American Revolution/Civil War: Book Recommendations Please.

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johnnyreb

Lifer
Aug 21, 2014
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612
To learn how the war really started yrs before the shot fired at Ft. Sumter one should be familiar with the Missouri Compromise of 1820 which would serve to extend the Mason - Dixon Line of 1767, the Kansas - Nebraska Act of 1854 which would repeal the Compromise & by 1858 start the so-called Border War between Missouri & Kansas.

 

jackswilling

Lifer
Feb 15, 2015
1,777
24
^^^^

Agree

"What Hath God Wrought - The Transformation of America, 1815 to 1848"

But the Missouri/Kansas Border War aka Bleeding Kansas aka Bloody Kansas was the tipping point.

 
Oct 7, 2016
2,451
5,195
Sometimes, viewed from 1848 on, I have fallen into the trap of shaking my head in sorrow and saying the Civil War was inevitable. But if you look from 1824, not so much. There were events of massage long range consequence that were highly contingent. That is one reason why the Jacksonian era is so critically important.
That said, most histories of the civil war start at 1848. With that weakness in mind, David Potter's Impending Crisis is excellent.

 

mawnansmiff

Lifer
Oct 14, 2015
7,385
7,295
Sunny Cornwall, UK.
'What Hath God Wrought' plus the entire set of 'Oxford History of the United States' all appear to be very popular reads. Believe me, if I could afford them I would buy them all. They all have cracking reviews on Amazon.
Still, I have made my choices and good ones at that I reckon. Who knows, maybe after reading what I have already ordered I may still have an itch that needs scratching :puffy:
Regards,
Jay.

 

jackswilling

Lifer
Feb 15, 2015
1,777
24
I read an excellent biography of President Polk recently that really tied much of this together. He was Old Hickory's protégé and really backed his way into the Presidency. Was not really on the radar and then suddenly he is president.

 

johnnyreb

Lifer
Aug 21, 2014
1,961
612
Sometimes, viewed from 1848 on, I have fallen into the trap of shaking my head in sorrow and saying the Civil War was inevitable. But if you look from 1824, not so much.
I believe the Civil War was inevitable just as I believe the settling of the American West, the railroad & the government treaties with the Native American tribes made the Indian Wars inevitable.
OT & setting aside the illegality of secession I read with great interest the talk of secession by Texas after Obama was elected, & the talk of secession by California since Trump was elected. If it could be accomplished it is believed that either state could make it on their own based on their size, what they pay in federal taxes vs what they get from the federal government, & their GNP.

 

sablebrush52

The Bard Of Barlings
Jun 15, 2013
19,625
44,839
Southern Oregon
jrs457.wixsite.com
Jesse, you mentioned a book by Joseph J Ellis called 'The Founding Fathers' but I could only find 'The Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation'. Is this what you meant?
Yes, Jay, sorry about that. Ellis' book on Thomas Jefferson is also fascinating, a brilliant and deeply flawed mystery of a human being.
I think it can be said that the causes for the Civil War go back to the founding of the US and to the issues sidestepped in the effort to form some kind of union of the colonies. The basic reason for uniting was a stable currency and improved trade. There certainly wasn't a lot else.

 
Oct 7, 2016
2,451
5,195
Great counterfactual:. Suppose Clay had beaten Polk in the 1844 election (most historians think the votes for a third party cost him the electoral votes he needed to win). Clay was opposed to the annexation of Texas. That precipitated the Mexican American war. Absent the subsequent expansion of territory, the 1820 Missouri compromise would have remained in force. No controversy over slavery in the Territories.
I think it is one of the great ironies in history that the party that cost Clay that election was a single issue anti-slavery party. Again, that is a counterfactual.
I think, counterfactuals can be helpful in at least one respect. They highlight the contingencies of history. Viewing it as an inevitable process lets individual actors off the hook. Taking full account of the choices available to them at the time, we are, as readers and thoughtful citizens, entitled to make judgments as to whether what they did was smart or stupid, moral of immoral, etc. and apply those judgments to the events of our day if we are so inclined.
In that vein, IMO, the greatest work of American history written in the 20th Century was authored by a philosopher, Harry Jaffe, Crisis of the House Divided. Notionally, it is about the Lincoln Douglas debates. It is something of a demanding read, but by no means impossible. Not along the lines of what Jay was looking for, but it reminds me that regardless of how exceptional America might be or not, we still struggle with finding the answers to some of the fundamental questions about politics that would have been familiar to Plato.

 

mawnansmiff

Lifer
Oct 14, 2015
7,385
7,295
Sunny Cornwall, UK.
My very limited and basic understanding of the main cause was that London wanted far more than the early colonists were prepared (able even?) to give...and in my view quite correctly so as they had no voice in the Westminster Parliament to argue their case or representative to speak and work on their behalf.
People can only be pushed so far and King George III and his parliament just kept on pushing until the inevitable happened.
Again, greed, that oh so destructive aspect of human nature was, in my personal view, the cause of the initial problems.
I'm really looking forward to receiving my little collection of books and DVDs. I shall of course read them in chronological order of events and hopefully come out the other side a little more enlightened.
So much splendid advice has been offered here along with much informed debate and I am very much obliged to you all for it.
Regards,
Jay.

 

reverendsasquatch

Starting to Get Obsessed
Jun 13, 2016
102
0
Lancaster PA
I would say that Shaara's books are great, but they're fiction. "The Killer Angels", for example, was largely taken from Longstreet and Chamberlin's personal memoirs. Both were known for uh, "exaggerating" their role in both Gettysburg and the war as a whole. But if you read it w/ that in mind, and not for historical accuracy, it's a fantastic read.

 

johnnyreb

Lifer
Aug 21, 2014
1,961
612
Suppose Clay had beaten Polk in the 1844 election (most historians think the votes for a third party cost him the electoral votes he needed to win). Clay was opposed to the annexation of Texas. That precipitated the Mexican American war. Absent the subsequent expansion of territory, the 1820 Missouri compromise would have remained in force. No controversy over slavery in the Territories.
I see the point but if elected would Clay have been able to prevent the annexation? I'm not so sure. Annexation of Texas presented opportunities to make money. I often think about how Lincoln wanted the country to come together & heal at the end of the war, & was against taking a hard line in reconstruction of the south. Others including members of his own cabinet saw money to be made & therefore thought very differently about reconstruction. It's a plan that works for the few in war to this very day. In my view reconstruction is among the reasons why bad feelings still linger 150 yrs later.

 

prairiedruid

Lifer
Jun 30, 2015
1,998
1,116
Gutenburg.org has the Ebook Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant available. I was very fortunate. My neighbor had an estate sale and I was able to acquire these wonderful books.
I downloaded this and it is a great read; I highly recommend it. Thanks for pointing this out to me.

 

jackswilling

Lifer
Feb 15, 2015
1,777
24
Polk was all about expansion. Clay, and Calhoun for that matter, are all but lost to history and those few of us who study such things.

 
Oct 7, 2016
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johnnyreb, Clay's constituency was vehemently anti annexation. Would be hard to see how it could have happened in his term. We forget that along with Annexation came assumption of Texas'debts. In other words, a bailout. Just looking at the economics, had Texas not been annexed at that time, the creditors would have basically been in the driver's seat. Who were those creditors? The British. So, agreed that the commercial opportunities presented by Texas were compelling, but the Brits were in a position to take advantage of them. There has been some attention paid ton his issue fairly recently, and I think the historians are split. One group says alignment with Great Britain was seriously on the table, one group says Texas was just using the issue as a squeeze play to force the US' hand. But, Polk was a Jacksonian, and the last thing he would countenance was a British presence in Texas.
Again, this is all counterfactual. But the Jacksonian era was hugely controversial during the time people lived through it. There were many hard fought battles, and the outcome of some of them was heartbreakingly close.

 
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