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The Abolitionist Movement : Documents Decoded
Intended for high school and undergraduate students, this work provides an engaging overview of the abolitionist movement that allows readers to consider history more directly through more than 20 primary source documents. The Abolitionist Movement: Documents Decoded collects primary sources pertaining to various aspects of the American anti-slavery movement in the 18th and 19th centuries and presents these firsthand sources alongside accessibly written, expert commentary in a visually stimulating format. Making use of primary source documents that include pamphlets, articles, speeches, slave narratives, and court decisions, the book models how scholars interpret primary sources and shows readers how to critically evaluate the key documents that chronicle this major American movement. The work begins with an essay that contextualizes the documents and guides readers toward perceiving the narrative that comes into focus when the seemingly disparate elements are read as a collection. Annotations throughout the book translate difficult passages into lay language, suggest comparisons of key passages, and encourage the reader to cross-reference documents within the volume. This book will illuminate American abolitionism and U.S. history prior to the Civil War while helping readers improve their ability to analyze and interpret primary source information--a key skill for both high school and undergraduate level students. * Includes a concise introduction that summarizes the critical points in the history of slavery and abolition * Provides carefully selected key documents that represent the full range of American thoughts on slavery * Supplies useful annotations that guide the reader's analysis and shows how historians deconstruct documents * Presents information and materials that help readers to understand the forces that supported and opposed slavery, thereby giving students a better grasp of American history in general.
American Eras : Primary Sources - Reform Era & Eastern US Development (1815-1850)
This volume [reproduces full text or excerpts of primary sources] representing a diversity of views that provide insight into the seminal issues, themes, movements, and events of the Reform era and the urbanization and economic growth of the eastern United States. Also included with each primary source is concise contextual information, notes about the author, further resources, and full-color photos and illustrations. About 100 primary source entries include laws, acts, speeches, diaries, broadsides, news articles, cartoons, art, and photos of those who lived through the events described. "Further Resources" section for each entry provides a gateway to additional research opportunities. Provides in-depth descriptions of important events, including trends, movements, conflicts, and diplomatic efforts that shaped America in the first half of the nineteenth century. Multiple primary sources on particularly significant subjects are often presented in more than one chapter of a volume, providing opportunities to see the significance and impact of an event or figure from many angles.
Artifacts from Nineteenth-Century America
This book presents both nationally significant objects and ordinary items from everyday life to provide insight into 19th century American society, showing readers how the production, design, function, and use of these objects can inform our understanding of the period.Artifacts from 19th Century America examines a broad array of objects representing various aspects of 19th century American society. The objects have been chosen to illuminate daily life in a number of categories including cooking, entertainment, grooming, clothing and accessories, health, household items, religious life, work, and education.The book's 53 entries include a brief introduction to the background of the object, when and why it was made, and who used it, followed by a detailed description of the object itself. Finally, each entry provides a deep dive into the object's significance and how the object reveals clues about the social, political, economic, and intellectual life of the society in which it was produced and utilized. Students and general readers alike will not only learn about the time period but also learn to use the skills of material culture theory and method, including how to draw meaningful conclusions from each object about their historical context and significance.
Defining Documents in American History : Court Cases (1803-2017)
This title covers important historical documents from the U.S. Supreme Court as well as other courts in American history. Readers will find in-depth analysis of a broad range of court cases covering critical topics. The set provides detailed, thought-provoking analysis of: Marbury v. Madison Roe v. Wade Plessy v. Ferguson Bush vs. Gore Muller v. Orgeon Each in-depth chapter guides readers with historical insight and comprehension. Written by historians and teachers, several elements explain the document's historical impact and provide thoughtful critical analysis, including a Summary Overview, Defining Moment, Author Biography, Document Analysis, and Essential Themes. Plus, an historical timeline and bibliography of important supplemental readings will support readers in understanding the broader historical events covered. From the earliest decisions of the Supreme Court to the battles over civil rights to divisive events in contemporary America, this set provides thoughtful analysis of court cases allowing readers to gain a better understanding of this crucial topic in American history. An important resource for the history collections of high schools, undergraduate libraries and public libraries.
Defining Documents in American History : Dissent & Protest (1635-2017)
Dissent & Protest studies crucial documents from various protests, dissents, revolts, riots, and revolutions throughout American history, from the American Revolution to the Black Lives Matter Movement of today. This text closely studies more than eighty primary source documents to deliver a thorough examination of issues so important to Americans that they took action, exercised their rights and stood up to protest. Defining Documents in American History: Dissent & Protest provides detailed thought-provoking analysis of speeches and documents surrounding: American Revolution Native American Dissent Women's Rights Worker's Rights Abolitionism Slave Rebellions State Rights Political & War Protests Whiskey Rebellion Racism Poverty Civil Rights . Each in-depth chapter guides readers with historical insight and comprehension. Written by historians and teachers, several elements explain the document's historical impact and provide thoughtful critical analysis, including a Summary Overview, Defining Moment, Author Biography, Document Analysis, and Essential Themes. Plus, an historical timeline and bibliography of important supplemental readings will support readers in understanding the broader historical events covered. The documents include highlight American's commitment to stand up and fight for the issues they believe in. This volume will be a welcome addition to the history collections of high schools, undergraduate libraries, and public libraries.
Defining Documents in American History : Environment & Conservation (1791 - 2015)
Defining Documents in American History: Environment & Conservation offers in-depth analysis of a broad range of historical documents and historic events that shaped environmental and conservation issues throughout the American history. This text closely studies more than forty primary source documents to deliver a thorough examination of environmentally related events in the U.S. from 1872 to 2015. Defining Documents in American History: Enivronment & Conservation provides detailed, thought-provoking analysis of: The Demise of the Bison on the Plains The Founding of the First National Parks The Emergence of the Modern Conservation Movement Ecological Consciousness, Earth Day, and Gaia Contemporary Environmental Battles and many, many more! An historical timeline and bibliography of important supplemental readings will support readers in understanding the broader historical events and subjects in the period. An introduction for each of the major subjects covered in the title considers the significance of document analysis for students and educators. Each in-depth chapter guides readers with historical insight and comprehension. The documents included represent the diversity of ideas and contexts that defined social, political, and cultural subjects throughout this period in American history. Defining Documents consists of a collection of essays on important historical documents by a diverse range of writers on a broad range of subjects in American history. The series offers a broad range of historical documents on important authors and subjects in American history, with primary source documents, in-depth analysis, and comprehensive lesson plans that represent the diversity of ideas and contexts that define social, political and cultural subjects throughout American history. The Defining Documents series is perfect for students, those researching a particular era, or anyone interested in American History since 1492.
Defining Documents in American History : Immigration & Immigrant Communities (1650-2016)
This text explores the full history of immigration issues in America, from those early immigrants making their way through Ellis Island, to immigration issues in modern society. With in-depth analysis of a broad range of documents, researchers come away with fresh understanding and insight to study this hot button topic.
Defining Documents in American History : Manifest Destiny and the New Nation, 1803-1860
Defining Documents offers a broad range of historical documents on important authors and subjects in American history, with primary source documents, in-depth analysis, and comprehensive lesson plans. Defining Documents offers a broad range of historical documents on important authors and subjects in American history. Each two-volume title, designed in consultation with an expert in the field, contains approximately 80 primary source documents with an in-depth critical analysis. Articles begin by introducing readers to the historical context, followed by a description of the author's life and circumstances in which the document is written. A document analysis, written by professional writers and historians, guides readers in understanding key elements of language, rhetoric, and social and political meaning that define the significance of the author and document in American history. Each title is organised by chapter themes, highlighting major ideas in the period. The series begins with a collection of exploration and colonial documents, and continues to cover every time period in American history. This collection will introduce students and educators to a diverse range of genres, including journals, letters, speeches, government legislation, and court opinions. Documents represent the diversity of ideas and contexts that define social, political and cultural subjects throughout American history. An important supplement to each historical document is a carefully designed lesson plan, which follows national history standards for learning, to guide students and educators in document analysis and historical comprehension. Study questions, activities, and suggested author pairings will establish the legacy of documents and authorship for readers today. In addition, comparative analysis highlights how every document emerges from a myriad of social and political influences. A historical timeline and bibliography of important supplemental readings will support readers in understanding the broader historical events and subjects in the period. An introduction for each of the major subjects covered in the title considers the significance of document analysis for students and educators.
Defining Documents in American History : Native Americans (1451-2017)
This title covers important historical documents from influential figures in Native American history. Readers will find in-depth analysis of a broad range of historical documents, including speeches, letters, legislation, court cases, and other sources about Native Americans. The set provides detailed, thought-provoking analysis of: Iroquois Thanksgiving Address Tecumseh: Speech to Governor Willian Henry Harrison Indians of All Tribes Occupation of Alcatraz: Proclamation Andrew Jackson on Indian Removal Zitkala-Sa: Old Indian Legends Each in-depth chapter guides readers with historical insight and comprehension. Written by historians and teachers, several elements explain the document's historical impact and provide thoughtful critical analysis, including a Summary Overview, Defining Moment, Author Biography, Document Analysis, and Essential Themes. Plus, an historical timeline and bibliography of important supplemental readings will support readers in understanding the broader historical events covered. From the first meetings between Native Americans and European settlers to twentieth-century events, this set provides thoughtful analysis of documents and speeches allowing readers to gain a better understanding of this crucial topic in American history. An important resource for the history collections of high schools, undergraduate libraries and public libraries.
Defining Documents in American History: Political Campaigns, Candidates, and Debates (1787-2017)
Documents and commentary that showcase the American political process. The 80 documents are organized into major categories that include: Politics and War; Politics and Social Issues; Politics and the Economy; Politics and Education; and Political Debate.
Defining Documents in American History : The American West (1836–1900)
Defining Documents in American History: The American West offers a broad range of historical documents on important figures and topics in American West research. Written by historians and experts in the field, this resource examines a wide array of primary source documents with an in-depth critical analysis. Articles begin by introducing the reader to the document's historical context, followed by a description of the author's life and circumstances in which the document was written. A document analysis guides readers in understanding key elements of language, rhetoric, and social and political meaning that define the significance of the author and the document in American history.
Eyewitness to the Alamo
Contains over one hundred descriptions of the Battle of the Alamo by people who were witnesses or who claimed to have witnessed the event. These accounts are the basis for all of the histories, traditions, myths, and legends of this famous battle. Many are conflicting, some are highly suspect as to authenticity, but all are intriguing.
Milestone Documents in American History : Exploring the Primary Sources That Shaped America
Contains thirty-two full-text primary source documents that helped to shape American society from 1763 to 1823 including the Proclamation of 1763, Treaty of Fort Pitt, the Bill of Rights, the Missouri Compromise, and the Monroe Doctrine.
The Oregon Trail
Keen observations and a graphic style characterize the author's remarkable record of a vanishing frontier. Detailed accounts of the hardships experienced while traveling across mountains and prairies; vibrant portraits of emigrants and Western wildlife; and vivid descriptions of Indian life and culture. A classic of American frontier literature.
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American Antislavery Writings : Colonial Beginnings to Emancipation
For the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, here is a collection of writings that charts our nation's long, heroic confrontation with its most poisonous evil. It's an inspiring moral and political struggle whose evolution parallels the story of America itself. To advance their cause, the opponents of slavery employed every available literary form: fiction and poetry, essay and autobiography, sermons, pamphlets, speeches, hymns, plays, even children's literature. This is the first anthology to take the full measure of a body of writing that spans nearly two centuries and, exceptionally for its time, embraced writers black and white, male and female. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, Phillis Wheatley, and Olaudah Equiano offer original, even revolutionary, eighteenth century responses to slavery. With the nineteenth century, an already diverse movement becomes even more varied: the impassioned rhetoric of Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison joins the fiction of Harriet Beecher Stowe, Louisa May Alcott, and William Wells Brown; memoirs of former slaves stand alongside protest poems by John Greenleaf Whittier, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and Lydia Sigourney; anonymous editorials complement speeches by statesmen such as Charles Sumner and Abraham Lincoln. Features helpful notes, a chronology of the antislavery movement, and a16-page color insert of illustrations.
American Datelines : Major News Stories from Colonial Times to the Present
An eyewitness account of the events-war, politics, the arts, sports, human interest-that have most influenced American political and popular culture.
The American Nation : Primary Sources
The American Nation: Primary Sources resumes the narrative begun in its companion volume, The American Republic which covered the first eight decades of U.S. history, ending at the onset of the Civil War. The American Nation continues the story through America’s entrance into World War II. The American Nation makes available, in one volume, many of the most crucial documents necessary for understanding the variety of policies and viewpoints driving American public life during an important, substantive part of American history. The primary sources in The American Nation are relevant to the Civil War, Reconstruction, the rise of a national capitalist system and culture, the waves of reform-minded thought and policy that moved the nation toward formation of the national administrative and welfare states, and America’s emergence as a major power on the world stage. This period was a watershed in the history of the nation--the time of establishing and consolidating national power and laying the foundations of a national government committed to promoting the material well-being of Americans. It was an era that witnessed the development of the nation-state and the establishment of the New Deal regime, which set the stage for the radical social movements of the 1960s and beyond. For decades debates have raged concerning the nature and impact of post-Civil War Reconstruction, as well as the major popular legal and ideological movements shaping the United States during the period up to World War II. This critical era encompassed the rise of mass-market corporatism and America’s entry into world politics. Recent social history has uncovered a great deal of information regarding the daily lives of Americans during this era. Of equal importance is an in-depth study of the public documents critical for an understanding of the effects of public acts and pronouncements on Americans. This volume will allow students and readers to readily engage, without interpretation, the original historical documents that have shaped the history of American public life. Some of the primary documents include the Emancipation Proclamation, the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill, the Sherman Antitrust Act, and the Monroe Doctrine. Some of the authors featured include Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jefferson Davis, Robert LaFollette, Eugene Debs, Jane Addams, William Graham Sumner, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Booker T. Washington, among many others. Bruce P. Frohnen is Associate Professor of Law at Ohio Northern University College of Law. He holds a J.D. from the Emory University School of Law and a Ph.D. in Government from Cornell University.
American Sermons : The Pilgrims to Martin Luther King, Jr.
The sermon is the first and most enduring genre of American literature. At the center of the Puritan experience, it continued in succeeding centuries to play a vital role--as public ritual, occasion for passion and reflection, and, not least, popular entertainment. The fifty-eight sermons collected in this volume display the form's eloquence, intellectual rigor, and spiritual fervor. Ranging from the first New England settlements to mass-media evangelism and the civil rights movement in the 1960s, these texts reclaim a neglected American tradition. The Puritan sermons with which the volume opens are extraordinary in their richness of imagery, force of argument, and probing psychological insight. From John Winthrop's visionary injunction that "wee must consider that wee shall be as a citty upon a Hill," to Samuel Danforth's admonition not to deviate from the divine "errand into the wilderness," these seventeenth-century works first explored what it means to be an American. Jonathan Edwards's remarkable "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," which stirred its eighteenth-century audiences to frenzy, shows the intensity to which the sermon could rise, while Jonathan Mayhew's "Discourse Concerning Unlimited Submission" heralds the political thinking that led to the American Revolution. The ferment of the nineteenth century--the Mexican War, the struggle against slavery, the Civil War--inevitably affected the sermon. Orthodoxies were challenged, and a new diversity emerged in the Unitarianism of William Ellery Channing, the Transcendentalism of Ralph Waldo Emerson, the new Church of Latter Day Saints, and the gathering strength of the African-American sermon tradition. The twentieth-century sermons collected here continue to wrestle with fundamental spiritual and civic concerns. They range from a homily on charity by the popular evangelist Billy Sunday to a discourse on interfaith cooperation by Abraham Joshua Heschel, and from Harry Emerson Fosdick's controversial "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?" to John Gresham Machen's uncompromising riposte. The achievement of the African-American sermon attains a new breadth of influence in the inspiring oratory of Martin Luther King Jr.
American Speeches : Political Oratory from the Revolution to the Civil War
pt. 1. Political oratory from the Revolution to the Civil War -- pt. 2. Political oratory from Abraham Lincoln to Bill Clinton.
Democracy in America
Alexis de Tocqueville, a young aristocratic French lawyer, came to the United States in 1831 to study its penitentiary systems. His nine-month visit and subsequent reading and reflection resulted in Democracy in America (1835-40), a landmark masterpiece of political observation and analysis. Tocqueville vividly describes the unprecedented social equality he found in America and explores its implications for European society in the emerging modern era. His book provides enduring insight into the political consequences of widespread property ownership, the potential dangers to liberty inherent in majority rule, the importance of civil institutions in an individualistic culture dominated by the pursuit of material self-interest, and the vital role of religion in American life, while prophetically probing the deep differences between the free and slave states. The clear, fluid, and vigorous translation by Arthur Goldhammer is the first to fully capture Tocqueville's achievements both as an accomplished literary stylist and as a profound political thinker. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
Madison - Writings
Over 200 years after the founding of the federal republic, James Madison remains the most important political thinker in American history. The prime framer of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, Madison was also a brilliant expositor of the new republican government and its underlying principles. His eloquent and insightful writing on freedom of religion, freedom of speech and the press, the rights of minorities under majority rule, the role of the states in the federal system, and the separation of powers are central to American political thought and speak to the controversies of the present day. Arranged chronologically, this Library of America volume contains 197 essays, addresses, speeches, private memoranda, and letters written between 1772 and 1836. Included are all twenty-nine of Madison's contributions to The Federalist, as well as revealing letters and speeches from the Constitutional Convention, the crucial Virginia ratifying convention, and the first federal Congress that illuminate his central role in framing and ratifying the Constitution and adopting the Bill of Rights. Early letters from the Revolution and the Confederation record Madison's strong commitment to religious freedom, his acute observations on the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation, and the beginning of his historic political collaboration with Thomas Jefferson. Selections from the 1790s include eloquent denunciations of the Alien and Sedition Acts and candid private appraisals of George Washington and John Adams. Writings from his terms as secretary of state and president record his determination to uphold American independence during the conflicts of the Napoleonic era and his leadership of the nation during the fiercely controversial War of 1812. Letters and memoranda from his retirement demonstrate his opposition to nullification and secession, his illusory hopes for African colonization as a solution to the dilemma of slavery, and his deepening concern over the sectional threat to the federal union he loved. James Madison: Writings includes a chronology of Madison's life, an essay on the texts, explanatory notes, and an index.
Memoirs and Selected Letters : Personal Memoirs of US Grant, Selected Letters 1839-1865
Twenty years after Appomattox, stricken by cancer and facing financial ruin, Ulysses S. Grant wrote his Personal Memoirs to secure his family's future. in doing so, the Civil War's greatest general won himself a unique place in American letters. His character, intelligence, sense of purpose, and simple compassion are evident throughout this vivid and deeply moving account, which has been acclaimed by readers as diverse asMark Twain, Matthew Arnold, Gertrude Stein, and Edmund Wilson. Annotated and complete with detailed maps, battle plans, and facsimiles reproduced from the original edition, this volume offers an unparalleled vantage on the most terrible, moving, and inexhaustibly fascinating event in American history. included are 174 letters, many of them to his wife, Julia, which offer an intimate view of their affectionate and enduring marriage. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
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