly
New York: Norton, 1974. formed nation and whether or not independence was
Rakove, Jack N. Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the worth the disruptions that followed.
Making of the Constitution. New York: Knopf, 1996. These experiments in an American fictional voice
Rutland, Robert Allen. The Ordeal of the Constitution: The Anti- took place exclusively in the North. The American
federalists and the Ratification Struggle of 1787–1788. South did not engage in the creation of fiction. While
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1966; Boston:
southerners certainly helped to shape political dis-
Northeastern University Press, 1983.
course, novels and other fictional forms were pro-
Veit, Helen E., Kenneth R. Bowling, and Charlene Bangs Bick-
ford, eds. Creating the Bill of Rights: The Documentary
duced by the pens of northerners. As white south-
Record from the First Federal Congress. Baltimore: Johns erners tightened their defense of slavery after the
Hopkins University Press, 1991. American Revolution, they took a lesser part in the
Wood, Gordon S. The Creation of the American Republic, 1776– creation of an American national identity than the
1787. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, northerners who engaged in the questions of identity
1998. in both fiction and nonfiction. In addition, the contri-
bution to American fiction was limited by race. For
Jeremy A. Stern
African Americans in all parts of the new Republic,
racism and the concomitant poverty and lack of edu-
cation of blacks kept them from writing. Although
poetry of African American Phillis Wheatley (1753?–
1784) was widely read, only four novels by African
FICTION There is an ongoing debate in the field of Americans were published before the Civil War, and
literary history about when a distinctly American none of these were published until the mid-
literature emerged. Some scholars argue that Ameri- nineteenth century.
can authors did not gain a voice separate from their
British forebears until well into the nineteenth centu-
ry. According to these critics, the form and voice of THE REVOLUTIONARY ERA
literature published in the early American nation was While American writers did not break away from the
not distinctive enough to merit consideration as literary forms of the British, there were several at-
“American.” In some opinions, an added detriment to tempts to create a distinctly American literature. The
anything that might be considered American litera- Connecticut (or Hartford) Wits were among the first
ture is that nothing produced had literary merit. group of writers who consciously tried to do that.
Books were expensive to produce, and pirating of al- These men had been born in Connecticut and had at-
ready produced English works was more profitable tended Yale College. They believed that they could
FICTION
create an American voice and advocate a political Story (1774), the colonists appeared as a farmer’s
cause. The Wits were concerned about the emergence sons fighting against mismanagement of their fami-
of democratic movements after the war. They wrote ly farm. These political allegories helped set the stage
poems to honor stability and oppose Jeffersonian de- for later American fiction. Early American play-
mocracy. The Wits included John Trumbull (1750– wright Royall Tyler (1757–1826) also worked to dis-
1831), author of two popular satiric poems, tinguish Europe and America. In The Contrast (1787),
M’Fingal (1776–1782) and The Progress of Dulness the first comedy play to be professionally produced
(1772–1773), and Timothy Dwight (1752–1817), on the American stage, Tyler pitted the republican
the author of The Conquest of Canaan (1785), an epic American against the refined European, with the
poem about the American Revolution. The Wits put American triumphing in the end.
themselves in opposition to Philip Freneau (1752–
1832), known as the “poet of the American Revolu-
tion,” who embraced Jeffersonian democracy. De- THE NEW NATION
spite his ideological differences with the Wits, Fre- The fiction of the early American nation reflected the
neau also believed in the importance of developing an rapid changes brought about by the Revolution and
exclusively American idiom. Although these early the nation making that followed. The first American
writers largely failed in their attempts to break from novels were about seduction, telling the stories of
British forms, their attempts to create something young women who lost their virtue to conniving
truly American are noteworthy. men. Novels centered on the seduction of young
women highlighted the dangers and upheavals of the
One of the first authors to explicitly attempt to new nation. Focused on an English novel, Clarissa
define American character was J. Hector St. John de (1747–1748), and nervous about the changes in the
Crèvecoeur (1735–1813). A French immigrant who nation he helped to create, John Adams famously
was married to a woman from a Loyalist family, compared democracy to Lovelace, the immoral char-
Crèvecoeur was unable to choose a side during the acter who leads to Clarissa’s ruin. He argued that de-
American Revolution. After spending time in a Brit- mocracy would lead to the ruin and death of the new
ish army prison in New York and then sailing to United States, much as Lovelace had ruined Clarissa.
London, Crèvecoeur published the fictional Letters While Adams called on an English example written
from an American Farmer in 1782. Taking the persona before the creation of the United States, male and fe-
of James, a farmer without extensive schooling, male American authors in the early American nation
Crèvecoeur asked, “What, then, is the American, this deliberately toyed with these same concerns.
new man?” He answered his question by arguing By the end of the eighteenth century, Charles
that the American was indeed new, a mixture of eth- Brockden Brown had begun to publish his Gothic
nicities and beliefs, rising from a melting pot of Euro- novels in which nothing was settled and the world
pean cultures. Crèvecoeur celebrated the American seemed a very chaotic place. These early novels, like
character, one that he believed had left behind the the poems, allegories, plays, and other forms of fic-
prejudices of Europe and defined itself by hard work tion in early America, were British in form. Yet they
and perseverance. However, Crèvecoeur did not leave all spoke to the question of political unsettledness
the picture entirely rosy, but wrote of frontier dwell- and the questions raised by the Revolution. Who had
ers who were less advanced than their eastern coun- power? Who could speak? Had the republican experi-
terparts and of brutality in the slave system of the ment succeeded or failed? Who was an American citi-
American South. zen and what characteristics was that citizen to em-
While other authors did not address the question brace? All of the early American novels advanced a
as directly as Crèvecoeur had, the process of defini- theory of education, a topic that was much in the po-
tion and differentiation from Britain was apparent in litical and social discourse. Novelists like Charles
many of the early works of fiction. Much as Crève- Brockden Brown believed that their novels did noth-
coeur had sought to define the American man as dif- ing less than engage in the ongoing cultural dialogue
ferent from the European man, other early American about politics and society.
writers sought to justify American independence or Despite Brown’s defense of the novel, the form
define American character. Francis Hopkinson had many critics. Politicians and ministers railed
(1737–1791), one of the signers of the Declaration of against novels. These critics believed, or said they be-
Independence, was well-known for his political alle- lieved, that novel reading would lead to the downfall
gories, which helped make the case against Britain of the Republic. Critics wrote about these fears in
during the war. In his best-known piece, The Pretty magazines and newspapers. In their prefaces or in-
FICTION
troductions, novelists condemned the very form in Other important writers emerged at the end of
which they engaged. Novels, in the opinion of the the eighteenth century. Hugh Henry Brackenridge
critics, took readers away from the serious matters (1748–1816), a Scottish immigrant and a friend of
of citizenship. Instead of reality, readers would be so Philip Freneau, published several dramas based on
tied up with fantasy they would be unable to func- events in the Revolutionary War. His most impor-
tion in the virtuous ways necessary for maintaining tant work was a novel, Modern Chivalry, published in
the Republic. After all, the United States was new and four volumes during the years from 1792 to 1815.
fragile. Psychologically, novel reading was danger- In the republic of Modern Chivalry, men without
ous for other reasons as well. In the growing field of qualifications are elected to office by ill-informed vot-
medicine focused on mental illness, doctors believed ers. In the text Brackenridge praised democracy but
that mental health was maintained by control. Men also worried about it. In a work written over more
or women who spent too many hours immersed in than a decade, a reader can see some of Bracken-
the fantasy world of novels would more easily lose ridge’s own shifting alliances.
their control and would be ill-prepared to deal with
The author who came closest to making a living
disappointment or shock. Reading history or essays
as a writer in the period before 1820 was Charles
led to rationality; reading novels led to irrationality.
Brockden Brown, although he was never able to fully
support himself with his writing. With his Gothic
novels, he emerged at the end of the eighteenth cen-
WRITERS AND WORKS
tury as one of the most prolific writers of fiction.
It is generally agreed that the first American novel is
Brown’s first novel, Wieland (1798), is a story of
The Power of Sympathy, or the Triumph of Nature
madness. In his madness, Theodore Wieland eventu-
Founded in Truth (1789), by William Hill Brown
ally kills all four of his children, tries to kill his wife,
(1765–1793). The main story in The Power of Sympa-
and eventually commits suicide. Brown, engaging in
thy is of a doomed, incestuous love. Embedded within
the larger discourse about nationhood, believed this
the story of Harriot and Harrington, who discover
novel would be useful to his readers, particularly
too late that they are brother and sister, was the real-
with regard to thoughts about “the moral constitu-
life eighteenth-century story of Fanny Apthorp and
tion of man.” Without checks on liberty, anarchy
her brother-in-law, Perez Morton. Morton had se-
would reign. He sent his novel to Vice President
duced Apthorp, and she became pregnant. In August
Thomas Jefferson, perhaps believing that he offered
1788, Apthorp committed suicide, unwilling to
a solution to the problems of the new United States.
make public accusations against Morton. In his
Brown followed Wieland with Ormond (1799), Edgar
book, Brown thinly disguised Apthorp as Ophelia in
Huntly (1799), and Arthur Mervyn (1799–1800).
a vignette that briefly distracts the reader from the
main story line. With such tales, “founded in truth,” While all of the published fiction in the early
Brown argued that his novel was a cautionary tale American nation was flawed, these works are reflec-
and therefore fit for reading, unlike other, frivolous tive of a society born out of war, cut off from its co-
works of fiction. lonial past, and experimenting with new forms of
government. With this in mind, these publications
Other novels quickly followed The Power of Sym-
can be seen as American publications. The writers
pathy. The two best-selling novels in the early Amer-
adopted familiar forms and tropes but used these to
ican nation were written by women. In Charlotte
comment on the new society, and in Charles Brock-
Temple (1791), by Susanna Rowson, young Char-
den Brown’s case, to push for change. For the new
lotte is seduced by Montraville, carried from her na-
Republic to function and perhaps thrive, these au-
tive England to America, and then left to her ruin and
thors believed, citizens needed to be educated. Female
death. The novel was so popular that it was sur-
and male authors argued that this was true of
passed in sales only after the mid-nineteenth centu-
women as well as men. And novelists, even those
ry, by Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852). Second only to Char-
who—like Brackenridge—supported increased de-
lotte Temple was The Coquette; or, The History of Eliza
mocracy, worried about what would happen if de-
Wharton (1797), by Hannah Webster Foster (1758–
mocracy was taken too far.
1840). In this story Eliza Wharton chooses the path
of coquetry, eschewing the life of virtue she felt The new United States was far from united.
would confine her too much. The consequence is Crime rose in the cities and disorder seemed to reign
death and dishonor, but the novel raised interesting everywhere people looked. A myth about the Ameri-
questions about the nature of female roles in the new can Revolution has developed over the centuries to
nation. the point where people now believe almost everyone
FIREARMS (NONMILITARY)
supported the cause and the consequences. The fic- FIREARMS TECHNOLOGY
tion of the time gives a more accurate picture of the By 1754 the civilian use of firearms had been com-
debates, the upheavals, the disagreements, and the mon in England for some three hundred years and in
fears. While flawed as literature, it is utterly reflec- its American colonies from the outset. Over the cen-
tive of a time and place otherwise largely lost. turies, technology had led to the replacement of
cumbersome, heavy, and inaccurate military weap-
See also African Americans: African American ons by more reliable and smaller flintlock muskets
Literature; Authorship; Poetry. and, in the eighteenth century, by the famous Brown
Bess musket. Lighter fowling pieces and pistols were
also available and popular for personal protection
BIBLIOGRAPHY and hunting. By the mid-seventeenth century, well-
Davidson, Cathy N. Revolution and the Word: The Rise of the to-do women had taken to carrying little “pocket
Novel in America. New York: Oxford University Press, pistols” that could fit in a purse. By the eighteenth
1986. century the handgun had also become the weapon of
Fliegelman, Jay. Declaring Independence: Jefferson, Natural choice for duels and highway robbery.
Language, and the Culture of Performance. Stanford, Calif.:
Stanford University Press, 1993.
Stern, Julia A. The Plight of Feeling: Sympathy and Dissent in PEACEKEEPING AND HUNTING
the Early American Novel. Chicago: University of Chicago The American colonists, faced with an often hostile
Press, 1997. native population and the usual array of crimes, im-
Tompkins, Jane P. Sensational Designs: The Cultural Work of mediately instituted the familiar means of keeping
American Fiction, 1790–1860. New York, Oxford Uni- the peace. Every colony passed legislation to establish
versity Press, 1985. a militia and towns created systems in which house-
Warner, Michael. The Letters of the Republic: Publication and holders took turns standing watch. All men between
the Public Sphere in Eighteenth-Century America. Cam- the ages of sixteen and sixty were liable for militia
bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990. service, with some exceptions for clergy, religious
Sarah Swedberg objectors, and blacks. The dangers were so great that
not only militia members but all householders were
ordered to be armed. Many of these laws remained
in place well into the eighteenth century. Connecti-
cut’s 1741 militia act, for example, ordered all citi-
zens, both those listed in the militia and every other
FIREARMS (NONMILITARY) Among the prac- householder, to “always be provided with and have
tices and prejudices English colonists carried with in continual readiness, a well-fixed firelock . . . or
them to North America was the assumption that an other good fire-arms . . . a good sword, or cutlass”
armed population was normal and necessary. Few and a specific amount of gunpowder. In 1770 Geor-
governments, then or since, have been prepared to gia felt it necessary, “for the better security of the in-
trust the common people with weapons. Since “time habitants,” to require every white male resident “to
out of mind,” however, the English had preferred a carry firearms to places of public worship.” In many
citizen militia to a professional military force and de- colonies those who could not afford a firearm were
pended on armed citizens to protect themselves and set to work to earn one.
their neighbors by shouldering a host of local Firearms were valued for hunting as well as pro-
peacekeeping duties. Until the Glorious Revolution of tection. Game was plentiful in the New World and,
1688–1689, being armed had been more a duty than in contrast to common European practice that strict-
a right. But the English Bill of Rights of 1689, passed ly limited those who could hunt, colonists were en-
in the wake of that bloodless revolution, guaranteed ticed to American shores with the promise of the “lib-
Protestants, then some 90 percent of the population, erty of fishing and fowling.” American firearm needs
what it described as their “true, ancient and indubita- differed from European needs, however, since hunt-
ble rights,” including the right to “have arms for ing was less a sport than a key to survival in the wil-
their defence suitable to their conditions and as al- derness and a reliable gun was critical for self-
lowed by law.” The English prejudices that favored defense. For these purposes Americans wanted a rifle
an armed citizenry translated easily to America, that was light, shot light bullets that needed only a
where the dangers of the wilderness made such com- modest amount of powder, was easy to load, and
munity peacekeeping and self-reliance especially ur- had a flat trajectory that would make it more accu-
gent. rate. By 1735 a rifle that met these specifications had
FIRES AND FIREFIGHTING
been developed in Pennsylvania, although for some See also Gunpowder, Munitions, and Weapons
reason it was generally known as the Kentucky rifle. (Military); Militias and Militia Service.
It quickly became popular throughout the country
and proved effective in bringing down the larger ani- BIBLIOGRAPHY
mals in the American forests. Firearms expert Robert Bailyn, Bernard. The Ideological Origins of the American Revolu-
Held claims that until the last quarter of the eigh- tion. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
teenth century, “there were no guns anywhere in the 1967.
world which could shoot so far, so accurately and so Botein, Stephen. Early American Law and Society. New York:
efficiently” as the Kentucky rifle. A better weapon Knopf, 1983.
was developed in Britain but neglected by the British Higginbotham, A. Leon. In the Matter of Color: Race and the
War Office, and so the Kentucky rifle remained the American Legal Process: The Colonial Period. New York:
most accurate, and actually the only, long-range Oxford University Press, 1978.
shooter until about 1840. Malcolm, Joyce Lee. To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an
Anglo-American Right. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni-
Travelers to America were struck by how com- versity Press, 1994.
mon guns were. Charles Augustus Murray, who Shy, John W. A People Numerous and Armed: Reflections on the
toured America in 1834, noted that “nearly every Military Struggle for American Independence. New York:
man has a rifle, and spends part of his time in the Oxford University Press, 1976.
chase,” while Alexis de Tocqueville, who visited Thorpe, Francis N., ed. The Federal and State Constitutions, Co-
America in 1831, described a typical “peasant’s lonial Charters, and Other Organic Laws of the States, Ter-
cabin” in Kentucky or Tennessee as containing “a ritories, and Colonies. 7 vols. Washington, D.C.: Govern-
fairly clean bed, some chairs, a good gun.” ment Printing Office, 1909.
Joyce Lee Malcolm
INDIANS AND BLACKS

Sensible restrictions were put in place on the use of
firearms in crowded areas or with intention to terri-
fy. But the emphasis of colonial and early national
governments was on ensuring the populace was well FIRES AND FIREFIGHTING Fire was a serious
armed, not on restricting individual stocks of weap- and ongoing problem in colonial America and the
ons. For the security of white colonists, efforts were new nation, especially in towns and cities. In an era
made to prevent Indians, and in some colonies black before zoning regulations, flammable materials were
slaves, from acquiring firearms. Nevertheless, Indi- regularly stored near the open fires necessary for
ans managed to obtain firearms and quickly became heating homes and cooking food. As cities increased
excellent shots. Access of slaves and free blacks to in size and density in the late eighteenth and early
guns varied. The New England colonies and New Jer- nineteenth centuries, catastrophic conflagrations be-
sey permitted blacks, both slave and free, to keep pri- came common occurrences. A candle in a New Orle-
vate firearms but usually excluded them from the ans building set off a fire that destroyed over eight
militia. A Virginia statute of 1640, “Preventing Ne- hundred buildings in 1788; three years later a Phila-
groes from Bearing Arms,” was one of the first acts delphia fire spread easily through the wooden build-
to legally define slave status. Free blacks in Virginia ings on Dock Street, while an 1820 fire in Savannah,
and South Carolina were permitted to keep firearms, Georgia, became a conflagration after setting off a
as could blacks, whether slave or free, living on the cache of gunpowder stored in one building.
frontier. Georgia, however, insisted upon a license Colonial fire codes required homeowners to be in
for even temporary use of a gun by a slave. In the possession of two buckets and prepared to transport
eyes of the law, neither the Indian nor the slave was water in them to the scene of any nearby fire. By the
a citizen; therefore, neither was entitled to the rights mid-eighteenth century municipal governments
of citizenship. During the 1820s and 1830s there- were taking a more active role in controlling fires.
fore, a wave of anti-black legislation throughout the New Amsterdam taxed the citizenry to pay for chim-
country was able to curtail the ability of blacks to be ney inspectors starting in 1646. In 1718 Boston citi-
armed. zens organized the first American volunteer fire com-
In sum, Americans were expected to provide pany, complete with a small hand-operated pump
themselves with firearms for the protection of them- fire engine, and uniforms for its members. In 1736
selves and their colony. There is ample evidence that Benjamin Franklin organized, publicized, and partici-
they did. pated in a Philadelphia volunteer fire company, set-
FIRES AND FIREFIGHTING
FIRST LADIES
ting a standard for the participation of civic leaders

in volunteer firefighting followed by George Wash- FIRST LADIES The institution of the “first lady,”
ington, Aaron Burr, and Thomas Jefferson, among meaning the role of the wife of the president of the
others. Fire companies were patriotic hotbeds in the United States, did not take its modern form in the era
1777s, as firemen in cities including New York, Bos- of the new American nation. However, some of the
ton, and Philadelphia transformed their shared obli- salient features that have historically surrounded
gation to the preservation of public safety and order presidential wives—popular interest, leadership of
into active and outspoken support for the Revolu- Washington society, and ambivalence about the sta-
tion. tus of these women—emerged in these years. In the
By the early nineteenth century, every American case of Dolley Madison, the first celebrity assumed
city was protected by volunteer fire companies, orga- the position of wife of the president. Elizabeth Mon-
nized around small hand-operated fire engines, roe and Louisa Adams did not, however, build on
under the loose control of a municipal overseeing or- what Madison had done. The wife of the president in
ganization. Rural areas were also served by volunteer 1829 remained a potential source of political and cul-
fire companies. All firefighting in the new nation was tural influence but had not yet emerged as a figure
conducted by volunteers: paid fire departments were in her own right.
instituted only in the middle of the nineteenth centu- The first presidential spouse, Martha Washing-
ry. Baltimore, for example, had three volunteer fire ton, lived in New York and then in Philadelphia for
companies in 1790, six in 1800, and seventeen by the eight years of her husband’s administrations. She
1843, and close to eight hundred active members in conducted receptions for the president’s guests each
the 1830s. Philadelphia had seventeen volunteer week on Friday evenings and otherwise was a prac-
companies by 1790. Early fire companies were selec- ticed hostess on numerous social occasions. Martha
tive in their membership and combined social activi- Washington had some direct correspondence with
ties with firefighting, including visits to firemen in the wives of diplomats and officials of foreign coun-
other cities. One of the most notable characteristics tries, most of which others drafted for her to send.
of volunteer fire companies in the early nineteenth Although she was a semipublic figure, she did little
century was the occupational heterogeneity of their to satisfy any appetite of her fellow citizens to know
membership. Clerks, skilled laborers, and merchants about her or to have her reveal her private thoughts.
fought fires side by side. Fire companies also provided
Abigail Adams is one of the most famous women
early social services, including some of the first pub-
in the nation’s history, but the four years from 1797
lic lending libraries. Firehouses contained rooms for
to 1801 when her husband was president did not
public use, and as early as 1792 fire departments set
represent a high point in her life. She spent some time
up widow and orphan funds to support dependents
in Philadelphia in its last years as the capital, but she
of injured or killed firemen. Volunteer firemen were
also returned to her Massachusetts home for extend-
not paid salaries but were absolved from jury and
ed periods. Abigail received numerous letters from
militia duty, and received an important public trib-
office seekers and sought to publicize the president’s
ute and prestige for their actions. This prestige moti-
achievements in the press. In 1800, as the Adams ad-
vated firefighters to become active and outspoken in
ministration wound down, the family moved to
the Revolution, and sustained them in their belief
Washington and took up residence in the still un-
that their public service revealed their civic virtue.
completed presidential mansion. Her husband’s de-
See also City Growth and Development. feat in the election of 1800 made her stay in the exec-
utive mansion a short one, but she has the honor of
being the initial first lady to live there.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Carp, Benjamin L. “Fire of Liberty: Firefighters, Urban Vol-
untary Culture and the Revolutionary Movement.” Wil- DOLLEY MADISON
liam and Mary Quarterly 58 (October 2001): 781–818. Thomas Jefferson was a widower when he became
Greenberg, Amy S. Cause for Alarm: The Volunteer Fire Depart- president in 1801, and for eight years the nation did
ment in the Nineteenth-Century City. Princeton, N.J.: not have a first lady in the usual sense. During the
Princeton University Press, 1998. Jefferson presidency, however, an important
Hazen, Margaret Hindle, and Robert M. Hazen. Keepers of the woman stepped onto the national stage. Dolley
Flame: The Role of Fire in American Culture, 1775–1925.
Payne Todd Madison was the wife of James Madison,
Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1992.
the secretary of state. She was thirty-three years old
Amy S. Greenberg in 1801 and had been married to Madison for more
FIRST LADIES
As far as formal entertaining was concerned, the

Madisons held parties on a regular basis and sought
to invite as wide a circle of guests from the Washing-
ton area as possible. The tradition of receptions that
they established remained a distinctive feature of the
presidency for one hundred and twenty years. These
events enabled politicians and diplomats to meet on
a neutral ground while allowing the president and
his wife to create better relations with members of
Congress. Some foreign diplomats chafed at the rela-
tively simple style of these affairs, which lacked the
rituals and formality of the European courts. Ameri-
cans applauded Dolley Madison’s ability to make all
her guests feel at home. Under her direction, the
practice of using the social aspects of the executive
mansion for the political ends of the president began
to emerge. The duties of her position were exacting
and time-consuming, but she impressed the nation
as the embodiment of what a president’s wife
should be.
The most famous moment of Dolley Madison’s
years as the first lady came during the summer of
1814. As the War of 1812 continued, British troops
invaded and then moved toward Washington. As the
military threat grew, Madison packed as much of the
Dolley Madison (1768–1849). The wife of President
silver and as many of the other important posses-
James Madison, in an engraving (1804–1855) based on a
painting by Gilbert Stuart. © BETTMANN/CORBIS. sions as she could and then dispatched the wagon to
a nearby bank for protection. She also saw to it that
the celebrated Gilbert Stuart portrait of George
than six years. Jefferson did a minimum of enter- Washington was removed for safekeeping. Madison
taining on a large scale. As a result, the Madisons be- then left Washington while the British troops burned
came surrogates for the president in a social sense. the mansion. In the wake of the British invasion,
The couple lived two blocks from the White House. Dolley Madison played a large role in lobbying to re-
Dolley helped with official entertaining and became tain the capital in Washington City. The presidential
renowned for her skill as a hostess. In so doing, she mansion was reconstructed during what remained
helped to define a world of Washington society that of the Madison presidency and repainted white.
lent a special style to the new American Republic. James Monroe and his wife moved back into what
After Jefferson had served two terms as president, was now the White House once the work was com-
James Madison succeeded him in 1809. Now Dolley pleted during 1817.
Madison had the task of putting her own stamp on Dolley Madison’s conduct during the war and
the executive mansion. her rescue of the Stuart painting became part of the
Her work went forward in two areas. In the personal legend that followed her until she died in
president’s house itself, her husband gave Dolley 1849. She symbolized the era when the United States
Madison the authority to handle the task of decorat- felt itself becoming a nation, and she embodied the
ing the new mansion. Working with Benjamin La- distinctive republican style of the time. For the rest
trobe, an architect for the government, she took the of the nineteenth century, she remained the most fa-
limited fund that Congress appropriated for that mous presidential wife.
purpose and set to work. She emphasized the use of
American-made furniture and avoided any taints of
the aristocratic Federalist style that her husband’s ELIZABETH MONROE AND LOUISA ADAMS
political party disliked. Madison succeeded in striking The two women who followed Dolley Madison did
the right balance of simplicity and elegance that not even approach having her impact on the institu-
made the executive residence a testament to her good tion of the first lady. Elizabeth Monroe was a far
taste. more reserved and less outgoing person than her pre-
FISHERIES AND THE FISHING INDUSTRY
decessor. Her experience as the wife of an American AFTER 1828

diplomat in European courts led her to adopt proto- Over the next twelve years two widowers, Andrew
cols for entertaining and receiving guests that relied Jackson and Martin Van Buren, occupied the White
more on formality and etiquette than had been Dol- House. In the 1840s, interest in presidential wives re-
ley Madison’s practice. Uncertain health also dis- vived with the presidencies of William Henry Harri-
posed Elizabeth Monroe to limit her commitment to son, John Tyler, and James K. Polk. However, with
the new, more democratic politics of the mid-
entertaining. These changes in style at the White
nineteenth century, the power of presidential wives
House led to several social battles among women in
receded. The first ladies of the new American nation
Washington, including a boycott by Mrs. Monroe’s
from Martha Washington to Louisa Adams dis-
critics in 1819 and 1820. The resulting tensions played some of the future roles of the institution—
spilled over into the masculine world of politics. hostess; decorator of the White House; and in the
Eventually, the president’s wife prevailed; her policy case of Dolley Madison, political celebrity. They form
of limiting the number of visitors that she needed to part of the tradition of presidential wives that now
receive proved enduring for future first ladies. Her stretches into the twenty-first century. If their con-
worsening health reduced her public appearances tributions to the evolution of the position were mod-
still further during her husband’s second term. Dur- est, they worked hard in pursuit of the success of
ing her eight years in the White House, the position their husbands’ administrations. They were all inter-
of the presidential wife lost some of the luster that esting women who helped to develop popular fasci-
Dolley Madison had imparted to it. nation with the relation of the president and his fam-
ily to the rest of their fellow citizens. In that respect,
Louisa Catherine Adams continued the down-
their influence and example continues down to the
ward trend of participation in social affairs during present time.
her husband’s single term in office from 1825 to
1829. Her marriage to John Quincy Adams had had See also Presidency, The.
its rocky moments before he won the disputed presi-
dential contest of 1824. Nevertheless, she had used BIBLIOGRAPHY
her political skills effectively in his efforts to become Allgor, Catherine. Parlor Politics: In Which the Ladies of Wash-
ington Help Build a City and a Government. Charlottes-
president during the election and in the proceedings
ville: University Press of Virginia, 2000.
of Congress that resolved the election. Once in the
Caroli, Betty. First Ladies. Expanded ed. New York: Oxford
White House, Louisa Adams did not do much enter- University Press, 1995.
taining, nor did she reach out to political Washing- Fields, Joseph E., comp. Worthy Partner: The Papers of Martha
ton. Instead, she went into a shell, regarding the ex- Washington. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1994.
ecutive mansion more as a prison than as a place to Gould, Lewis L., ed. American First Ladies: Their Lives and Their
make a reputation as a hostess. Her husband was Legacy. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge, 2001.
preoccupied with the cares of office and devoted little Mattern, David B., and Holly Shulman, eds. The Selected Let-
time to his wife. The two became more distant from ters of Dolley Payne Madison. Charlottesville: University
each other as the Adams presidency unfolded. They Press of Virginia, 2003.
spent some months apart when they took separate National First Ladies’ Library. Available at http://
www.firstladies.org.
vacations in 1826. Poor health, perhaps arising from
menopause, dominated her existence. Lewis L. Gould
In 1827 a newspaper friendly to Andrew Jack-
son, whom John Quincy Adams had defeated in
1824, attacked Louisa for her English origins and
made her a target for political invective. In response,
she authored an anonymous essay countering her FISHERIES AND THE FISHING INDUSTRY
critics and outlining her own virtues. That was a de- The fishing industry was one of the more important
parture for a presidential spouse. Louisa hoped that components of the American economy of the late
her husband would be reelected in 1828, but the tide eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. However,
of support for Jackson sent the couple into private there was significant regional variation in the type
life. The four years of Louisa Adams left little impact and quantity of fish caught, the nature of the market
on the issue of what a president’s wife should do and for those fish, and the importance of the industry to
how she should behave. the regional economy.
The Sacred Cod. The New England cod fishery was the largest and most important of the fisheries in what became the
United States. The importance of the industry in Massachusetts is symbolized by the “Sacred Cod,” a carving that hangs
in the Massachusetts House of Representatives in Boston. Jonathan Rowe, a Boston merchant, gave the carving to the
state in 1784. © LAKE COUNTY MUSEUM/CORBIS.
NEW ENGLAND as not only a source of commerce, but also as “nur-

The New England cod fishery was the first, the larg- series” for their navies, in which men would learn the
est, and the economically most important of the fish- craft of sailing. During wartime, harvests declined as
eries in what became the United States. In the 1600s, men were taken from the fishing fleets to serve on
fishing vessels from New England towns such as men-of-war.
Gloucester and Marblehead joined ships from Portu- When the Treaty of Paris of 1763, which ended
gal, Spain, France, and England in the cod-rich wa- the Seven Years’ War, severely restricted French ac-
ters along the shores of Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, cess to the Canadian fisheries, the New England fish-
and Labrador. In the first half of the eighteenth cen- ermen and the British resident and cross-Atlantic
tury, ships from France, Britain, and New England fishermen, or “bankers,” became the primary com-
also began to fish for cod on the Grand Banks, a petitors for the cod. For the next sixty years, the fish-
forty-thousand-square-mile portion of the North ermen from New England struggled to maintain
Atlantic off the southeastern coast of Newfoundland. their rights to catch and export cod while Parliament
The fish taken by these fishermen were salted, dried, sought to prevent them from doing so through par-
and shipped across the Atlantic and to the Caribbean liamentary acts (the Restraining Act and Palliser’s
in quantities known as quintals—112 pounds of Act, both of 1775) and treaty stipulations. The Trea-
dried, salted cod. These quintals of cod formed one leg ty of Paris of 1783 maintained the access of Ameri-
of the so-called Golden Triangle, in which fish from can fishermen to the Grand Banks and to portions of
the northwestern Atlantic were sent to Europe, loads the shore fishery in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, while
of slaves were transported from Africa to the Carib- restricting their access to onshore areas on which to
bean, and commodities such as sugar, molasses (a dry their catch. This resulted in shorter fishing trips,
key ingredient in rum), and indigo were shipped or “fares,” as the New Englanders had to return
from the Caribbean to New England and Canada. All home to preserve their fish for export. A British act
the nations involved in the cod fisheries viewed them of that same year prohibited the sale of American fish
in the British West Indies, which forced the New En- tion Acts) against the importation of salt directly to
glanders to turn to the French West Indies as the pri- the Chesapeake colonies. This lack of salt and the re-
mary market for their fish. sulting danger of fish spoilage resulted in a fishing in-
The War of Independence devastated the Ameri- dustry that was primarily local. What fish was ex-
can fishery, as annual exports declined by nearly 30 ported went primarily to the West Indies, where—
percent, a reduction from the prewar level of like merchants from New England—those from the
350,000 quintals per annum to 250,650 per annum Chesapeake picked up molasses, coffee, sugar, and
after the war. The postwar recovery was slow, and oranges.
exports did not return to their prewar average until
1790. In an effort to stimulate the industry, Con-
THE GREAT LAKES
gress in 1792 instituted a bounty system under
Commercial fishing in the Great Lakes developed
which shipowners and operators would receive a cer-
somewhat later than in New England or the Chesa-
tain amount according to the tonnage of their vessel,
peake, due in large measure to the relative lateness of
so long as they were engaged in cod fishing for at
the region’s settlement. Low population levels and
least four months in a given year. This system was
lack of markets for fish impeded the industry’s
altered several times to increase the bounty and in-
growth. It was not until the 1820s and 1830s that
clude pickled cod. In 1807 the bounties were repealed,
new markets opened up and the industry could ex-
and this—in concert with the War of 1812 (1812–
pand.
1815)—again decimated the fishery. The 1816 ex-
port of 220,000 quintals was the lowest since before Of the Great Lakes fisheries, the Atlantic salmon
the Revolution. In 1813 the bounties were reestab- fishery of Lake Ontario was the first to be exploited
lished, pending the end of the war. commercially. By the 1790s, large numbers of these
anadromous species (fish that grow to maturity in
When the War of 1812 came to a close, the rights
the lake’s waters and swim upstream to reproduce)
of Americans to the British North American fisheries
were being taken commercially in the Lake Ontario
were again in dispute. The New Englanders main-
watershed. The fish’s need to migrate to reproduce
tained that the rights guaranteed in the 1783 treaty
made them vulnerable to extensive harvesting as
remained in operation, while the British asserted that
they made their annual spawning run upstream. Be-
the recent hostilities had annulled those privileges.
ginning in 1801, the New York legislature enacted a
The question was not settled until the Convention of
series of laws intended to extend some protection to
1818, which allowed New Englanders to catch and
the salmon, especially during the spawning season.
preserve fish on the southern and western shores of
By 1848 the state had enacted a total of twenty-four
Newfoundland and the coast of Labrador. Elsewhere
laws regulating salmon fishing in the state’s waters.
in British Canadian waters, American vessels could
fish no closer than three marine miles from shore. The fishing industry on the other Great Lakes de-
Thereafter, the New Englanders’ struggle for mar- veloped even later than that of Lake Ontario. In these
kets in which to sell their fish was part of a larger waters, other species formed the base of the fishery:
trade struggle with England in which each nation whitefish, sturgeon, lake trout, bass, pickerel, and
imposed tonnage and import duties and closed their herring, primary of these being the whitefish.
ports to each other’s ships. Around 1812 these fish were being harvested com-
mercially in the Saint Clair River and by 1815 in the
Maumee River and Bay. In the early days of this
THE CHESAPEAKE commercial fishery, the catches were minuscule
The earliest explorers and settlers of the Chesapeake compared to those of New England’s fishery. In 1817
Bay area discovered abundant and diverse marine re- approximately three thousand barrels of fish were
sources. Herring, shad, alewives, mullet, sturgeon, taken from the lakes, only 2.7 percent of New En-
and many other species filled the rivers, estuaries, gland’s prior year exports, which was a relatively
and bays. However, in spite of the rich fish resources, small number for an industry still feeling the nega-
the fishing industry was relatively slow to develop in tive effects of the War of 1812.
these waters. This delay was caused mainly by a lack By 1830, the Great Lakes fishery was about to
of salt with which to preserve the fish caught in this experience its first period of substantial growth. The
warm climate. Locally produced salt was inferior and population around the lakes had grown, creating
superior salt from the Mediterranean was unavail- new markets close at hand, while the advent of lake
able in adequate quantities because of a prohibition steamers and the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825
by Parliament (in the seventeenth-century Naviga- created access to markets further afield.
FLAG OF THE UNITED STATES
See also Treaty of Paris.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bogue, Margaret Beattie. Fishing the Great Lakes: An Environ-
mental History, 1783–1933. Madison: University of
Wisconsin Press, 2000.
Innis, Harold A. The Cod Fisheries: The History of an Interna-
tional Economy. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University
Press, 1940.
Jefferson, Thomas. “Report on the American Fisheries by the
Secretary of State.” In The Papers of Thomas Jefferson. Ed-
ited by Julian P. Boyd. Vol. 19. Princeton, N.J.: Prince-
ton University Press, 1974.
Lear, W. H. “History of Fisheries in the Northwest Atlantic:
The 500-Year Perspective.” Journal of Northwest Atlantic
Fishery Science 23 (1998): 41–73.
Wharton, James. The Bounty of the Chesapeake: Fishing in Co-
lonial Virginia. Williamsburg: Virginia 350th Anniver-
sary Celebration Corp., 1957.
Kevin L. Gooding
FLAG OF THE UNITED STATES As a product

of the political struggle with Great Britain during the
1760s and 1770s, the American flag reflects in its de-
sign and concept the nation’s revolutionary origins.
Flags had long been familiar to the American colo-
nists, especially those used to identify imperial pow-
ers such as England and France. New Englanders
even crafted their own standard sometime in the late
seventeenth century. The flag adopted the red cross
of St. George from England’s state banner and added Early American Flags. Top to bottom: the flag proposed
in 1777; the flag approved in 1794; and the altered flag of
a pine tree, which represented one of the region’s 1818. © BETTMANN/CORBIS.
most important natural resources. It was an impor-
tant precedent. Not only did the New England flag il-
lustrate the tendency of Americans to adapt tradi- senting the colonies to persuade Americans to “Join
tional English designs for their standards, but it also or Die” during the French and Indian War (1754–
supplied a potential model for later American flags. 1763), and while his efforts failed, they did establish
Three popular designs emerged during the the snake as a symbol of union in Americans’ minds.
American Revolution to provide possible prototypes The image was revived in the 1770s, appearing in
for a national flag. In 1775 and 1776, several Massa- newspapers as well as on numerous flags. The most
chusetts privateers and Continental naval vessels enduring example is the Gadsden Flag featuring a
flew modified pine tree flags that often substituted St. coiled rattlesnake atop the ominous warning “Don’t
George’s Cross with the words “An Appeal to Heav- Tread on Me,” a phrase that subsequently became
en.” So-called Liberty Trees, usually American elms, embedded in the American lexicon. It was not un-
were becoming popular symbols of the Revolution known for the rattlesnake image to be superimposed
throughout the colonies, but this Pine Tree Flag was upon either a Pine Tree Flag or a striped union flag,
perhaps too narrowly identified with New England the third major design popularized by the Revolu-
to serve as a national flag. Another common motif tion.
of Revolutionary flags was the timber rattlesnake, a The use of alternating red and white stripes,
creature indigenous to America. Benjamin Franklin though later closely identified with the American
(1706–1790) had printed a segmented snake repre- flag, was in fact characteristic of some earlier English
FLAGS
banners. The pattern assumed new meaning in the BIBLIOGRAPHY

context of the American Revolution, when Sons of Furlong, William Rea, and Byron McCandless. So Proudly We
Hail: The History of the United States Flag. Washington,
Liberty in Boston and elsewhere employed it to sug- D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1981.
gest unity among the thirteen colonies. To express Zelinsky, Wilbur. Nation into State: The Shifting Symbolic
continued loyalty to the crown, however, the British Foundations of American Nationalism. Chapel Hill: Uni-
Union Jack often appeared in an upper corner, creat- versity of North Carolina Press, 1988.
ing what became known as the Continental Colors.
Jonathan M. Beagle
It was this flag that flew over George Washington’s
camp during the siege of Boston in early 1776, and
it was also the first “American” flag to be recognized
by some of Britain’s European rivals later that year.
Yet the Continental Colors—whose stripes variously FLAGS Nobody can be sure that Betsy Ross
appeared as red, white, blue, and even green—had no stitched the first version of the Stars and Stripes. She
official status as a national standard. was accustomed to making flags, but her role re-
After declaring independence in July 1776, the garding the initial U.S. flag was not proclaimed until
Continental Congress set to work fashioning the 1870 and continues to be much debated. It is certain,
symbols of a new American nation. Its first priority however, that thirteen alternating white and red
stripes below a blue rectangle set in the upper left-
was an official seal that would identify the United
hand corner bespoke power in North America and
States as a sovereign entity. Less attention seems to
the Malay Sea before either the United States or Ma-
have been paid to the issue of a flag until the follow-
laysia was formed. Both have flags like that flown by
ing summer, when Congress passed a resolution on
the British East India Company’s men-of-war well
14 June 1777 stating, “That the flag of the United before the Continental Congress passed its resolution
States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; of 14 June 1777 “that the flag of the united states be
that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, 13 stripes alternate red and white, that the Union be
representing a new constellation.” However, the 13 stars white in a blue field representing a new con-
function of the flag was as much utilitarian as it was stellation.” It is unclear whether they had Vermont
nationalistic—to help distinguish Continental forces in mind for the thirteenth state or Florida.
on land and, especially, at sea. The person generally The first flag of the national army of the Ameri-
credited with the design of the flag, which substitut- can Revolution was flown at the siege of Boston
ed a set of stars for the British Union Jack on the (1775–1776) but was replaced after it was mistaken
Continental Colors, is Francis Hopkinson (1737– for a flag of surrender. The second, bearing the im-
1791), who served on the Continental Navy Board. pression of a serpent, had unpleasant implications
Standardization of the American flag was slow for the biblically literal and was replaced in 1779. The
green flag of John Houstoun McIntosh’s East Florida
to develop. Not only did the use of rattlesnake de-
Republic of 1811 was equally easy to misunder-
signs and the Continental Colors continue for a time
stand, for it depicted a bayonet-carrying Patriot
during the war, but also endless variations of the
wearing a tricolor hat with his pigtail flying behind
“stars and stripes” theme emerged on cloth and can-
his head. When the wind reversed, so did the pigtail,
vas in the following decades. The addition of new and the Patriot appeared to be retreating in haste.
states in the 1790s touched off a debate in Congress
Read from any direction, the Stars and Stripes
about including them on the American flag. Al-
meant Union and freedom as well. As such, it has
though some argued that thirteen ought to be the
been emulated by Uruguay, Venezuela, Chile, Tai-
permanent number of stars and stripes, federal legis-
wan, Thailand, Burma, Tonga, Western Samoa, Li-
lation was passed in 1794 and in 1818 to allow for beria, Togo, Greece, and the Netherlands Antilles.
the alteration of the flag to include fifteen and then Single-starred emblems, on the other hand, have fis-
twenty stars respectively. The 1818 act also provided siparous associations. The Lone Star Flag of Fulwar
for the future addition of a single star for each state Skipwith’s Republic of West Florida of 1810 flew for
admitted to the Union, thus enabling the flag to keep a month or two as a symbol of defiance of the federal
up with the rapid growth of the nation. government. It was resurrected by the secession con-
vention of Mississippi on 9 January 1861 to became
See also Music: Patriotic and Political; Patriotic the Confederacy’s famous Bonnie Blue flag. The very
Societies; “Star-Spangled Banner.” similar Lone Star Flag of the Texas Republic of 1836
FLETCHER V. PECK
See also Flag of the United States.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Arthur, Stanley Clisby. The Story of the West Florida Rebellion.
St. Francisville, La.: St. Francisville Democrat, 1935.
Kennedy, Roger G. Burr, Hamilton and Jefferson: A Study in
Character. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
———. Mr. Jefferson’s Lost Cause: Land, Farmers, Slavery, and
the Louisiana Purchase. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2003.
Roger G. Kennedy
FLETCHER V. PECK Chief Justice John Mar-

shall’s 1810 decision in Fletcher v. Peck arose from the
Yazoo Land Fraud, in which the Georgia legislature
voted in 1795 to sell 35 million acres of land (in what
is now Alabama and Mississippi) to four private
companies. The Yazoo land, named after a major
river running through it, was sold at bargain rates
(less than two cents per acre). Many Georgia legisla-
tors had been bribed to offer such good terms: many
The Gadsden Flag. The timber rattlesnake, a creature of them received stock in one of the companies; oth-
indigenous to America, was a common motif on ers received cash payments.
Revolutionary flags. The best-known example is the
Gadsden Flag, featuring a coiled rattlesnake atop the
U.S. Senator James Jackson of Georgia returned
warning “Don’t Tread on Me.” Christopher Gadsden was from the capital in Philadelphia to run for the state
a Revolutionary leader from South Carolina and a delegate legislature and lead the fight against the Yazoo fraud.
to the Continental Congress. PICTURE HISTORY. Angry Georgia voters turned the legislators who
voted to sell the land out of office and the new legisla-
ture, at the instigation of Jackson, repealed the grant
drew the United States into the Mexican War (1846–
in 1796. In the interim, however, much of the land
1848), which produced the deepest divisions since
had been sold one or two times, and the new proper-
President Thomas Jefferson’s Embargo (1807–1809)
ty owners—many of whom had paid as much as six-
and the War of 1812 (1812–1815). Albert Gallatin,
teen cents per acre—now claimed they were innocent
Revolutionary War soldier and secretary of the Trea- victims of the Georgia legislature’s repeal. But propo-
sury for Presidents Jefferson and James Madison, nents of the repeal claimed that the subsequent pur-
later referred to the U.S. banner raised over chasers had known about the circumstances of the
Chapultepec in the war with Mexico as “slavery’s fraud (the story was reported throughout the na-
flag.” That was Gallatin’s way, less inflammatory tion) and thus could not claim to be innocent pur-
than that of the flag burners of a later era, of joining chasers.
future president Abraham Lincoln and former presi- The Yazoo fraud took on national dimensions
dent John Quincy Adams in calling upon the con- when the purchasers asked Congress to compensate
science of their fellow countrymen. Gallatin, Lincoln, them from their losses. Federalists, who generally
and Adams regarded the Mexican War as being di- supported property rights more vigorously than Jef-
rected by President James K. Polk for the purpose of fersonian Republicans, opposed the repeal. Mean-
expanding the cotton-growing empire of his fellow while, the four land companies that had purchased
planters, and they disapproved. The national flag the land sought to challenge the repeal by concocting
has, therefore, been at most times the rallying point a lawsuit. John Peck, an investor in the New England
it provided George Washington’s army after 1779, Mississippi Company (one of the grantees in 1795),
but at other times a symbol of sharp divisions in the sold land to Robert Fletcher (another investor in the
American community. same company). In his lawsuit Fletcher presented
FLOGGING
himself to the court as innocent of the wrongdoing White, G. Edward. The Marshall Court and Cultural Change,
and claimed that he was being deprived of his proper- 1815–35. New York: Macmillan, 1988.
ty rights. The repeal by the Georgia Legislature thus Alfred L. Brophy
pitted subsequent purchasers against initial grantees.
Marshall’s opinion invalidated Georgia’s repeal,
using two arguments: “Georgia was restrained, ei-
ther by general principles . . . common to our free in-
stitutions” or by article I, section 10 (the Contracts
Clause), of the U.S. Constitution (Fletcher v. Peck,10 FLOGGING Flogging, defined as punishment by
U.S. 87, 139 [1810]). The “general principles” in- whipping according to forms prescribed by law, was
cluded the idea that innocent subsequent purchasers a common practice at the time of the founding of the
should not be deprived of their property. As Marshall United States. It was one of a number of corporal
said, “He has paid his money for a title good at law, punishments, including branding, the pillory, and
he is innocent, whatever may be the guilt of others, the stocks that were in general use at a time when
and equity will not subject him to the penalties at- prisons were employed more as a means to hold peo-
tached to that guilt” (Fletcher,10 U.S. at 133). ple already in the process of judgment than to punish
or to rehabilitate and when many offenders were too
Marshall also broadly construed the Contracts
poor to make fining them worthwhile. Flogging was
Clause, which prohibits states from passing a “law
also the most common method of punishing slaves,
impairing the obligation of contracts.” The initial
though no slave was entitled to the protections and
understanding of that clause appears to have been
limitations of the practice to the extent that these
that states could not interfere with contracts among
were prescribed in law for civilians.
private parties; it seemed to have no bearing on con-
tracts between the government and individuals. With the creation of national armed forces dur-
Thus when Fletcher proclaimed the power of federal ing the Revolutionary and early republican eras—in
courts to protect legislated contracts from interfer- the form of, first, the Continental Army, and subse-
ence, it marked an expansion of the Contracts Clause. quently the U.S. Army and the U.S. Navy—flogging
In praise of the Contracts Clause, Marshall wrote, was the punishment of first resort to enforce subor-
“The people of the United States, in adopting the in- dination and the unquestioning obedience that were
strument, have manifested a determination to shield deemed essential for military operations. In drawing
themselves and their property from the effects of up articles of war in the Continental Congress in
those sudden and strong passions to which men are 1776, John Adams borrowed from the customs and
exposed” (Fletcher,10 U.S. at 138). practices of the British army and navy, though he
also sought to prevent the excesses of the British
For Marshall and other Federalists, the Constitu-
codes, such as the naval ritual of flogging men round
tion was a support against the passions of legisla-
the fleet—a form of punishment administered to a
tures. Subsequent cases, like Dartmouth College v.
man tied to a grate in a boat in which he received a
Woodward (1819) and Ogden v. Saunders (1827) ap-
dozen lashes alongside every vessel in the harbor—
plied the Contracts Clause to prohibit legislative in-
from entering into American law. Punishment for
terference in state charters and bankruptcy. The
lesser offenses, such as drunkenness, were usually
Contracts Clause thus became an important vehicle
limited to a dozen lashes with a cat-o’-nine tails, to
for judges (particularly those of the Federalist and
be ordered after only minimal or sometimes no judi-
later Whig Parties) to protect property rights.
cial proceedings. More serious offenses, such as a
See also Land Policies; Land Speculation; first attempt to desert the service, could be punished
Marshall, John; Property. with up to one hundred lashes after sentencing by a
general court martial.
After the Revolution, flogging came under in-
BIBLIOGRAPHY
creasing criticism. In part, this was because it sub-
Fletcher v. Peck,10 U.S. (6 Cranch) 87 (1810).
jected the citizens of a new Republic that placed a
Magrath, C. Peter. Yazoo: Law and Politics in the New Republic,
high premium on the autonomy and dignity of the
the Case of Fletcher v. Peck. Providence: Brown University
Press, 1966. individual to a cruel form of punishment that was
Siegel, Stephen. “Understanding the Nineteenth Century
one of the defining characteristics of slavery. But it
Contract Clause: The Role of the Property-Privilege Dis- was also in part because of wider transatlantic
tinction and ‘Taking’ Clause Jurisprudence.” Southern changes, associated with the Enlightenment, in
California Law Review 60 (1986): 1–108. thinking about human nature and the causes of
FLORIDA
crime and deviance. Philosophers, religious leaders, BIBLIOGRAPHY

and administrators believed that offenders could be Ayers, Edward. Vengeance and Justice: Crime and Punishment
in the 19th Century American South. New York: Oxford
reformed through changes to their environment and University Press, 1984.
by encouraging them to repent of their erring ways, Glenn, Myra C. Campaigns against Corporal Punishment: Pris-
provided they were not brutalized by degrading and oners, Sailors, Women, and Children in Antebellum Ameri-
disfiguring punishments. For rehabilitation to occur, ca. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1984.
a range of carceral institutions, including asylums, Hare, John S. “Military Punishments in the War of 1812.”
penetentiaries, orphanages, and workhouses were American Military Institute Journal 4 (1940): 225–239.
established to create the circumstances under which Hindus, Michael S. Prison and Plantation: Crime, Justice, and
offenders could develop the character and self- Authority in Massachusetts and South Carolina, 1767–
1878. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1980.
discipline necessary to function as useful and virtu-
Meranze, Michael. Laboratories of Virtue: Punishment, Revolu-
ous citizens.
tion, and Authority in Philadelphia, 1760–1835. Chapel
Consequently, from the 1780s to the Civil War Hill: University of North Carolina, 1996.
the states of the Union, with the exception of South Valle, James E. Rocks and Shoals: Order and Discipline in the
Carolina, restricted and ultimately abolished the Old Navy, 1800–1861. Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute
Press, 1980.
practice of flogging offenders in public and replaced
it with various forms of incarceration, accompanied J. C. A. Stagg
by regular work regimes. This did not mean, howev-
er, that flogging actually ended as a means of either
discipline or punishment. It merely moved indoors
and out of public view as almost all carceral institu-
tions in the early Republic continued to use whipping FLORIDA Congress admitted Florida to the Union
in 1845 as a slave state together with Iowa, a free ter-
and other forms of corporal punishment to enforce
ritory, maintaining the balance between slave and
discipline within the reforming institution itself. And
free states. The United States acquired Florida in
in South Carolina, not only did the state not abandon
1821 following Spain’s concession, under the
corporal punishments in favor of the penitentiary, it
Adams-Onís Treaty (1819), of its colonies East and
also allowed masters to send offending slaves to the West Florida in lieu of a five-million-dollar debt to
workhouse, where they could be flogged for the pay- American citizens. Spain had controlled Florida from
ment of a fee. the settlement of St. Augustine in 1565 until the end
Flogging in the armed forces was only minimal- of the Seven Years’ War in 1763, when Britain took
ly and far more slowly affected by these changes. possession. The British occupation ended with the
From time to time, Congress would revise the Arti- American Revolution and the signing of the Treaty
cles of War, but flogging remained the first recourse of Paris in 1783, which returned Florida to the Span-
ish. The War of 1812, the Florida campaigns of Gen-
for punishment, in the case of the navy up until
eral Andrew Jackson, and the First Seminole War
1850. In the army flogging was abolished on the eve
(1817–1818) convinced Spain that it could no longer
of the War of 1812. The change was made not so
protect its Florida possessions.
much for humanitarian reasons as from a more
pragmatic awareness that potential recruits under a
WEST FLORIDA
voluntary system of miltary enlistment might be re-
The initial boundary of West Florida extended from
luctant to leave their local militias, where flogging
the Apalachicola River in the east to the Mississippi
was not practiced, to subject themselves to harsher
River in the west, north approximately to present-
forms of discipline. This reform had only limited suc-
day Vicksburg (Mississippi), and east to the Chatta-
cess, and after 1815, as the number of immigrants hoochee River. It included the cities of Mobile, Natch-
in the ranks increased along with the number of de- ez, and, serving as its capital, Pensacola. Americans
sertions, the army became convinced that only the claimed that the territory above the northern border
restoration of flogging would improve discipline. Ac- of present-day Florida at the thirty-first parallel be-
cordingly, in 1833 flogging for desertion was rein- longed to the United States. Under the 1795 treaty
troduced and remained in force until the outbreak of negotiated by Thomas Pinckney, U.S. envoy to
the Civil War. Spain, a militarily weak Spain ceded this territory,
which included the lower parts of present-day Mis-
See also Penitentiaries. sissippi and Alabama, to the United States.
FLORIDA
Spanish records indicate that the nonwhite pop- tive slaves, then allied with the Spanish and helped
ulation in 1795 was 8,390, among which were defeat the patriots.
Spanish, English, French, and Americans. The colony
recognized the Roman Catholic faith as the official re-
INDIANS, BLACKS, AND CESSION
ligion, but perhaps 15 percent of the population was
Americans found Florida Indians an especial irritant
Protestant. The mainstays of the economy were tim-
because among them lived so-called black Seminoles,
ber, indigo, and tobacco, although competition from
fugitive slaves from the British colonies and later the
Mexico significantly reduced tobacco’s economic po-
southern U.S. states. Beginning in 1693 Spanish
tential. Probably the most lucrative endeavor was
Florida offered freedom to runaway slaves from the
trading British-manufactured products with Indians
British colonies who pledged their loyalty to Spain
in return for land.
and converted to Catholicism. That policy continued
Historians argue that the conflict in West Florida into the second Spanish period over the protests of
was an early expression of Manifest Destiny, the be- American slaveholders, eventually strengthening
lief, which became widespread in the 1840s, that the congressional support for the acquisition of the two
United States was destined to expand across the con- Floridas.
tinent. Spain maintained a generous land-grant poli-
The climax in the struggle over Florida came
cy that brought large numbers of Americans into the
during and after the War of 1812. During the war
colony, mostly to the Baton Rouge area; eventually
Jackson conducted forays against the British (allies
this policy led to Spain’s loss of territory that came
of Spain) in Florida, capturing fortifications in Mo-
to be known as the Florida Parishes of Louisiana. In
bile, Pensacola, and St. Marks. When British forces
1810 American insurgents captured Baton Rouge,
withdrew after the war, they left Seminoles and
declared it independent, and created the Republic of
blacks with provisions at a fort on the Apalachicola
West Florida; under a flag bearing a single star, it be-
River just south of the Georgia border. Jackson or-
came—before Texas—the first lone-star republic. At
dered the destruction of the so-called Negro Fort for
the insurgents’ urging and despite Spanish opposi-
security reasons. Its demolition was soon followed
tion, the United States annexed the territory (now
by the Seminole War and the Spanish cession of its
part of Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi) along
Florida provinces.
the Gulf Coast between the Mississippi and Perdido
Rivers (the present-day western boundary of Florida)
into the Territory of Orleans. U.S. TERRITORY
The first territorial census in 1825, which is incom-
plete, counted less than 15,000 slave and free people
EAST FLORIDA living in Florida, almost all in the northern section
East Florida included most of present-day Florida, and representing to a large degree the remnants,
with St. Augustine as its capital and only significant though culturally diverse, of the Spanish period.
city. Following Spanish acquisition, the non-Indian During the four decades following U.S. acquisition,
population of East Florida dropped to below two Florida became increasingly Anglo and African as
thousand from a peak of approximately twelve settlers and slaves, mainly from Georgia and South
thousand during British occupation. Yet with Mi- Carolina, flooded into the region. The census recorded
norcans, Greeks, Italians (all of whom the English 34,730 people living in Florida in 1830, 54,477 in
had imported as laborers), British, Americans, Span- 1840, 87,445 in 1850, and 140,424 in 1860. The
ish, and Africans, the population remained diverse. slave population continually hovered around 40 per-
A continually unstable economy revolved around cent, which in 1860 belonged to 5,152 slaveholders.
timber, cattle, rice, and increasingly cotton. Seeking Free blacks were legally prohibited from relocating to
to end its financial dependence on Spain, East Florida Florida, which kept their population below 1,000.
instituted a liberal land-grant policy like that in West Representing approximately one-half the total popu-
Florida, only to suffer similar consequences. lation and the majority of the slave population, mid-
Encouraged by West Florida insurgents, self- dle Florida, between the Apalachicola and Suwanee
professed East Florida patriots—Americans living in Rivers, grew into the wealthiest and most politically
the colony and others who came down from Geor- powerful region.
gia—staged their own insurgency. They managed to The territorial capital was built in 1824 on the
seize Amelia Island, but when the United States de- Indian fields of Tallahassee in middle Florida, which
clared war on Britain in 1812, it withdrew its sup- dominated Florida’s agrarian economy. Although
port of the patriots. Seminoles, including many fugi- farmers grew rice, corn, and later sugarcane, the sta-
FOLK ARTS
ples of a robust economy were cotton and timber. See also American Indians: American Indian
Middle Florida yeomen farmers (known as Crackers) Resistance to White Expansion; American
and planters with their slaves produced 80 percent of Indians: Southeast; Jackson, Andrew;
the territory’s cotton. By the 1850s, Florida’s annual Louisiana Purchase; Seminole Wars;
cotton crop represented the highest per-capita yield Spain; Spanish Borderlands; Spanish
in the South with the highest dollar value. Timber— Empire.
pine and oak—was extracted mainly from northeast
Florida and shipped out of Jacksonville, the territo- BIBLIOGRAPHY
ry’s largest city and busiest port. With more than Gannon, Michael. Florida: A Short History, rev. ed. Gaines-
twenty sawmills in operation along the St. Johns ville: University Press of Florida, 2003.
River in the 1850s, Jacksonville claimed to be the Hoffman, Paul E. Florida’s Frontiers. Bloomington: Indiana
largest timber market in the South. Cattle raising by University Press, 2002.
that time had emerged as a third major industry, Landers, Jane. Black Society in Spanish Florida. Urbana: Uni-
with the export trade passing mainly through the versity of Illinois Press, 1999.
port of Tampa. Tebeau, Charlton W. A History of Florida. Coral Gables, Fla.:
University of Miami Press, 1971.
Jack E. Davis
SEMINOLE WARS
An estimated five thousand Indians occupied the ter-
ritory at the time of U.S. acquisition. By the middle
of the eighteenth century, disease and warfare had
wiped out the original native population. In the eigh- FOLK ARTS An analytical category of cultural
teenth and early nineteenth centuries, continuing expression, “folk art” draws attention to traditional
conflicts between whites and Yamasee, Cherokee, and handiwork produced with aesthetic intent, typically
Creek peoples in South Carolina, Georgia, and Ala- crafted by and for ordinary people. Twentieth-
bama forced a fresh influx of Indians into Florida, century scholars began using the term to refer to a
where the Spanish generally welcomed them as allies body of material produced outside of the worlds of
and trading partners. Beginning with the British, academic art, and in the United States there has been
they became collectively known as Seminoles. In a special interest in the relation of folk art as grass-
contrast to the expanding general population, wars roots expression to the rise of distinctive American
with the United States would nearly eliminate their identities. Examination of folk art, found in great va-
numbers. riety among the diverse communities in the new na-
White Americans generally regarded Indians as tion, expands the evidence of art in American every-
a threat to their safety and property. To that end, the day life and raises questions about the influence on
First Seminole War followed after Secretary of War cultural production of the country’s broad social and
John C. Calhoun dispatched General Jackson to Flor- physical landscape.
ida to prevent Seminoles from conducting raids on There are disputes among scholars about what
homesteads in southern Georgia and providing sanc- should properly be included in the category of folk
tuary to runaway slaves. Lasting from 1835 to art for the purposes of cultural and historical analy-
1842, the Second Seminole War was the longest sus- sis. Many collections emphasize painting and sculp-
tained conflict between the United States and a single ture that appear to be naive, primitive, or plain by ac-
Indian group. The war broke out after a treaty forced ademic standards and that therefore are assumed to
Indians out of middle Florida and other areas of white be crafted by ordinary citizens. There is a tendency
settlement and onto a reservation north of Tampa. to overstate the middle class as “common folk” and
Approximately three hundred Seminoles survived feature novel nationalistic expressions in such collec-
the war and evaded relocation to the Oklahoma terri- tions. Many of the images presented of common
tory, where nearly four thousand Seminoles had folk, for example, emphasize merchants and artisans
been sent. Minor conflicts continued between the re- who produced or consumed portraits and wares,
maining Seminoles and Florida whites, who de- sometimes in imitation of status symbols marking
manded the Indians’ execution or removal. War the elite who could commission professional artists.
erupted again in 1855, lasting two years. About two Scholars have noted that to establish a class identity
hundred Seminoles escaped to the Everglades and the that was merely derivative of European high style,
Big Cypress Swamp, where their descendants remain but distinctive, merchants and artisans often under-
today. scored the home-grown source of their products
FOLK ARTS
Pennsylvania German Dower Chest (1799). In Pennsylvania German communities it was common to give a wood dower
chest, often painted with ethnic symbols, to newlyweds. © PETER HARHOLDT/CORBIS.
contributing to the rising national identity of “ordi- aged by the absence of a protective European guild
nary” Americans. system in the new nation and a mobile population
rapidly establishing new communities with craft
The use of “folk” as defined by folklorists, how-
needs. In addition, a can-do, self-sufficient (some say
ever, implies the significance of tradition in the trans-
democratizing) spirit of vernacular free expression,
mission of skills and themes in diverse community
represented by guides such as Benjamin Franklin’s
contexts. The material included in folkloristic collec-
Poor Richard’s Almanack (1732–1757), led Americans
tions that is meant to illuminate continuities with
to believe that they could try their hand at various
native and Old World traditions typically comprises
skills once reserved for elites.
decorated craftwork such as ethnic-regional pottery,
needlework, ironwork, basketry, calligraphy, and The extent of connection to, and separation
carving. Occupational traditions, especially in mari- from, the Old World is not simply a matter of ana-
time trades along the expanse of America’s abundant lyzing whether transplantation took root in the New
shores, with sailors producing decorated scrimshaw World. Some distinctive conditions during the period
and shipcarvings flourished. Further inland, the of the emerging Republic affected the adaptation, hy-
growth of lumber and textile industries included cot- bridization, and emergence of many traditions on the
tage operations producing decorative coverlets and American landscape. First was the presence of an in-
rugs using hand-made wooden looms, wheels, and digenous population with skills and images that en-
winders. Artisanship in traditional arts was encour- tered into the symbolic repertoire of many non-
FOLK ARTS
The Peaceable Kingdom (1826) by Edward Hicks. Many folk renderings of William Penn’s treaty with the Indians,
including fireboards by Pennsylvania Quaker Edward Hicks, emphasize the mythological foundations of Penn’s “holy
experiment.” © PHILADELPHIA MUSEUM OF ART/CORBIS.
native artists. Second was the diversity of languages, trenched as a result of diffusion emanating from sev-
religions, and backgrounds in the nation, particular- eral prominent ports of entry on the eastern seaboard
ly in places like Pennsylvania, where—according to and the Gulf Coast. Communities within these re-
the 1790 census—one-third of the population spoke gions, often isolated by physical or social boundaries,
German and lived in homogeneous farming commu- maintained folk art traditions that symbolized their
nities. This diversity included the significant presence difference. In the Adirondacks, the pack basket be-
of enslaved Africans, particularly in the South, many came one such marker; in the South Carolina Sea Is-
of whom incorporated African aesthetics when lands, it was the sweetgrass basket; in central Penn-
forced to take up British American crafts. There is sylvania, the ryestraw basket.
also substantial evidence for the persistence of Afri- The wide availability of land and the movable
canisms in, among other things, ironwork, grave nature of the frontier in America contributed to the
decoration, and basketry that informed hybrid perception that a rooted peasant class associated with
American forms. In Louisiana, creole foodways and the folk art of European villages did not exist in the
arts emerged from the racial mixing of blacks and United States. But the openness of America’s borders,
whites and the ethnic fusion of Spanish, African, and the need for labor, and the promise of religious and
French traditions. Regional cultures of New England, political tolerance provided opportunities for sepa-
the mid-Atlantic, and the South, with their distinc- ratist communities (e.g., Amish, Shakers, Harmo-
tive ethnic and religious mixtures, became en- nists) that produced distinctive artistic expressions.
FOLK ARTS
With settlement moving toward the varied interior, of Youth; Giving Support to the Bald Eagle (1796), her
some highland communities in the Appalachians, tender, youthful image—festooned with a flower
Ozarks, and Adirondacks evolved in relative isolation garland—is feeding the aggressive eagle from a cup.
and developed localized folk cultures. Some maritime While the name Liberty is frequently applied to this
locations, such as the Eastern Shore of Maryland and Greek revival image, she also goes by Columbia (after
northern “Arcadian” Maine, were also comparatively Christopher Columbus) and was a favorite design for
isolated and thus preserved colonial era folk arts well post-Revolutionary ship figureheads, tobacco-store
into the industrial era. In not-so-isolated urban trade figures, and weather vanes. The eagle often ap-
areas, folk arts also took hold, especially for immi- pears alone in carvings, scissors cuttings, illuminated
grant and religious communities that provided for manuscripts, and coverlets of the period. Sometimes
ritual needs with specialized artisans. In New York, a shield with the colors of the new nation covers the
Philadelphia, and Boston, Jewish calligraphers, bird’s breast. In many renderings of Liberty, she is
stonecarvers, and metalsmiths produced ritual ob- holding a cornucopia for the abundance of the new
jects needed by the community. land or a torch for providing a light to the world,
Using folk art to construct a cultural history well before Fréderic-Auguste Bartholdi erected the
during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth cen- Statue of Liberty, unveiled in 1886.
turies, one finds evidence of several themes emerging The liberty cap, often portrayed being hoisted on
as the colonies gave way to a new nation. They were a pole, is especially prevalent in the period of the early
cultural expressions of nationalism and regional Republic. A soft, conical hat, its symbolism of free-
identity; ethnic-religious distinctions and continui- dom and independence for Americans derives from
ties; and occupational, class, and craft consciousness. the Roman custom of awarding it to freed slaves to
wear on their shorn heads. In addition to being paint-
ed on banners and signboards as a patriotic symbol,
NATIONALISM AND REGIONAL IDENTITY carved and woven caps were paraded on top of poles
As a revolutionary Republic, the United States needed in public processions and festivals during the early
icons that could be artistically expressed and in- years of the nation. Among the most enthusiastic
grained in cultural traditions. In folk art, the con- paraders were volunteer firefighters who showed
struction of patriotic and heroic symbols for private their civic pride by fashioning elaborate hats, engine
domestic uses or public celebrations became an im- panels, and buckets with patriotic symbols for pa-
portant aspect of nation building and regional identi- rades on Independence Day and other occasions.
fication. While eighteenth-century printmakers cre-
ated a symbol of the thirteen colonies in the form of The flag and its colors figured prominently in
a fierce Amazonian Indian queen-huntress, colonists traditional forms marking the Americanness of their
also fashioned a more Anglicized figure in the form users. Among Pennsylvania Germans, for instance,
of the more civilized, but nonetheless indigenous, In- patriotic eagles transformed ethnic crafts of scheren-
dian princess to pottery, trade signs, weather vanes, schnitte, or scissors cuttings, and fraktur, or illumi-
and statuary. The young, industrious maiden was nated manuscripts for baptism and weddings, into
usually adorned with a feathered headdress and skirt American forms. Painted furniture in “Dutchland,”
and thus represented a stylized image rather than an traditionally decorated with hearts, tulips, and ro-
ethnographic portrayal of North American Indians. settes, often had eagles and flags added to their design
At the time of the protests against the Stamp Act of after the turn of the eighteenth century. Elsewhere,
1765, the figure became significant politically as the expressions of nationalism appeared to be especially
rebel daughter of the British “Britannia” and some- evident in woven bed coverlets and table covers,
times accompanied the Sons of Liberty on folk ban- hooked rugs, and quilts.
ners. Although the United States did not claim a pan-
After the Revolution, the female symbol of theon of gods comparable to European mythologies,
America received a neoclassical makeover in folk ex- the figure of George Washington arguably became
pressions. She appeared as a Greek goddess in flow- mythologized as “father of his country” in folk art
ing robes, at least in part because of the linkage made after his death in 1799. Schoolgirls stitched and
between classical republics and the modern American painted memorial pictures in his memory, sign
nation. In folk art, the American classical icon may painters adopted his visage for trade shingles, and
be accompanied by a flagpole, often with a tasseled craftsmen forged weather vanes and carved cake
liberty cap on top. In imitations of Edward Savage’s boards and statuary with his likeness. Often shown
popular engraving, Liberty, in the Form of the Goddess with his horse, in uniform with period hat and
FOLK ARTS
sword, Washington assumed a majestic pose and quilt persists as a distinctive African American form
typically suggested a nation inspired to action. into the twenty-first century.
Often less visible than the nationalistic symbols The German-speaking settlers who came in large
but nonetheless significant to the American heritage numbers to Pennsylvania beginning in 1683 were
of simultaneous local-national loyalties, regional ex- hardly united, since they came from several source
pressions also emerged as signs of American distinc- areas stretching from Holland down to Switzerland.
tiveness. Frequently, these expressions were in the But as they mixed together, a distinctive Pennsylva-
form of landscapes recognized as “homeland.” Per- nia German dialect and culture formed during the
haps prepared as an overmantel, fireboard, or wall eighteenth century that stretched into the Shenando-
mural, the landscapes tended to emphasize the pros- ah Valley of Virginia and western Maryland. The
perity of the settlement they depicted. Connecticut- colorful designs of hearts, tulips, rosettes, and birds
born Winthrop Chandler (1747–1790), for instance, used on baptismal paper certificates, redware pot-
painted for his extended family members several tery, painted softwood furniture, fancy linens or
overmantels featuring the shorescapes of booming “show towels,” gravestones, and tinware stood in
New England. In the South, a number of anonymous
contrast with the subdued products of the politically
paintings of plantations, probably commissioned by
dominant English Quakers. The Pennsylvania Ger-
the plantation owners, show the extent of their hold-
mans resisted control of their German-speaking
ings. In Pennsylvania, many folk renderings of Wil-
schools and institutions by English-speaking au-
liam Penn’s treaty with the Indians, including fire-
thorities, and were able to do so because of their en-
boards completed by Pennsylvania Quaker Edward
trenchment in often inaccessible valleys. As canals
Hicks (1780–1849), establish a mythological foun-
and roads reached into the Dutchlands, more traffic
dation for William Penn’s Holy Experiment. Some-
from Philadelphia westward brought more inter-
times called “The Peaceable Kingdom” by the artist,
change with English-speaking citizens. Laws were
the scene includes animals and cherubic figures look-
passed to make the Germans conform to an English
ing at the scene of the treaty in the background.
standard. In central Pennsylvania, many German
Hicks frequently surrounded the painting with text
schoolmasters and ministers ushered in a revival of
such as “The leopard with the harmless kid laid
traditional designs and skills in the early nineteenth
down, And not one savage beast was seen to frown,
century to proclaim Pennsylvania German ethnic
when the great PENN his famous treaty made, With
identity within the new American nation. Grave-
Indian chiefs beneath the elm tree’s shade.”
stones were more highly elaborated than in earlier
generations, before becoming less ethnically distinc-
ETHNIC-RELIGIOUS DISTINCTIONS AND tive around the Civil War. Illuminated family regis-
CONTINUITIES
ters, tracing generations in the American experience,
The practice of folk art was a visible way of express-
announced the maintenance of an ethnic legacy
ing, reinforcing, and sometimes reformulating the
within a growing nation-state.
identities of new settlers in new settings. In South
Carolina, where African Americans were forced to While the Germans covered a large regional ex-
cultivate rice, they created coiled baskets for fanning panse in Pennsylvania and beyond, some groups
rice similar to those made in West Africa for that formed small enclaves of believers who wanted to
purpose. Often outnumbering whites in rice- live separately from “the world” or to organize uto-
producing regions, Africans were able to maintain pian experiments. William Penn’s Holy Experiment
craft traditions. Commonly made with hard rush of religious tolerance attracted many of these
plants by men during the early years of slavery, groups, including the Ephrata community, which
coiled baskets forming designs unlike those of Anglo- created a renowned set of illuminated hymnbooks;
American baskets were later made with soft, pliant Moravian villages known for their slip-decorated
sweetgrass and tied with palmetto strips as remind- pottery; and Harmony, which produced illustrated
ers of African heritage. If the use of Africanisms by plans of the built and natural environment. Outside
slaves was discouraged outside the home by masters, of Pennsylvania, the most notable separatist com-
inside the home women retained African aesthetics in munity that spanned the Revolutionary and national
the strip quilt. Although the techniques of quilting periods was the Shakers, known formally as the
are associated with British American tradition, the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Ap-
strip quilt for which long, narrow bands of cloth are pearing. Persecuted in England, the Shakers formed
assembled into quilt-top patterns harks back to West seventeen communities in the United States between
African textile techniques. The tradition of the strip 1776 and 1810. But relations between the Shakers
FOLK ARTS
and non-believers in America were often tense as decorative items such as framed mirrors, benches,
they had been overseas, and arrests of its pacifist wall hangings, and floor coverings meant to convey
membership occurred during the Revolutionary status before visitors were taken “back-stage.”
War. They proclaimed their difference visually with The enlargement of the whaling trade in the
inspirational drawings meant as “gifts of love” to one early nineteenth century gave rise to a distinctive
another. Among the designs were illustrated “re- American sailor’s art in scrimshaw, namely, engrav-
wards” shaped into hearts and fans; “sacred sheets” ings and carvings on whale’s teeth and bones. Many
filled with motifs such as mystical circles, doves, an- of the scenes illustrate occupational pride in the expe-
gels, eyes, and hands; and colorful trees of life ac- riences of the voyage or expressions of love for those
companied by commentaries about being led to the left home. Home ports in New England as well as
spirit world or messages from spirits often inspired scenes of exotic locations and adventures are depict-
by biblical passages. ed, showing pride in American sailing expertise. Sail-
ors also created implements out of whale ivory, in-
OCCUPATIONAL, CLASS, AND CRAFT cluding pie crimpers and dippers that often had
CONSCIOUSNESS carved animal figures for handles.
The expansion of communities inland along a mov- Although the period of the young Republic has
able frontier and their separation from European often been romanticized as being a golden pre-
markets created localized or regionalized markets industrial age when American folk art flowered, tra-
within America for many traditional artisans. In ad- ditions continued to evolve and emerge even as in-
dition, the availability of land, especially in newer, dustrialization and urbanization spread. While folk
more remote settlements, fostered the taking up by art is not restricted to one period, the symbols and
farm families of a variety of crafts, including smith- forms of grassroots production that took shape dur-
ing, pottery, and basketry, that might have been ing the early national period bring into relief the
done on a more specialized basis in a more feudal-like ways that people expressed their separateness and
system. Especially notable on the American land- unity within a broad American landscape.
scape was an abundance of wood, which often sur-
prised Europeans, whose forests had been depleted. A See also African Survivals; Art and American
number of American arts made use of this resource Nationhood; Communitarian Movements
in the making of such things as cigar-store figures, and Utopian Communities; Food; Furn-
signs for shops and inns, ship figureheads and stern- iture; Pennsylvania; Textiles Manu-
boards, weather vanes, bird decoys, toys and game- facturing.
boards, gates, butter molds, dough trays, and cake
boards. BIBLIOGRAPHY
By the time of the Revolution, furniture making Bishop, Robert, and Jacqueline M. Atkins. Folk Art in Ameri-
can Life. New York: Viking Studio Books, 1995.
was one of America’s leading trades, and many ex-
amples of decorated chests, benches, tables, beds, and Christensen, Erwin O. Early American Wood Carving. Cleve-
land: World Publishing, 1952.
chairs enlivened domestic environments. In Pennsyl-
vania German communities, it was common to be- Fox, Sandi. For Purpose and Pleasure: Quilting Together in Nine-
teenth-Century America. Nashville, Tenn.: Rutledge Hill,
stow a decorated dower chest and bride’s box, fre-
1995.
quently painted with ethnic symbols, to newlyweds.
Harding, Deborah. Stars and Stripes: Patriotic Motifs in Ameri-
Elsewhere, storage boxes made of wood for candles, can Folk Art. New York: Rizzoli, 2002.
knives, trinkets, and spices were constructed in
Lipman, Jean, and Alice Winchester. The Flowering of Ameri-
households. Among the decorated furniture that an- can Folk Art, 1776–1876. New York: Viking, 1974.
nounced rising economic status was the tall clock.
Lipman, Jean, Elizabeth V. Warren, and Robert Bishop.
Sometimes reaching as high as ninety-five inches, Young America: A Folk-Art History. New York: Hudson
fancy clockworks were typically made by a special Hills, 1986.
artisan, while the impressive case was made by McManus, Michael. A Treasury of American Scrimshaw: A Col-
someone else. The tall clock usually contained deco- lection of the Useful and Decorative. New York: Penguin
rations on both the case and dial and would usually Studio, 1997.
be kept in a prominent place in the hallway near the Quimby, Ian M. G., ed. The Craftsman in Early America. New
house’s entrance. Indeed, one of the architectural de- York: Norton, 1984.
velopments in the late eighteenth century that fos- Sprigg, June. Shaker Design. New York: Norton, 1986.
tered domestic arts was the idea of a “front-stage” Swank, Scott T. Arts of the Pennsylvania Germans. New York:
hallway furnished with—in addition to the clock— Norton, 1983.
FOOD
Vlach, John Michael. The Afro-American Tradition in Decora- THE NORTH

tive Arts. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Much of the wealth in New England during the colo-
Reprint, Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1990. nial era derived from the shipping trade, which car-
______. Plain Painters: Making Sense of American Folk Art. ried goods to Britain, Continental Europe, and the
Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1988. Caribbean, a major market for American foodstuffs.
Weekley, Carolyn J. The Kingdoms of Edward Hicks. Williams- In particular, New England settlers produced and
burg, Va.: Abrams, 1999. sent large quantities of dried fish to southern Europe
and the Caribbean, which also received livestock, salt
Simon J. Bronner
beef and pork, butter, and cheese. Some cheese and
foodstuffs went to the American South as well.
In the earlier part of the eighteenth century, New
England farmers supplied the Caribbean and south-
ern Europe with wheat, corn, and flour, too, but by
FOOD The story of American food in the mid- to the latter half of the century, Maryland, Virginia,
late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in- and the middle colonies, which included New York,
volves changes in production, trade, cuisine, and Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware, had sur-
consumption. During these years, American settlers passed New England in the production of bread-
witnessed not only the birth of a nation but also the stuffs. Indeed, New England settlers as a whole came
emergence of a national economy based on the circu- to depend on the middle colonies and the South for
lation of such foodstuffs as wheat, corn, livestock, their own wheat as well. Inhabitants of the middle
and rice. Overall, the period was a time of increased colonies also produced salted beef and pork for the
prosperity for settlers able to take part in the most Caribbean and southern Europe, which in the late
lucrative forms of agriculture and trade. This pros- eighteenth century experienced unusually bad har-
perity was reflected in the diet of the wealthy, who vests that drove up the price and demand for Ameri-
chose from an abundant and diverse selection of can wheat.
foodstuffs. New England dietary habits have been studied in
Growth throughout the original colonies and more detail than those of other regions, and research
new territories was not uniform, however, and set- suggests that the seasonal diet of the early colonial
tlers did not profit equally from the changes. In par- period had given way by the late eighteenth century
ticular, many Amerindians and African slaves, to a more diversified fare throughout the year. In co-
whose knowledge, labor, and land proved essential to lonial times, settlers subsisted mainly on breads
the success of the new nation, were excluded from made with corn, which Amerindians taught them
the benefits of economic progress. Poorer white how to grow and cook, as well as other corn-based
Americans also did not necessarily see a significant dishes, such as hasty pudding and other cornmeal
change in their standard of living. Indeed, economies mushes or porridges. Colonists also made breads
and ways of life, including culinary customs, varied from a corn and rye mix. By the early nineteenth
widely by racial and socioeconomic status, as well as century, however, wealthier inhabitants were using
by region. White ethnic groups also practiced unique wheat grain and flour.
traditions that contributed to regional habits. Salt pork and beef were the most popular meats
A few commonalities did exist among groups, in New England, and New England settlers in general
however; for instance, corn (often called Indian corn adhered to the English dietary preference for meat by
or maize) and pork remained staples well into the consuming it in increasing quantities. Early colonists
nineteenth century for virtually all. Additionally, depended on wild game, but later inhabitants used it
women largely were responsible for food prepara- only as a supplement. The consumption of butter
tion, and scholars at the turn of the twenty-first cen- and cheese also increased, and by the nineteenth cen-
tury are particularly interested in examining Ameri- tury, families of moderate means could eat it year-
can-authored cookbooks, first published in the late round.
eighteenth century and often written by women, for The production of garden vegetables, such as
information about women’s lives and beliefs. In spite pumpkins, squashes, beans, and peas—many of
of these similarities, regional variations in the ways which also had Amerindian origins—had increased
people produced, obtained, prepared, and consumed by the nineteenth century, too, and could be eaten
food in the early years of the nation are significant year-round by the more wealthy. Peas and beans
enough to merit separate treatment here. often were boiled with salt pork to form a kind of
FOOD
porridge or stew; baked beans also were a popular can culinary culture can trace its roots to Amerindi-
dish. These one-pot meals were mainstays for poorer an practice, Amerindians themselves were not incor-
families, who also consumed turnips and, by the late porated wholeheartedly into the United States.
eighteenth century, potatoes. On the other hand,
well-to-do residents could partake of such imported
luxuries as oranges, limes, coffee, and chocolate. THE SOUTH
Colonial-era planters depended on tobacco for their
Archaeological research into the trash sites of
livelihood, but those in Maryland and Virginia in-
homes shows further disparity between the foods
creasingly began to grow corn, and more so wheat,
consumed by wealthy and poor families. Although
by the late eighteenth century to supply the Caribbe-
chickens were prevalent in New England, they were
an and southern Europe, as well as New England. In
eaten more frequently by the wealthy. The wealthy
the Carolinas, Georgia, and other parts of the South,
also seem to have eaten more expensive cuts of meat,
rice became a major export crop during the eigh-
while poorer families depended more on fish and
teenth century and continued to be produced into the
shellfish, which, however, were consumed by all
nineteenth. Some slaves, familiar with rice cultiva-
classes. Settlers also grew apples across New England
tion in Africa, contributed greatly to the rise of rice
and used them in pies and cider, which along with
as a staple commodity by providing both technical
beer was a ubiquitous beverage.
knowledge and labor. Slaves also worked on sugar
Some New England settlers thus experienced a plantations established in the Lower Mississippi Val-
significant increase in their daily standards of con- ley during the late eighteenth century. By the early
sumption in the late eighteenth century. The middle nineteenth century, other American markets were
colonies, endowed with richer soils, may have been importing sugar from the lower Mississippi in sig-
the site of less noticeable changes. In large port cities, nificant quantities.
such as New York and Philadelphia, the wealthy con-
Slaves also transformed Southern cuisine by pre-
tinued to eat better foods. However, the French Revo-
paring most of the food on the plantations, as well
lution, which began in 1789, had a profound impact
as by using ingredients unfamiliar to white settlers.
on upper-class cuisine, which incorporated the ra-
Barbecuing became a favorite method of food prepa-
gouts, soups, and ice cream introduced by exiled
ration adopted from Caribbean Indians by slaves.
cooks. These cooks also founded the first restaurants,
Okra, too, was a popular ingredient after arriving ei-
a French invention, up and down the eastern sea-
ther directly from Africa or from Africa via the Ca-
board and in New Orleans.
ribbean. The wealthiest planters lived lavishly on
Among farmers, a simple if ample diet still elaborate breakfasts, dinners, and suppers of eggs,
reigned. The Dutch in New York and the Germans in ham, fish, fowl, seafood, cheese, apples, cakes, pick-
Pennsylvania were especially known for eating a les, marmalades, creams, sweetmeats, jellies, rum,
wide variety of dairy products, fruits, and vegeta- and Madeira. The less moneyed planters may not
bles, including cottage cheese, coleslaw, and sauer- have lived as luxuriously, but the wealthy did set a
kraut. Among German immigrants, pork was popu- standard for lavish eating that others emulated.
lar and was turned into sausages, filled pig’s Slaves and poorer whites lived on less exalted
stomachs, and scrapple, a boiled pudding of pork and fare, depending on the staples of pork and corn. Corn
buckwheat. was used to make breads, cakes, mush, hominy, and
Less fortunate than the white settlers were the grits, all of which wealthier settlers ate, too. Sweet
region’s Amerindian inhabitants, who were gradual- potatoes also occupied a paramount place in a less af-
ly forced west, especially after the Louisiana Pur- fluent diet, and for many, turkeys, rabbits, partridg-
chase (1803), in which the United States bought the es, squirrels, opossums, and other wild animals pro-
Louisiana Territory from France. Although many vided an important supplement to pork. Some slaves
Amerindians by the mid- to late eighteenth century were allowed to cultivate gardens, raise livestock,
were raising livestock and crops for consumption and hunt, but others did not receive adequate provi-
and trade, the United States government preferred sions or have the opportunity to produce their own
strategies of removal to those of assimilation. Amer- food. Standard slave rations included corn and, in
indians also faced food shortages by the late eigh- some areas, salted herring or, occasionally, meat.
teenth century because of the depletion of game and Those who had gardens produced cabbages, collard
other forest resources. Some Amerindians experi- greens, turnips, and other vegetables. Some slaves
enced shortages because of their increased focus on also raised hogs and chickens, while others sold sur-
producing goods for trade. Although much Ameri- plus goods to their masters and in markets.
FOOD
Slaves around New Orleans, too, had opportuni- grease comprised one of the principal flavorings and
ties to grow produce for the market, and Amerindi- was often added to various dishes as shortening.
ans also grew and sold crops in what was perhaps Cornmeal made into bread or pone, mush, and por-
the most cosmopolitan region of the time. There, ridge was a staple, as were pork and bacon. Whiskey,
French, Spanish, African, Amerindian, and, later, En- too, was a popular drink that allowed settlers to
glish influences mixed to produce a unique culture trade grain in portable form. A large number of
and cuisine that became known as Creole. Indeed, for Scots-Irish settlers populated the Backcountry as
most of the eighteenth century, European settlers in well and brought the use of potatoes with them.
the area depended heavily on trade with Amerindians They also made a dish called clabber, which con-
for basic foodstuffs, including cornmeal, bear oil, tained sour milk, curds, and whey, and partook of
poultry, vegetables, fish, and game. Colonists also the basic fare that characterized much of the region
emulated Amerindians in using a mix of agriculture, as a whole.
hunting, gathering, fishing, livestock raising, and Food in early America thus was a varied and
trading to supply their daily needs. complex affair. Although some feasted on elaborate
Lower Mississippi cookery had a similarly mul- preparations, many adhered to a simpler cuisine. A
tiethnic provenance, and many settlers adopted Am- widespread plenty may have been emerging, but the
erindian foods and methods of food preparation. Sa- terms also were set for distinctions in wealth and
gamité, or corn boiled in water with butter or bacon consumption that have continued into the twenty-
fat, was a popular dish among many settlers. Afri- first century.
can slaves also had an impact on the diet and incor-
See also Agriculture: Overview; Domestic Life;
porated rice into many of the region’s dishes, includ-
Work: Domestic Labor; Work: Women’s
ing rice with red beans. Various types of fish and
Work.
shellfish also formed the basis of bisques, gumbos,
and jambalayas. The latter two dishes have names
that could be of African, Choctaw, and French origin
BIBLIOGRAPHY
and represent the diversity that characterized the re- Benes, Peter, ed. Foodways in the Northeast. Boston: Boston
gion overall. University, 1984.
Bidwell, Percy Wells, and John I. Falconer. History of Agricul-
ture in the Northern United States, 1620–1860. Washing-
THE WESTERN TERRITORIES ton, D.C.: Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1925.
The western territories, which included western Calloway, Colin G. New Worlds for All: Indians, Europeans,
Pennsylvania, western Maryland, the land around and the Remaking of Early America. Baltimore: Johns
the Appalachians, and much of the Ohio and Missis- Hopkins University Press, 1997.
sippi Valleys, were for most of the eighteenth centu- Gray, Lewis Cecil. History of Agriculture in the Southern United
ry and beyond largely isolated from major centers of States to 1860. 2 vols. Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Insti-
commerce. Significant routes of trade had opened up, tution of Washington, 1933.
however, by the early nineteenth century, so that Hooker, Richard J. Food and Drink in America: A History. Indi-
corn, flour, and salted pork from the Upper Missis- anapolis, Ind.: Bobbs-Merrill, 1981.
sippi Valley, for example, were being sent downriver Hurt, R. Douglas. Indian Agriculture in America: Prehistory to
to New Orleans and thence to the Caribbean. Settlers the Present. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1987.
in the Ohio Valley, Kentucky, and Tennessee had also Littlefield, Daniel C. Rice and Slaves: Ethnicity and the Slave
Trade in Colonial South Carolina. Baton Rouge: Louisiana
begun transporting cattle and hogs to the east by the
State University Press, 1981.
late 1820s. The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 fa-
McMahon, Sarah F. “A Comfortable Subsistence: The Chang-
cilitated the shipment of grain and other provisions
ing Composition of Diet in Rural New England, 1620–
out of the Ohio Valley and presaged the important 1840.” William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., 42 (1985):
role the region would assume later in the production 26–65.
of wheat. Theophano, Janet. Eat My Words: Reading Women’s Lives
Although those participating in these profitable through the Cookbooks They Wrote. New York: Palgrave,
trades enjoyed a high standard of living, less 2002.
wealthy, Backcountry settlers maintained a more Usner, Daniel H., Jr. Indians, Settlers, and Slaves in a Frontier
subsistence-oriented diet and depended heavily on Exchange Economy: The Lower Mississippi Valley before
1783. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
game, including bear, venison, rabbit, squirrel, opos-
1992.
sum, woodchuck, and turkey. Settlers also con-
sumed nuts, wild fruits, and wild honey. Bear’s Julie Chun Kim
FOREIGN INVESTMENT AND TRADE
TABLE 1
FOREIGN INVESTMENT AND TRADE The
European settlement of British North America began Estimated Average Amount of Annual Trade
as a series of business ventures. Though the Virginia from Thirteen Continental Colonies, 1768–1772
and Plymouth joint-stock companies failed to reap (thousands of pounds sterling)
large profits, they did provide the capital and organi-
Destination/Origin Value of Exports Value of Imports
zation through which permanent settlement began
in the early seventeenth century. Even after these Great Britain and Ireland £1,615 £3,082
West Indies (British and Foreign Islands) £759 £770
companies disappeared, the overseas trade they inau- Southern Europe and Wine Islands £426 £68
gurated grew in importance as British North Ameri- Other £21 N/A
ca emerged as a primary supplier of raw materials Total £2,800 £3,920
and a major consumer of British finished goods.
After independence, Britain remained a primary in-
Source: McCusker and Menard, Table 4.1, pp. 812–812.
vestor and partner in international trade, though the
United States found new markets throughout Eu-
rope and the Western Hemisphere. At the end of the colonial period, Britain very much
remained the center of American trade and finance.
LATE COLONIAL PERIOD

The economic effects and even the meaning of mer- REVOLUTIONARY ERA, 1765–1789
cantilism remain contested, but if nothing else the Conditions of war notably altered and restricted
system tied colonists commercially to English, Scot- trade while also raising the need for more foreign in-
tish, Irish, and British West Indian markets. Nor was vestment from new sources. The nonimportation
that relationship necessarily disadvantageous, as agreements from late 1774 to April 1776 and Brit-
Americans profited mightily from the Atlantic trade. ain’s wartime embargo curtailed foreign commerce
Inadequate evidence prevents definitive conclusions, considerably. The signing of a Treaty of Amity and
but work on the period from 1768 to 1772 provides Commerce with the French on 6 February 1778, and
a glimpse into the nature of trade at the end of the similar treaties with the Netherlands (8 October
colonial period. As Table 1 demonstrates, the British 1782) and Sweden (3 April 1783), did, however, fa-
Isles were the primary source of trade for the thirteen cilitate the importation of goods from non-British
mainland colonies. As a result of mercantilist legisla- nations. In addition, American privateering against
tion like the Navigation Acts, manufactured and lux- British traders caused an estimated £18 million
ury goods from the British Isles composed an esti- worth of damage and illegally brought confiscated
mated 79 percent of colonial imports. In exchange, goods into the United States.
the colonists exported 58 percent of their commodi- The war shifted the sources of foreign trade
ties—most notably tobacco, flour, rice, fish, wheat, somewhat. Though Britain reemerged in the early
and naval stores—to Great Britain. French and Brit- 1790s as the single most important trading partner
ish planters in the West Indies consumed 27 percent of the nation (consuming 31 percent of American ex-
of the mainland’s exports, exchanging sugar and ports from 1790 to 1792), American merchants also
molasses for foodstuffs and lumber. In the 1760s de- dealt directly with northern European trading hous-
mand for food in the Iberian Peninsula and the Medi- es, especially in the Netherlands, Germany, and
terranean region broadened the market for American France, nations that consumed 14 percent of U.S. ex-
rice and wheat, making southern Europe a destina- ports. (See Table 2.)
tion for 14 percent of total exports. Generally speaking, the war and its immediate
Statistical evidence regarding finance in early aftermath adversely affected exports more than im-
America, especially in the colonial period, remains ports, in part because of the need to purchase sup-
scattered and imprecise. Nevertheless, economic his- plies for armies. To make up for the resulting trade
torians have estimated that on the eve of the Revolu- deficit and to fund the war effort, Americans were
tion, Americans owed British investors around £2.9 forced to borrow large sums of money. In December
million in commercial debt. In addition to this Mira 1776 the Continental Congress authorized the first
Wilkins, in The History of Foreign Investment in the of several loans from France, which by war’s end to-
United States to 1914 (1989), has estimated that there taled $4.4 million. Dutch and Spanish allies contrib-
was an additional £1.1 million of long-term foreign uted additional sums of $1.8 million and $200,000,
investment in land, ironworks, and other ventures. respectively. Overseas investment and finance
FOREIGN INVESTMENT AND TRADE
TABLE 2 TABLE 3
Destination of Average Annual Exports from the Value of United States Exports and Imports, 1790–1830
United States, 1790–1792 (millions of dollars)
Canada Other
2% 1% $160
Africa Great Britain & Ireland
1% 31%
140
Total Imports
120
100 Exports of
U.S. Goods
80
60
40 Re-exported Goods
(Exports of Non-US Origin)
20 Total
Exports
West Indies 1790 1795 1800 1805 1810 1815 1820 1825 1830
Northern Europe
34% Year
16%
Southern Europe
14% Note: These statistics include gold and silver transfers
and are taken from the Historical Statistics of the
United States, from Colonial Times to 1970, U187–200,
Source: Shephard and Walton, Table 3, p. 406. p. 886.
changed during the Revolutionary period as Britain’s Better credit along with international circum-
rivals became the chief lenders to the new nation. stances made the period from 1793 to 1806 a time
Particularly important were the Dutch, who in 1782 of considerable growth in foreign commerce. Direct
floated the United States additional loans of around trade with Europe remained an important part of
$2 million. By the time Alexander Hamilton prepared American overseas trade, especially after Jay’s Trea-
his Report on the Public Credit (1790), the country’s ty (1794) secured peaceful relations between the
total federal debt at the end of 1789 had reached $54 United States and Britain. But with the outbreak of
million, of which 21.6 percent ($11.7 million) was war in Europe in 1793, America’s position as a neu-
held overseas. A portion of Virginia and South Caro- tral nation allowed it to profit from the reexport
lina’s state debts were also foreign-held, meaning trade. American merchants and shippers indirectly
that at least 29 percent of the public debt was held transported sugar, coffee, cocoa, and pepper from
overseas, predominantly in the Netherlands and French and British West Indian colonies to Europe, a
France. carrying trade that contributed considerable wealth
to northeastern port cities. By 1805 the reexport car-
rying trade of foreign goods was valued at slightly
EARLY REPUBLIC, 1790–1830
over $53 million, while that of domestic products
The implementation of Secretary of the Treasury Al- was only $42 million. This trade’s profitability,
exander Hamilton’s financial system helped to stabi- however, further embroiled the United States in Eu-
lize the nation’s public credit and attract increased ropean conflicts, leading to commercial retaliation
European (especially British) investment in the feder-
under the administrations of Thomas Jefferson
al debt and the stocks of the First and Second Nation-
(1801–1809) and James Madison (1809–1817). (See
al Banks. By 1803, about 62 percent (or $6.2 million)
Table 3.)
of the stocks in the First Bank of the United States
were foreign-owned, including $4 million by British In December 1807 Congress passed, at Jeffer-
firms like the prestigious House of Baring. In that son’s request, a complete embargo or ban on Ameri-
same year, largely as a result of the loans necessary can exports. Despite some smuggling, Jefferson’s
to pay for the Louisiana Purchase (1803), the percent embargo and accompanying enforcement legislation
of foreign investment in the federal debt reached its dramatically reduced foreign trade. Total exports of
all-time high of 56 percent. U.S. merchandise dropped from an estimated $49
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several merchants, fitted out a caravel and put Gomez in command.
Gomez, if he did not stand as high as some men of his time, was a
navigator of experience. In 1519 he sailed as chief pilot with
Magellan, but incurred much odium by leaving him in the Straits
which now bear Magellan’s name, and returning to Spain. Peter
Martyr, who gives an account of the congress at Badajos, says: “It is
decreed that one Stephanus Gomez, himself a skilful navigator, shall
go another way, whereby, between Baccalaos and Florida, long since
our countries, he says he will find out a way to Cataia. Only one
ship, a caravel, is furnished for him,” and, the chronicler continues,
“he will have no other thing in charge than to search out whether
any passage to the great Chan from among the various windings
and vast compassing of this our ocean is to be found.” Of the voyage
out from Spain few particulars are now available, though the account
of the return was penned by Martyr subsequently to November 13,
1525, and probably before the close of the year. The voyage was,
upon the whole, a short one. Martyr, however, says that he returned
at the end of “ten months,” while Navarrete states that he sailed in
February. Galvano tells us that, having failed to obtain the command
of an expedition to the Moluccas, he went on the coast of the new
world in search of a passage to India, observing that “the Earl Don
Fernando de Andrada, and the doctor Beltram, and the merchant
Christopher de Serro, furnished a galleon for him, and he went from
Groine, in Gallicia, to the Island of Cuba, and to the Cape of Florida,
sailing by day because he knew not the land.” Galvano tells us,
likewise, that he passed the Bay of Angra and the river Enseada, and
so “went over to the other side, reaching Cape Razo in 46° N.” This
means that he sailed up from Florida past the coast of Maine. Martyr,
writing after the return of Gomez, indulges in a strain of ridicule, and
says: “He, neither finding the Straight, nor Cataia, which he
promised, returned back in ten months after his departure;” and
continues: “I always thought and supposed this worthy man’s
fancies to be vain and frivolous. Yet he wanted not for suffrages and
voices in his favor and defense.” Still, Martyr admits that “he found
pleasant and profitable countries agreeable with our parallels and
degrees of the pole.”
The results of the voyage along the coast from Florida to
Newfoundland are indicated on the Map of Ribeiro, 1529, which
represents a new exploration, as nothing seems to have been
borrowed from either the voyage of Verrazano or from the voyages
made by the Portuguese, with the exception that Ribeiro used old
Portuguese maps of Newfoundland, which was the case with
Verrazano. We must, however, confine our observations to things
that relate to this immediate region, and notice what the
accompanying maps so fully exhibit, the difference of the delineation
of Sandy Hook and Long Island. On the Ribeiro Map Sandy Hook
appears as “Cabo de Arenas,” the Sandy Cape, exaggerated in size,
while Long Island is hardly distinguishable, as the coast line runs too
close to the north. It is indicated by the section of the coast between
two rivers, “Montana Vue,” evidently one of the hills of Long Island
that the navigator now views from the sea. On the Verrazano Map,
the region of Sandy Hook is “Lamuetto” and “Lungavilla,” while Long
Island is indicated as a part of the mainland, bearing the names of
“Cabo de Olimpo” and “Angolesme,” the bay of “San Germano” lying
between. The delineations of Verrazano exhibit his short stay and
hasty departure, while the survey of Gomez must have occupied
more time, at least around Sandy Hook. That this map resulted from
the voyage of Gomez is evident from the legend, which calls the land
“Tierra de Estevan Gomez;” (the country of Stephen Gomez) while
eastward, where the coast of Maine is delineated, is the “Arcipelago”
of Gomez. On this Map of Ribeiro the lower Bay of New York is
indicated by “E. de S. Xpoal,” with several Islands. A river appears
between this bay, given in later documents as Bay of “St.
Chrispstabel,” and Long Island, but the name of the river is not
given. “B. de S. Antonio,” however, is given which indicates the
upper bay or harbor, and subsequently we shall see the river itself
indicated as the river “San Antonio,” while the place of Sandy Hook
in the old cartography will be fully established and identified with
Cape de Arenas. Ribeiro evidently had pretty full notes of the
calculations and observations of Gomez.
FRA. DRAKE.
As the reverential old navigators were often in the habit of

marking their progress in connection with prominent days in the
Calendar, it is reasonable to suppose that the Hudson was
discovered by Gomez on the festival of St. Anthony, which falls on
January 17. Navarrete indeed says that he left Spain in February, but
the accounts are more or less confusing. If Martyr, who is more
particular, is correct, and Gomez was absent “ten months,” he must
have sailed early in December, which would have brought him to our
coast on the festival of the celebrated Theban Father. At this time
the navigator would have seen the country at its worst. Evidently he
made no extended exploration of the river, as in January it is often
loaded with ice and snow.
Gomez was laughed at by the courtiers, and had no disposition to
return to the American coast. The legend on the Map of Ribeiro
proclaiming his discovery, that is, exploration of the coast, declared
that here were to be found “many trees and fruits similar to those in
Spain,” but Martyr contemptuously exclaims, “What need have we of
these things that are common to all the people of Europe? To the
South! to the South!” he ejaculates, “for the great and exceeding
riches of the Equinoxial,” adding, “They that seek riches must not go
to the cold and frozen North.” Gems, spices, and gold were the
things coveted by Spain, and our temperate region, with its
blustering winters, did not attract natures accustomed to soft
Andalusian air.
After the voyage of Gomez, which, failing to find a route to the
Indies, excited ridicule, there is nothing of special interest to
emphasize in this connection until 1537. In the meanwhile, the
English were active, and in 1527 two ships, commanded by Captain
John Rut, were in American waters. It has been claimed that he
sailed the entire coast, often sending men on land “to search the
state of these unknown regions,” and it has been affirmed that this
is “the first occasion of which we are distinctly informed that
Englishmen landed on the coast.” Also that, “after Cabot, this was
the second English expedition which sailed along the entire east
coast of the United States, as far as South Carolina.” Granting,
however, that the expedition of Rut actually extended down the
American coast, there is no proof that he gave any attention to the
locality of the Hudson.
A SECTION OF THE
MAP OF ALONZO CHAVES.
We turn now to the account of our particular locality, as given by

Oviedo in 1537, who wrote an account of the coast based largely
upon the Map of Alonzo Chaves. It appears that, in 1536, Charles V.
ordered that the official charts should “be examined and corrected
by experienced men, appointed for that purpose.” Acting under their
instructions, Alonzo Chaves drew up a chart, embodying the
information that he had been able to collect from maps and
narratives. It is evident that he had notes of the voyage of Gomez,
and that he used the Ribeiro Map, but he had no information about
the voyage of Verrazano or that of Cartier in 1534. His delineation of
the coast began in the Bay of Mexico, and extended to
Newfoundland. Oviedo, in his “History of the Indies,” used this map,
and describes the coast by its aid. The Map of Chaves does not
appear to be accessible, but its American features have been
reconstructed from the descriptions of Oviedo, and this portion of
the Map is given herewith, the latitudes and distances being exactly
preserved. From the Cape of Florida, Oviedo moves northward in his
descriptions, which are distinctly recognizable. “Cabo de Sanct
Johan” stands at the mouth of the Chesapeake, and from this place
“Cabo de los Arenas” is thirty leagues to the north-northeast. The
latter cape is 38° 20′ N. From “Arenas” the coast runs thirty leagues
to “Cabo de Santiago,” which is 39° 20′ N. On this map Sandy Hook
appears as Cape Santiago, but generally the name of “Arenas,” the
Sandy Cape, is affixed to the Hook[7]. Oviedo, on reaching the end
of Sandy Hook, proceeds to give an unmistakable delineation of the
Bay and Harbor of New York, and of the river which is now known as
the Hudson. “Thence,” continues Oviedo, with his eye on the Map of
Chaves, “the coast turns southwest twenty leagues to the Bay of
Sanct Christobal, which is in 39°, passes said bay, and goes thirty
leagues to Rio de Sanct Antonio, north and south with the bottom of
this bay; and the ‘Rio de Sanct Antonio’ is in 41° N.” Dr. Kohl says
that “it is impossible to give a more accurate description of the
Hudson River,” but this is not quite true. It was an excellent
description for that period, considering the material at hand; yet it
must be remembered that all the distances are given as general
estimates on the decimal system. Besides, the Map of Chaves, like
all the maps, was drawn on a small scale, and Sandy Hook and the
Lower Bay are both exaggerated, as on the Map of Ribeiro, which
will be seen by a comparison of the two maps, placed side by side to
facilitate investigation. Both Ribeiro and Chaves had erroneous
measurements of distances, and made the Lower Bay quite a large
gulf, while the latitude of “Rio Sanct Antonio” is placed one degree
too high. Ribeiro, however, gave the Hook its right name,
“Arenas.”[8] The size of the Hook is exaggerated on the Maijolla Map,
1527, though not on the Verrazano, 1529. These things show free-
hand drawing on the part of the mapmakers, and defective rule-of-
thumb measurements by the navigator, who probably viewed the
waters behind the Hook when veiled in mist, failing to test his own
estimates.
Oviedo says that “from the Rio de Sanct Antonio the coast runs
northeast one-fourth east forty leagues to a point (punta), that on
the western side it has a river called the Buena Madre, and on the
eastern part, in front of (de lante) the point, is the Bay of Sanct
Johan Baptista, which point (punta) is 41° 30′ N.”; or, rather,
correcting the error of one degree, in 40° 30′ N. This point is
Montauk Point, Long Island being taken as a part of the main. The
Thames River in Connecticut answers to the River of the Good
Mother, and the Bay of John Baptist is evidently the Narragansett.
Oviedo then goes on to the region of Cape Cod, varying from the
general usage, and calling it “Arrecifes,” or the Reef Cape, instead of
“Cabe de Baxos,” which signifies substantially the same thing. Under
the circumstances, the description of Long Island is remarkably
exact, as its shore trends northward almost exactly half a degree in
running to Montauk Point. What, therefore, lies on either side of the
River San Antonio fixes beyond question the locality of the Hudson,
and proves that it was clearly known from the time of Gomez to
1537.
The next navigator whose work touched our part of the coast was
Jehan or Jean Allefonsce, who, in 1542, came to Canada as pilot of
Roberval, and gained considerable knowledge of the North Atlantic
shores. This hardy sailor was a native of Saintonge, a village of
Cognac, France. After following the sea for a period of more than
forty years, and escaping many dangers, he finally received a mortal
wound while engaged in a naval battle in the harbor of Rochelle.
Melin Saint-Gelais wrote a sonnet in his honor during the year 1559.
It can hardly be doubted that Allefonsce himself ran down the coast
in one of the ships of Roberval, probably when returning to France.
With the aid of Paulin Secalart he wrote a cosmographical
description, which included Canada and the West Indies, with the
American coast. Very recognizable descriptions are given as far down
as Cape Cod and the islands to the southward. The manuscript also
possesses interest in connection with the region of the Hudson,
though farther south the description becomes still more available.
Allefonsce after disposing of the region of New England, turns
southward, and says: “From the Norombega River,” that is, the
Penobscot, “the coast runs west-southwest about two hundred and
fifty leagues to a large bay (anse) running inland about twenty
leagues, and about twenty-nine leagues wide. In this bay there are
four islands close together. The entrance to the bay is by 38° N., and
the said islands lie in 39° 30′ N. The source of this bay has not been
explored, and I do not know whether it extends further on.... The
whole coast is thickly populated, but I had no intercourse with
them.” Continuing, he says: “From this bay the coast runs west-
northwest about forty-six leagues. Here you come upon a great
fresh-water river, and at its entrance is a sand island.” What is more,
he adds: “Said island is 39° 49′ N.”
From the description of Allefonsce, it is evident that the “great
fresh-water river” is the Hudson, described five years before by
Oviedo, out of the Map of Chaves, as the River of St. Anthony, while
the “island of sand” was Sandy Hook.[9]
Turning from the manuscript of Allefonsce to the printed
cosmography, we discover that the latter is only an abridgement, it
being simply said that after leaving Norombega, the coast turns to
the south-southeast to a cape which is high land (Cape Cod), and
has a great island and three or four small isles. New York and the
entire coast south have no mention. The manuscript, however,
suffices for our purpose and proves that the coast was well known.
It has been already stated that it would be impossible to say when
the first Englishman visited this region; yet in the year 1567-8,
evidence goes to prove that one David Ingram, an Englishman, set
ashore with a number of companions in the Bay of Mexico,
journeyed on foot across the country to the river St. John, New
Brunswick, and sailed thence for France. Possibly he was half crazed
by his sufferings, yet there can be little doubt that he crossed the
continent and passed through the State of New York, traveling on
the Indian paths and crossing many broad rivers. If the story is true,
Ingram is the first Englishman known to have visited these parts.
In April, 1583, Captain Carline wrote out propositions for a voyage
“to the latitude of fortie degrees or thereabouts, of that hithermost
part of America,” and, in 1583, Sir Humphrey Gilbert had this region
under consideration, Hakluyt observing on the margin of his “Divers
Voyages” that this was “the Countrey of Sir H. G. Uoyage.” Hays says
in his account of the region, that “God hath reserved the same to be
reduced unto Christian civility by the English nation” and, also that
“God would raise him up an instrument to effect the same.” All this is
very interesting in connection with English claims and enterprise. In
the same year the French were active on the coast, and one Stephen
Bellinger, of Rouen, sailed to Cape Breton, and thence coasted
southwesterly six hundred miles “and had trafique with the people in
tenne or twelve places.” Thus the French were moving from both the
north and the south towards this central region; but we cannot say
how far south Bellinger actually came, as there is nothing to indicate
his mode of computation. It is not improbable that he knew and
profited by the rich fur-trade of the Hudson.
In 1598 and there about, we find it asserted that the Dutch were
upon the ground, for, in the year 1644, the Committee of the Dutch
West India Company, known as the General Board of Accounts, to
whom numerous documents and papers have been intrusted, made
a lengthy report, which they begin as follows: “New Netherland,
situated in America, between English Virginia and New England,
extending from the South [Delaware] river, lying in 34½ degrees to
Cape Malabat, in the latitude of 41½ degrees, was first frequented
by the inhabitants of this country in the year 1598, and especially by
those of the Greenland Company, but without making any fixed
settlements, only as a shelter in winter. For which they built on the
North [Hudson] and the South [Delaware] rivers there two little forts
against the attacks of the Indians.” Mr. Brodhead says that the
statement “needs confirmation.” Still it is somewhat easy to
understand why a statement of this kind coming from such a body
should require confirmation; but the Committee had no reason for
misstating the facts, and ought to have been accurately informed.
Yet if confirmation is insisted upon, we are prepared to give it, such
as it is, from an English and, in fact, an unexpected source. Our
authority is no less a personage than Governor Bradford, of
Plymouth Colony, whose office and inclinations led him to challenge
all unfounded claims that might be put forth by the Dutch.
Nevertheless, writing to Sir Ferdinando Gorges, the father of New
England colonization, who likewise was hostile to the pretensions of
the Dutch, Bradford says, under date of June 15, 1627, that the
Dutch on the Hudson “have used trading there this six-or-seven-and-
twenty years, but have begun to plant of later time, and now have
reduced their trade to some order.” Bradford lived in Holland in 1608,
and had abundant opportunities for knowing everything relating to
Dutch enterprise. It is perfectly well known that the Plymouth
Colonists of 1620 intended to settle at the Hudson, though
circumstances directed them to the spot pointed out by Dermer in
1619, when in the service of Gorges. Thus, about seventeen years
before the Committee of 1644 reported, Governor Bradford, an
unwilling, but every way competent and candid witness, carried back
the Dutch occupancy, under the Greenland Company, to the year
1600. Besides, on the English map of the voyage of Linschoten,
1598, there is a dotted trail from the latitude of the Hudson, 40° N.
to the St. Lawrence, showing that the route was one known and
traveled at that time. It is evident, from a variety of considerations,
that both the Dutch and French resorted to the Hudson at this
period to engage in the trade. Linschoten was one of the best
informed of Dutch writers, and probably understood the significance
of the representation upon his map. The probability is that this route
was known a long time before, and that it may be indicated by
Cartier, who, when in Canada, 1534, was told of a route by the way
of the river Richelieu, to a country a month’s distance southward,
supposed to produce cinnamon and cloves, which Cartier thought
the route to Florida. Champlain, writing in Canada, says that, in the
year previous, certain French who lived on the Hudson were taken
prisoners when out on an expedition against the northern Indians,
and were liberated, on the ground that they were friends of the
French in Canada. This agrees with the report of the Labadists, who
taught that a French child, Jean Vigné, was born here in 1614.
Evidently the French had been on the ground in force for some
years, and were able to make expeditions against the savages. Very
likely the French were here quite as early as the Hollanders.
There seems to be, however, another curious piece of
confirmation, which comes from the writings of the celebrated
Father Isaac Jogues, who was in New Amsterdam during the year
1646. In a letter written on August 3d of that year, he says that the
Dutch were here, “about fifty years” before, while they began to
settle permanently only about “twenty years” since. The latter
statement is sufficiently correct, as 1623 was the year when a
permanent colony was established by the Dutch. The former
statement carries us back to the date of the “Greenland Company.”
So far as present evidence goes, it is perhaps unnecessary to say
anything more in vindication of the statement of the Dutch
Committee of 1644, claiming that representatives of the Greenland
Company wintered here in 1598. Nevertheless, as a matter of
interest, and to show how well the Hudson was known at this time
by both Dutch and English, we may quote from the English
translation of the Dutch narrative of Linschoten, which clearly
describes the coast. He says: “There is a countrey under 44 degrees
and a halfe, called Baccalaos.” This country of Baccalaos reached
nine hundred miles, that is, from the Cape de Baccalaos [Cape Race]
to Florida.
The distances are given approximately, of course, by Linschoten,
being on the decimal system, but they distinctly mark the principal
divisions of the coast and fix the fact beyond question that the
Hudson was perfectly well known.
On the general subject it may be said, that the record of the
“Greenland Company” is not satisfactory, yet the word “Greenland”
at that time had a very general use, and all that the Committee of
Accounts may have meant by the phrase was, that a company or
association engaged in the fur and fish trade, which for centuries,
even, had been prosecuted at the north, had sent some ships to this
region in 1598. There is certainly nothing unreasonable in this
supposition, the coast being so well known. Various adventurers of
whom we know nothing doubtless came and went unobserved,
being in no haste to publish the source from which they derived such
a profitable trade in peltries. The Committee of Accounts either
falsified deliberately or followed some old tradition. Why may not a
tradition be true?
We turn next to examine a map recently brought to notice and
which is of unique value. Formerly the map usually pointed out as
the oldest seventeenth century map of this region was the Dutch
“Figurative” Map, which was found by Mr. Brodhead in the Dutch
archives. We have now, however, an earlier map of 1610, which was
prepared from English data for James I., a copy finding its way to
Philip III., by Velasco, March 22, 1611. Sandy Hook, though without
name, is delineated about as it appears in later maps, while Long
Island is shown as a part of the main, with no indication of the
Sound, though Cape Cod and the neighboring islands are well
delineated, and Verrazano’s Island of “Luisa” appears as “Cla[u]dia,”
the mother of Francis I. Clearly at this time neither Block nor any
other Dutch navigator had passed through Hell Gate into Long Island
Sound.
There is nothing whatever in this map relating to explorations by
any nation later than 1607. Jamestown appears on the Virginia
portion, and Sagadehoc in Maine. It was simply a copy of a map
made soon after the voyage to New England and Virginia in 1607.
The compiler had not heard of Hudson’s voyage, as that navigator
did not reach England until November 7, 1609. If he had received
any information from Hudson, he would have shown the river
terminating in a shallow, innavigable brook, whereas the river is
indicated, in accordance with Captain John Smith’s idea, as a strait,
leading to a large body of water. Further, the map contradicts
Hudson, who represents the Hoboken side of the river as
“Manhatta,” while this map puts the name on both sides,
“Manahata,” on the west and “Manahatin” on the east. It is not
unlikely that Hudson had with him a copy of the map, for his
guidance on the voyage in the Half-Moon.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Though this map bears a date subsequent to Hudson’s voyage,

the contents prove that the original could not have been drawn later
than 1608. It was evidently one of the various maps of which Smith
spoke and which he underrated. Its substance indicates that it was
drawn from a source independent of the Dutch and French, showing
that the English knew of the Bay of New York and its relation to
Sandy Hook, and that they supposed the great river delineated was
a broad stream which, in someway, communicated with the Pacific.
On the original map of which Velasco’s example was a copy, the land
west of the river was colored blue, and the legend says that it is
described by information drawn from the Indians. What we need
now is the original map, which may still exist in some obscure
collection in England or Holland, and quite as likely in the archives of
Spain, sent thither by jealous Spanish spies, who lingered, like
Velasco, at the court of James I., to learn what they could with
respect to English enterprise in America. At all events we have in this
English map the first seventeenth century delineation of this region,
and one showing that the English knew the form and general
character of the country which the crown conveyed to the colonists
of North and South Virginia in 1606. So far as now known, it was
clearly the English who first became acquainted with the name that
the Aborigines applied to the island upon which our great
metropolitan city stands. Whether or not this was an aboriginal word
or a corruption of a Castilian term future investigators may decide.
The unexpected finding of this old English map in the Spanish
archives revives our hopes relating to the discovery of new sources
of information concerning early voyages to this coast. English
enterprise and adventure on the Virginia coast, extending from
Raleigh’s expedition, 1584, to Gosnold’s fatal quest, 1603, must have
brought Englishmen into the Bay of New York, unless miracle was
balanced against curiosity and chance. There are archives yet to be
opened that may give the origin of the delineations of this region
found in the remarkable map from Samancas, and we need to be
cautious in making claims even for the priority of the Dutch in 1598.
The period under consideration was a period of reconnoissance,
one that offered some romantic incident, but more of
disappointment and mortification. Here was a site for one of the
noblest cities in the world, but the voyager was blind. The river
offered no route to the gorgeous Indies, and Verrazano had little
inclination to test its swift tide. Gomez, in the short January days of
1525, had no desire to ascend, for when his ship met the drift ice
tossing on the cold, swirling stream, he thought of Anthony in his
desolate retreat on the Red Sea, put the river under his charge, and
sailed away in search of happier shores. Sailors of other
nationalities, doubtless, ascended the river; but, finding it simply a
river, they took what peltries they could get, and, like Gomez, turned
the whole region over to the care of the solitary Saint, who for
nearly a century stood connected with its neglect. Much remained to
be done before steps could be taken with regard to colonization. The
initial work, however, was inaugurated by the sturdy Englishman,
Henry Hudson, and the proud Spanish caravel disappears, while the
curtain rises upon the memorable voyage of the quaint Dutch fly-
boat, the Half-Moon.
FOOTNOTES
[2] Letter addressed to the writer in 1890.
[3] The vignette on proceeding page is a faithful representation
of the Florentine portrait.
[4] The usual course was to sail southward and reach Florida
coasting north, or to sail to Newfoundland and coast southward.
It required especial boldness to take the direct course, and, in
1562, when Ribault followed this course, he was proud of the
achievement. The fact that Verrazano sailed the direct course at
that time proves the authenticity of his voyage, as a forger would
not have invented the story.
[5] On the Map of Verrazano, to which attention will be
directed, this triangular island is delineated. The voyager
approaching the island from the west comes to a point of the
triangle where he can look away in the easterly direction, and at
a glance take in two sides; while on reaching the eastern limit the
third side plainly appears. In sailing past Block Island, as
Verrazano did, from west to east, the navigator could not fail to
discover its triangular shape. Indeed it is so marked that one is
struck by the fact.
[6] The story of this map is curious. The American contents
were first given to the public by the writer in the “Magazine of
American History,” and afterward reprinted in “Verrazano the
Explorer.”
[7] In “Cabo de Arenas,” the coast names taken from a large
collection of maps are arranged in parallel columns, illustrating
three main divisions of the coast, showing that Cabo de Baxos
was the name applied to Cape Cod, and Cabo de Arenas to Sandy
Hook. Capo Cod in the early times was not a sandy cape, but a
beautiful and well-wooded cape. Sandy Hook ever since it was
known has borne its present character.
[8] Those who have fancied that Cape Arenas was Cape Cod,
and that the bay behind it was Massachusetts Bay, have the same
difficulty as regards dimensions. Students of American
cartography understand perfectly well that latitudes in the old
maps were often more than two degrees out of the way, the
instruments of that period being so defective.
[9] To convince himself of this fact the reader may compare the
reconstructed Map of Chaves with the coast surveys, when the
main difference will be found to consist in the exaggeration of
Sandy Hook. The “Narrative and Critical History of America,”
dealing with this point, suppresses all allusion to the fact that
Kohl recognizes the cape on the Map of Chaves with the names
“Santiago” and “Arenas” as Sandy Hook, which follows, as the
river inside of the Hook he identifies with the Hudson. Dr. Kohl,
though generally very acute, failed to see that Oviedo’s
description of the Map of Chaves was, substantially, the
description of Ribeiro, and that in identifying, as he chanced to,
the “Arenas” of Ribeiro with Cape Cod, he stultified his own
reasoning. Nor did he consider this, that if the great Cape
“Arenas” was intended for Cape Cod, there is no representation
whatever of Sandy Hook and the Hudson in the old cartography
and that all the voyages to this region geographically went for
nothing. Credat Judaeus Appellus! This exaggeration of Sandy
Hook is conceded, yet the inlets along the New Jersey shore may
have been viewed as connected by Gomez; and indeed, so great
have been the changes along the coast that no one can well deny
that they were connected in 1525, and formed a long bay running
down behind Sandy Hook. It will prove more historic to follow the
writer, who says, “that the coast of New York and the neighboring
district were known to Europeans almost a century before Hudson
ascended the ‘Great River of the North,’ and that this knowledge
is proved by various maps made in the course of the sixteenth
century. Nearly all of them place the mouth of a river between
the fortieth and forty-first degrees of latitude, or what should be
this latitude, but which imperfect instruments have placed farther
north.”—Nar. and Crit. His. of Amer., 4: 432.
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE.
Seventy-odd years ago the Rev. Sydney Smith wrote in the
Edinburg Review as follows: “Literature, the Americans have none—
no native literature, we mean. It is all imported. They had a Franklin,
indeed, and may afford to live for half a century on his fame. There
is, or was, a Mr. Dwight, who wrote some poems, and his baptismal
name was Timothy. There is also a small account of Virginia, by
Jefferson, an epic by Joel Barlow, and some pieces of pleasantry by
Mr. Irving. But why should the Americans write books, when a six
weeks’ passage brings them, in their own tongue, our sense, science
and genius in bales and hogsheads?”
Times have changed since Mr. Smith wrote this somewhat
sarcastic summary of our native literature; for, while it is true that
we still import British “sense, science, and genius in bales and
hogsheads,” it is done now on principles of reciprocity, and we return
quite as good and perhaps nearly as much as we receive.
Americans do not instance Mr. Dwight, whose “baptismal name
was Timothy,” or Mr. Barlow, the author of the epic so sneeringly
referred to, as the chiefs of American poesy; yet we need not blush
for either of them; for the first was a distinguished scholar the
President of Yale College, and the author of the hymn so dear to
many pious hearts:
“I love thy kingdom, Lord!

The house of Thine abode;
The church our blest Redeemer saved
With His own precious blood.”
The other, Mr. Barlow, was a well-known man of letters and

politician in his day, author of the “Columbiad,” the epic referred to
by Mr. Smith, and minister plenipotentiary of the United States to the
coast of France at a critical period of our history. As to the
“Columbiad,” it has been pronounced by competent critics to be
equal in merit to Addison’s “Campaign,” and surely it is no disgrace
to have equalled Addison.
It was the fashion in those days for Englishmen to sneer at
Americans; and so we find in another review, written by the same
gentleman in 1820, this language: “During the thirty or forty years of
their independence, they have done absolutely nothing for the
sciences, for the arts, for literature, or even for the statesmanlike
studies of politics or political economy.... In the four quarters of the
globe who reads an American book? or looks at an American picture
or statue? What does the world yet owe to American physicians or
surgeons? What new substances have their chemists discovered? or
what old ones have they analyzed? What new constellations have
been discovered by the telescopes of Americans? What have they
done in mathematics? Who drinks out of American glasses? or eats
from American plates? or wears American coats or gowns? or sleeps
in American blankets?” In the very same year that this array of
rather insolent queries was propounded by Sydney Smith, the genial
Washington Irving, in the advertisement to the first English edition
of his Sketch Book, remarks: “The author is aware of the austerity
with which the writings of his countrymen have been treated by
British critics.” We have not a particle of doubt as to the “austerity”
in question. The salvos of Old Ironsides and the roar of Jackson’s
guns at New Orleans, were unpleasant facts not yet forgotten by
Englishmen.
But Sydney Smith was not quite fair towards our countrymen. It
was “during the thirty or forty years of their independence” referred
to that Fulton’s steamboat revolutionized navigation, that
Rittenhouse developed a mathematical skill second only to that of
Newton; that West delighted even royalty itself with the creations of
his pencil; while in “the statesmanlike studies of politics or political
economy,” it was during this very period that Jefferson, Hamilton,
Madison, and their coadjutors did more to develop the true
principles of government and politics than had ever been done
before in the history of the world. True, we had not much to boast
of, but it would have been only just to give us credit for what we
were worth. Moreover, in a small way, but to the extent it was
possible under the circumstances, the English colonists in America
had cultivated letters from the beginning. In 1685, Cotton Mather
wrote his Memorable Providences; in 1732, Franklin began to issue
his Poor Richard’s Almanac; in 1749, Jonathan Edwards published his
Life of David Brainerd, and in 1754, his famous treatise on The
Freedom of the Will and Moral Agency. Besides these, which perhaps
stand out most conspicuously, there were many minor works of
more or less excellence, over most of which the iniquity of oblivion,
to use the fine phrase of Sir Thomas Browne, hath scattered her
poppy.
The moment that the Edinburg Review was thus dealing our
fathers these heavy blows seemed to be the real starting point in
our career of literary greatness. William Cullen Bryant, Washington
Irving, James K. Paulding, Richard H. Dana, James Fenimore Cooper,
Mrs. Sigourney and a host of others were giving direction to that
stream of literature that has since flowed broad and free over our
land, imparting life and vigor and beauty to our society and
institutions. It is, however, anterior to the year 1820, the thirty or
forty years of our national independence, during which Mr. Smith
says we have done “absolutely nothing” in literature, science or art,
to which we must more particularly advert. The literary product of
those years was scanty enough, it is true. The student of this period
will not find much, and not all of that of the first order, to reward his
labor—not much, at least, as compared with other nations at the
same time. But may there not have been some sufficient reason for
this, outside of any downright intellectual deficiencies on the part of
our fathers? Let us for a moment consider the condition of things at
that time in this country.
In the first place, at the time referred to, the citizens of the United
States were in a daily struggle with the material difficulties of their
situation. The country was new. The region west and north of the
Ohio and Mississippi was yet an almost unbroken wilderness, while
the country east and south of those rivers was but sparsely
populated. At the same time the tide of immigration was sweeping
into the country, and with it all the rush and turmoil incident to life in
a new country was going on. Forests were to be cut down; farms
were to be cleared up; houses were to be built; roads were to be
made; bridges were to be thrown across the rivers; while a
livelihood was to be compelled from the forests, the streams, and
the fields. The conditions of a new country are not favorable to the
cultivation of the arts, of sciences, or of literature. Why do not
Englishmen twit the people of Australia because during the past forty
or fifty years in which they have prospered so greatly in material
things, they have not produced a Macaulay, a Tennyson, a
Gladstone, a Tyndall, or a Huxley? It would be just as fair to do it.
Not only was there this hand to hand contest with their physical
environment, but the political conditions were also unfavorable to
any general dalliance with the Muses. Only in times of tranquility and
ease is it possible.
“To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,

Or with the tangles of Neaera’s hair.”
The country at the period referred to, had just emerged from a
long and exhausting war. Society was almost broken up; the arts of
peace were well nigh forgotten; the finances were in almost
hopeless confusion; the form of government was unsettled, and
scarcely yet determined upon. The first thing to do was to evolve
some system and some security out of this chaos. Politics alone
occupied the moments of leisure. When, finally, authority had
crystallized into definite government the people were not allowed to
be at rest. Murderous wars with the Indians on the frontiers; the
machinations of French emissaries; British oppression of American
commerce, and at length another long and bloody war with England,
harassed the minds of the people, and prevented them from giving
themselves up more generally to the kindly and refining influences of
literature and art. When we consider all the circumstances in the
case, there seems a degree of severity in Sydney Smith’s sneers and
taunts.
But though circumstances were thus unfavorable to the cultivation
of letters, yet something was done in this direction nevertheless.
Smith refers flippantly enough to Dwight, Jefferson, Barlow and
Irving. But besides these there were others, not brilliant luminaries
perhaps, yet stars shining in the darkness according to their orders
and degrees. We do not design here to enter upon any discussion of
their respective merits, but we may mention as a writer of that
period no less a character than George Washington, whose
greatness in other spheres of life has entirely eclipsed any fame of
which he may be worthy as an author, yet whose Farewell Address
alone would entitle him to a place among the most accurate writers
of English. Among others we may name John Adams, whose pen
was scarcely less eloquent than his tongue; Francis Hopkinson,
author of The Battle of the Kegs and many other pieces, of which it
has been said, that “while they are fully equal to any of Swift’s
writings for wit, they have nothing at all in them of Swift’s vulgarity;”
Dr. Benjamin Rush, a distinguished writer on medical and social
topics; John Trumbull, the author of McFingal and The Progress of
Dullness; James Madison, afterward President of the United States,
one of the ablest writers in The Federalist; Philip Freneau, a poet of
the Revolution and the period immediately following; Alexander
Hamilton, a contributor to The Federalist, and one of the clearest of
political writers; Joseph Dennie, the author of The Lay Preacher, and
editor of The Portfolio; Joseph Hopkinson, author of Hail, Columbia;
Charles Brockden Brown, author of Wieland, Arthur Mervyn, and
other works, and who was perhaps the first American who wholly
devoted his life to literary pursuits; William Wirt, author of the British
Spy, the Life of Patrick Henry, and other works; and Lyman Beecher,
the author of a work on Political Atheism, anti several volumes of
sermons and public addresses. This list might easily be extended,
but its length as it now stands, as well as the merits of the writers
adduced, is sufficient to contradict effectually the statement that
America had “no native literature,” and that during the thirty or forty
years immediately subsequent to the Revolution she had done
“absolutely nothing” for polite letters. Much of this early literature
still remains, and is read; many of these authors are still familiar to
this generation, and it is generally admitted that the writer whose
fame survives a century is assured of a literary immortality. Sydney
Smith was an acute man, a learned man, a great wit, a ready and
elegant writer, a trenchant critic, but the names of some of these
humble Americans whom he did not deign to mention, or mentioned
only to scoff, bid fair to stand as long in the annals of literature as
his own.
On the eastern slope of the Andes are a thousand springs from
which the slender rills, half hidden at times by the grass, scarcely at
any time seen or heard, trickle down the side of the immense
mountain range, here and there falling into each other and swelling
in volume as they flow, until at length is formed the mighty Amazon,
that drains the plateaus and valleys of half a continent. So the
beginnings of our literature, like the beginnings of every literature,
are small, indistinct, half hidden; but as they proceed, these little rills
of thought and expression grow and expand, until the mighty stream
is formed that irrigates the whole world of intellectual activity.
This stream, as we have said, first began to assume definite form
and direction about the time that Sydney Smith was uttering his
tirades against the genius and achievements of our countrymen. In
1817, appeared in the North American Review a remarkable poem
called “Thanatopsis.” The author was a young man named William
Cullen Bryant, only twenty-three years of age; yet the poem had
been written four years before. The annals of literature do not
furnish another example of such excellence at so early an age. The
poem yet stands as one of the most exquisite in the language. A
recent critic has characterized it as “lofty in conception, beautiful in
execution, full of chaste language and delicate and striking imagery,
and, above all, pervaded by a noble and cheerful religious
philosophy.” This first effort on the part of Bryant was succeeded by
a long career of eminence in the field of literature. In 1818 appeared
a volume of miscellanies called “The Sketch Book,” by Washington
Irving, a young man who had already acquired some slight
reputation as a dabbler in literature of a trifling or humorous kind.
The Sketch Book was almost immediately honored by republication
in England. This initial volume was followed by a second series of
miscellanies called “Bracebridge Hall,” which was published in
London in 1822. In the preliminary chapter the author pleasantly
adverts to the general feeling with which American authorship was
regarded in England. “It has been a matter of marvel to my
European readers,” says he, “that a man from the wilds of America
should express himself in tolerable English. I was looked upon as
something new and strange in literature; a kind of demi-savage, with
a feather in his hand instead of on his head; and there was a
curiosity to hear what such a being had to say about civilized
society.” In the same year with Irving’s Sketch Book appeared
Drake’s Culprit Fay, a poem that has not been surpassed in its kind
since Milton’s Comus. In 1821 Percival issued his first volume of
poems, Dana his Idle Man, and Cooper, his Precaution. His last
named volume was at once followed by a long list of works including
such famous titles as The Spy, The Last of the Mohicans, The
Pathfinder, and The Deerslayer. It marked the advent of our most
distinguished novelist—a man who has been styled the Walter Scott
of America. He justly stands in the same rank with the mighty
Wizard of the North, and has no other equal. Thus the stream of
American literature rolled on its course, and was swelled as it flowed
by the contributions of Everett, Prescott, Bancroft, Emerson,
Hawthorne, Poe, Willis, Holmes, Whittier, Lowell, and a host of
others, whose names the world will not willingly let die.
America has not yet produced a Shakespere or a Milton; but it
must be remembered that England has produced but one, each of
these in a period of a thousand years. Anywhere below these two
great names, American literature of the last seventy years is able to
parallel the best work that has been produced by our kinsmen on
the other side of the Atlantic. In wealth and elegance of diction, in
depth of thought or feeling, in brightness and grace of expression, in
any of the thousand forms and flights in which genius seeks to
express himself, the current literature of America stands on a level
with the current literature of England; and Sydney Smith’s sneers,
which must have touched our fathers to the quick, find no response
now except the smile of contempt which alone they ever deserved.
T. J. Chapman.
THE OHIO SOCIETY, AND OHIO IN
NEW YORK.
I.
There are many things that link the capital city of financial and
commercial America, to the State of Ohio, that New England
enterprise, and New York encouragement, and Virginian patriotism,
did so much to build beyond the Alleghenies. It is not merely in the
associations and connections of to-day that New York and Ohio are
bound together. A pregnant era of the early past, was disposed
toward good results forever, by the patriotic generosity of the Empire
State, at a time when Ohio was but a name in the far off wilderness;
a promise that many things must nurture, before it could be realized.
Historians will recall, when this much has been said, the events
that were pressed close upon each other, before the soil upon which
Ohio now stands, was declared the property of the nation,
disentangled from the conflicting claims of jealous States, and how
New York by her self-renunciation, led the way to harmony. For a
century had Virginia and Connecticut made their claims to the vast
westward territory; vaster than the imagination of any living man
then conceived. When the French were driven from the lands west
of the bounds of Pennsylvania, the contention commenced, and
claims were urged from time to time, until both voices of dispute
were temporarily silenced by the war in which the rivals fought side
by side for the freedom of both. When that conflict was ended, the
question again arose; not, this time, with the English Crown as the
greater power, but with the loose jointed Confederation, under which
America endeavored to work out a national salvation. Virginia, made
her demand under the grant of James, in 1609, which gave her: “All
those lands, countries and territories, situated, lying, and being in
that part of America called Virginia, from the point of the eastern
land called Cape or Point Comfort, all that space and circuit of land
lying, from the seacoast of the precinct aforesaid, up into the land,
throughout, from sea to sea, west and northwest, and also all the
islands lying within one hundred miles along the coast of the both
seas of the precinct aforesaid.”
This generous King, who was giving away so much that did not
belong to him, was really giving more than he dreamed of; for the
writer of the grant evidently believed that the South Sea, or Pacific
Ocean, was but little westward of the Atlantic, and never dreamed
that he was extending his line so as to take in the magnificent
Western and Northwestern empire of to-day.
Connecticut made her claim under Charles the II, who in 1662,
gave to the colony “All that part of our dominion in New England, in
America, bounded on the east by the Narragansett River, commonly
called Narragansett Bay, where the said river falleth into the sea,
and on the north by the line of the Massachusetts plantation, and on
the south by the sea, and in longitude as the line of the
Massachusetts colony, running from east to west; that is to say, from
the said Narragansett Bay, on the east to the South Sea on the west
part, with the islands thereto adjoining.”
It was under this very vague, but very extensive grant, that
Connecticut laid claim to, and maintained that claim, for that part of
Ohio known the world over, as the “Connecticut Western Reserve.”
While Virginia, Connecticut and Pennsylvania were warring in the
courts, in the legislatures, and before the people over their various
claims, there were many others who virtually assumed that the
whole unoccupied and unorganized land to the west, belonged to
the nation at large, and that no state had a right to exclusive
jurisdiction. This discussion threatened all sorts of difficulties, at a
time when peace and prosperity could only come through a mutual
helpfulness and internal harmony, and the wisest and most patriotic
declared themselves willing to waive all personal claims, and allow
the national government to administer the general estate for the
general good. Congress so viewed it, and appealed to the States to
yield their claims. The first response came from New York, which
conceded all her possible ownership to western territory, to the
general government, and the other States followed in her wake.
Virginia followed New York; and Massachusetts Virginia; and
eventually Connecticut came into line.
In the appeal of Congress to the States there was no ambiguity as
to the purpose to which these lands were to be devoted. The act of
October 10, 1780, resolved that “the unappropriated lands that may
be ceded or relinquished to the United States by any particular
State,” should be disposed of “for the common benefit of the United
States, and shall be settled and formed into distinct republican
States, which shall become members of the Federal Union, and have
the same right of sovereignty, freedom and independence as the
other States; that each which shall be so formed shall contain a
suitable extent of territory not less than one hundred nor more than
one hundred and fifty miles square, or as near thereto as
circumstances will admit, that the necessary and reasonable expense
which any particular State shall have incurred since the
commencement of the present war, in subduing any part of the
territory that may be ceded or relinquished to the United States,
shall be reimbursed.” It was further agreed that said lands should be
“granted or settled at such times and under such regulations” as
should be thereafter agreed upon by the United States, or any nine
or more of them.
In less than six months after the issuing of this broad invitation,
New York set an example of generosity to her young sister States,
which had so much yet to learn in the way of mutual concessions for
the general good. And she made no conditions in her surrender. She
simply said that she would draw a line across the western end of
Lake Ontario, north and south, and that while all east of it should be
hers, all west would be forever quit-claimed to the nation. It took
Virginia three years to make up her mind, and when she waived her
claim in March, 1784, she yet reserved nearly four million acres to
the south and east of the Ohio. The year following, Massachusetts
came in with no conditions, while Connecticut followed, in the fall of
1786, conditioning that she should retain the magnificent Western
Reserve, upon which a New Connecticut was eventually built in the
wilderness—that Reserve that has played so important a part in the
history, and the moral development of the republic. South Carolina,
North Carolina and Georgia, at last straggled, one by one, into the
path of manifest destiny; although the century had turned the point
of time by two notches, before the last hand was lessened, and the
Nation became in law what she had already been in fact—the
architect and master of the splendid empire that stretched from the
western edge of the civilization of that day, to where the Spaniard
and the Frenchman still held a nominal right to the westward of the
Mississippi.
With these cessions, the territorial system of our government
came into existence. That which Georgia gave, became the
Mississippi Territory; that from the Carolinas, the Southwest
Territory; and all that north of the Ohio River, the Northwest
Territory; and this brings us to a point where New York again had a
part in creating the State of Ohio, and in dedicating the soil upon
which she was reared, forever to the cause of human liberty.
It was within the limits of her chief city that the very foundation
stones, not only of the one State but of many, were laid with a far-
seeing wisdom and prophetic foresight that mark the men of that
early Congress as among the sages of legislative wisdom. In the old
hall, that stood at the corner of Wall and Broad streets, where the
restless oceans of a financial world roll in a flood that never rests,
and to which the lines of monetary interest center from all the far-off
corners of the land, upon the spot now hallowed to the memory of
Washington by a colossal statue of bronze, there was enacted, in the
midsummer of 1787, an ordinance that has well been called[10] “The
most important legislative act in American History”—there came into
existence a law that gave Ohio and Indiana, and that galaxy of
northwestern states to the Union; those free states, without which
that Union never could have been saved in the day of its imminent
peril.
Many States have been created, many important acts have been
passed by the various Congresses that have sat in New York, in
Philadelphia, and in Washington, but there was in this measure
something that saved the nation from being sometime all slave; that
reserved for freedom an empire that by mere stress of moral
example if in nothing else, was a menace forever before the
slaveholder. In that ordinance was one little clause that made Ohio
and Wisconsin and Illinois what they afterwards became.
“There shall be,” it recited, “neither slavery, nor involuntary
servitude in said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of
crimes.” Simple enough these words sound now, when human
bondage upon American soil is but the echo of a dead past, but for
the day in which they were uttered, they were the clarion call of a
new era—the death knell of a monster wrong; and the voice was
none the less that of God speaking in human legislation, because
many of the men who had become His instrument, had no dream of
the great things to which they had put their hands, and to which
they had given their votes.
So, in one sense, Ohio may be said to have had her beginning in
New York. From the days of her earliest childhood, she has been a
willing neighbor, willing to give and take of friendly offices with her
elder sister to the East. Two of her chief magistrates were the sons
of the Empire State; she has borrowed not a little of her legislation
from the experience of the older State; she patterned her canals
after those which DeWitt Clinton had so largely aided to bring into
being; she has developed many of her native resources by New
York’s financial aid; she has sought to build her railways so that they
should lead direct to the metropolis; she has in a thousand ways
acknowledged the commercial and financial supremacy of the
greater city and State; and last, but not the least, she has sent
scores of her sons to the East, to prove that the Buckeye is capable
of gaining and holding his own among the best, in any lines of

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Datapedia of the United States American History in

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New American Nation

Jan Ellen Lewis

New American Nation

The Emergence of the United States,

PAUL FINKELMAN, EDITOR IN CHIEF

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

This title is also available as an e-book.

Printed in the United States of America

West. Settlers found that clearing land required

FASHION Both as a concept and a changing array

and furnishings grew more restrained. By 1764,

THE FEDERAL PRINCIPLE CONSTITUTIONAL INNOVATION

FEDERALIST PARTY One of the first two U.S.

Constitutional Convention; for printers than producing new works of fiction by

Joyce Lee Malcolm

INDIANS AND BLACKS

ting a standard for the participation of civic leaders

As far as formal entertaining was concerned, the

decessor. Her experience as the wife of an American AFTER 1828

NEW ENGLAND as not only a source of commerce, but also as “nur-

See also Treaty of Paris.

FLAG OF THE UNITED STATES As a product

banners. The pattern assumed new meaning in the BIBLIOGRAPHY

See also Flag of the United States.

FLETCHER V. PECK Chief Justice John Mar-

crime and deviance. Philosophers, religious leaders, BIBLIOGRAPHY

Vlach, John Michael. The Afro-American Tradition in Decora- THE NORTH

LATE COLONIAL PERIOD

As the reverential old navigators were often in the habit of

We turn now to the account of our particular locality, as given by

Though this map bears a date subsequent to Hudson’s voyage,

“I love thy kingdom, Lord!

The other, Mr. Barlow, was a well-known man of letters and

“To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,

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