A Slaveholders' Union

by Van Cleve, George William

• ISBN13: 9780226846705
• ISBN10: 0226846709
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-11-15
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr

Summary

After its early introduction into the English colonies in North America, slavery in the United States lasted as a legal institution until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1865. But increasingly during the contested politics of the early republic, abolitionists cried out that the Constitution itself was a slaveowners' document, produced to protect and further their rights. A Slaveholders' Unionfurthers this unsettling claim by demonstrating once and for all that slavery was indeed an essential part of the foundation of the nascent republic. In this powerful book, George William Van Cleve demonstrates that the Constitution was pro-slavery in its politics, its economics, and its law. He convincingly shows that the Constitutional provisions protecting slavery were much more than mere "political" compromisesthey were integral to the principles of the new nation. By the late 1780s, a majority of Americans wanted to create a strong federal republic that would be capable of expanding into a continental empire. In order for America to become an empire on such a scale, Van Cleve argues, the Southern states had to be willing partners in the endeavor, and the cost of their allegiance was the deliberate long-term protection of slavery by America's leaders through the nation's early expansion. Reconsidering the role played by the gradual abolition of slavery in the North, Van Cleve also shows that abolition there was much less progressive in its originsand had much less influence on slavery's expansionthan previously thought. Deftly interweaving historical and political analyses, A Slaveholders' Unionwill likely become the definitive explanation of slavery's persistence and growthand of its influence on American constitutional developmentfrom the Revolutionary War through the Missouri Compromise of 1821.

Author Biography

George William Van Cleve is Scholar in Residence in the Department of History at the University of Virginia and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Seattle University School of Law.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	p. ix
Introduction	p. I
Slavery in the American Revolution
From Empire to Confederation	p. 17
Abolition, Slavery Reform, and the Climate of Opinion	p. 59
The Making of the Slaveholders' Constitution
Property and Republican Representation	p. 103
Sectional Bargaining and Moral Union	p. 143
Slavery in the New Nation
From Constitution to Republican Empire	p. 187
The Missouri Compact and the Rule of Law	p. 225
Conclusion: Slavery and the Dismal Fate of Madisonian Politics	p. 267
Acknowledgements	p. 277
Notes on the Law of Slavery and Bound Labor	p. 281
Calculating Nonslaveholder Voting Strength	p. 283
Calculations in Support of Table 4.1	p. 285
House of Representatives Action on the Quaker Memorials	p. 289
Abbreviations	p. 293
Notes	p. 295
Bibliography	p. 357
Index	p. 379
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.