Alan Taylor - American Republics: A Continental History of the United States, 1783-1850

ALSO BY ALAN TAYLOR

Thomas Jeffersons Education

American Revolutions:
A Continental History, 17501804

The Internal Enemy:
Slavery and War in Virginia, 17721832

The Civil War of 1812:
American Citizens, British Subjects, Irish Rebels, & Indian Allies

The Divided Ground:
Indians, Settlers, and the Northern Borderland of the American Revolution

American Colonies:
The Settling of North America

Writing Early American History:
Essays from the New Republic

William Coopers Town:
Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic

Liberty Men and Great Proprietors:
The Revolutionary Settlement on the Maine Frontier, 17601820

FRONTISPIECE IMAGE

War News from Mexico, 1848, by Richard Caton Woodville. This image represented the intense public interest in the war and the prominence of newspapers in public life. But Woodville feared for the Union as a consequence of the victories. In the right foreground he placed a pair of African Americans in ragged clothing to convey the salience of slavery in the wars causes and consequences. To the left, a careless listener drops a lighted match into a barrel to suggest the incendiary results that the conquest could bring.
Library of Congress, LC-DIG-pga-03891.

American Republics

A CONTINENTAL HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, 1783 1850

ALAN TAYLOR

Copyright 2021 by Alan Taylor

All rights reserved

First Edition

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Book design by Chris Welch Design

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The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

Names: Taylor, Alan, 1955 author.

Title: American republics : a continental history of the United States, 17831850 / Alan Taylor.

Description: First edition. | New York : W. W. Norton & Company, [2021] |

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021003043 | ISBN 9781324005797 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781324005803 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: United StatesHistory1783-1865 | United StatesTerritorial expansionHistory19th century.

Classification: LCC E301 .T39 2021 | DDC 973.3/18dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021003043

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For the members of the Haynes Seminar And in Memory of Elizabeth Wendy Hazard

CONTENTS

LIST OF MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS

Maps

In 1783, the United States had expansive bounds, reaching north to the Great Lakes, south to Florida, and west to the Mississippi, but the new country lacked possession and control of that claim. To the north and west, a rival confederacy of Native peoples defended their homelands, with the help of British garrisons at Niagara and Detroit. To the south and west, the Spanish Empire also claimed the territory between Tennessee and Florida. North America, 1783, by Jeffrey L. Ward.

By 1806, the United States had secured and begun to settle the contested border zones of 1783 after shattering the Indian confederacy and inducing the British and Spanish to recede. In 1803, American leaders obtained the Louisiana Territory, including New Orleans at the mouth of the Mississippi. This purchase stretched the Unions territorial claims westward to the Rocky Mountains, but almost all of that land remained in the possession of Native peoples. The Americans, British, and Spanish all claimed the Oregon Country. North America, 1806, by Jeffrey L. Ward.

By 1845, the United States had removed most Native peoples from east of the Mississippi to Indian Territory west of Arkansas and Missouri. In 1845 the United States annexed Texas, shown here with the regions borders as defined by Mexico. The United States provoked a war by extending those bounds south and west to the Rio Grande and to include Santa Fe. The United States and the British Empire still disputed sovereignty over the Oregon Country. North America, 1845, by Jeffrey L. Ward.

In 1846, the United States divided the Oregon Country with the British Empire and launched a war with Mexico that conquered the Southwest and California, extending American power to the Pacific. North America, 1850, by Jeffrey L. Ward.

Liberty is but an empty name, a mere burlesque, if we fear to speak the truth.

ZEPHANIAH KINGSLEY, JR., 1826

PREFACE

American Republics presents a history of the United States from 1783 to 1850. Meant as a concise introduction, American Republics offers basic coverage of some conventional topics. These include Alexander Hamiltons financial program; Thomas Jeffersons attempt to retrench the federal government; Andrew Jacksons war on the national bank; and efforts by Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth to realize a more democratic and inclusive nation by challenging the slave system.

In addition to this general coverage, American Republics examines Americas troubled relationships with its neighbors: the British and Spanish Empires, many Indian nations, and the independent republics of Haiti and Mexico. The survival of the Union seemed to depend on expanding settlements to accommodate a growing population and thereby alleviate internal tensions between East and West, North and South. But if the Union grew unevenly, benefiting one region at the expense of others, the tenuous balance of power within could collapse into disunion and civil war. American leaders also sought to control efforts by dissident groups to break away from the United States to create new, alternative republics in the vast interior of the continent. More than one republic contended for the future of North America.

Built on an unstable foundation of rival regions and an ambiguous constitution, the United States was far from united before 1850. We misunderstand our political origins if we read the postCivil War nation back onto the early republic. Not yet a nation, the early United States was a loose union of states, with regional leaders persistently at odds over just how strong their bonds should be. Those divisions became morally charged after 1815 as reformers promoted a more inclusive citizenry by challenging slavery and the subordination of women. Although deeply rooted in our history, white supremacy has also had many critics pushing for a more egalitarian nation.