Slavery, Capitalism and Politics in the Antebellum Republic: Volume 2, The Coming of the Civil War, 1850-1861

by John Ashworth

Overview

This book asks why the United States experienced a civil war in 1861 and analyses the descent into war in the final decade of peace. The book systematically surveys southern extremists, Republicans, Democrats, Whigs, temperance advocates and Know Nothings. It advances a new and unique explanation of the origins of the Civil War, the most important event in the history of the most powerful country in the world.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521885928
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	01/08/2007
Pages:	694
Product dimensions:	6.22(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.16(d)

About the Author

John Ashworth was born in Lancashire, England, and studied at the Universities of Lancaster and Oxford. He is currently Professor of American History in the School of American and Canadian Studies at the University of Nottingham. Professor Ashworth is the author of 'Agrarians' and 'Aristocrats': Party Political Ideology in the United States, 1837-1846, of Slavery, Capitalism and Politics in the Antebellum Republic: Volume 1: Commerce and Compromise, 1820-1850 (both of which were published by Cambridge University Press), and of numerous articles and reviews in learned journals.

Table of Contents

Part I. Slavery versus Antislavery: 1. Combating the weaknesses of slavery: Southern militants, 1850–1861; 2. The antislavery challenge: the Republicans, 1854–1861; Part II. Polarisation and Collapse: 3. The disintegration of democratic hegemony: northern and national Democrats, 1850–1861; 4. Political realignment: collapse of the Whigs and neo-Whigs, 1848–1861; Conclusion: explaining the Civil War (II).

Editorial Reviews

"John Ashworth’s explanation of the coming of the Civil War is intellectually attractive, structurally elaborate, and inadequately elaborated for so ambitious a book." -Lawrence T. McDonnell, The Journal of American History

"...a comprehensive, almost encyclopedic, examination of political ideology from Andrew Jackson's presidency to the firing on Fort Sumter." -James L. Huston, The Journal of Southern History

From the Publisher