Long Road to Harpers Ferry: The Rise of the First American Left (People's History)

This is the first comprehensive history of pre–Civil War American radicalism, mapping the journeys of the land reformers, Jacksonian radicals, and militant abolitionists who paved the way to the failed slave revolt at Harpers Ferry in 1859. Offering new and fascinating insights into the cast of characters who created a homegrown socialist movement in America—from Thomas Paine’s revolution to Robert Owen’s utopianism, and from Thomas Skidmore’s agrarianism to George Henry Evans’s industrial workers’ reforms—__Long Road to Harpers Ferry__captures the spirit of the times. Showing how class solidarity and consciousness became more important to a generation of workers than notions of American citizenship, the book offers a fascinating historical background to help us understand the rise of radicalism in the United States today. This is the first comprehensive history of pre-Civil War American radicalism, mapping the journeys of the land reformers, Jacksonian radicals and militant abolitionists on the long road to the failed slave revolt of Harpers Ferry in 1859.

This book contains new and fascinating insights into the cast of characters who created a homegrown American socialist movement through the nineteenth century - from Thomas Paine's revolution to Robert Owen's utopianism, from James Macune Smith, the black founder of organised socialism in the US, to Susan B. Anthony, the often overlooked women’s rights activist. It also considers the persistent pre-capitalist model of the Native American.

Long Road to Harpers Ferry captures the spirit of the times, showing how class solidarity and consciousness became more important to a generation of workers than notions of American citizenship. This is a story that's been hidden from official histories, which must be remembered if we are to harness the latent power of socialism in the United States today. Cover 1 Contents 6 Introduction 8 Part One: Working Citizens: From Ideas to Organization 14 1. Liberty: Eighteenth-Century Transatlantic Legacies and Challenges 16 2. Equality: The Mandates of Community and the Necessity of Expropriation 36 3. Solidarity: Coalescing a Mass Resistance 54 Part Two: Working Citizens Towards a Working Class: From Organization to a Movement 72 4. The Movement Party: Beyond the Failures of Civic Ritual 74 5. Confronting Race and Empire: Slavery and Mexico 95 6. Free Soil: The Electoral Distillation of Radicalism, 1847-8 115 Part Three: An Unrelenting Radicalism: from Movement to Cadres 136 7. Free Soil Radicalized: The Rise and Course of the Free Democrats, 1849-53 138 8. The Pre-Revolutionary Tinderbox: Universal Democratic Republicans, Free Democrats and Radical Abolitionists, 1853-6 157 9. The Spark: Small Initiatives and Mass Upheavals, 1856-60 176 Epilogue 198 Notes 208 Index 264 Offers a comprehensive history of pre-Civil War American radicalism, mapping the journeys of the land reformers, Jacksonian radicals, and militant abolitionists who paved the way to the failed slave revolt at Harpers Ferry in 1859. Lause provides new insights into the cast of characters who created a homegrown socialist movement in America--from Thomas Paine's revolution to Robert Owen's utopianism, and from Thomas Skidmore's agrarianism to George Henry Evans's industrial workers' reforms. He also discusses the persistent resistance of Native Americans to the expansion of capitalism. Showing how class solidarity and consciousness became more important to a generation of workers than notions of American citizenship, Lause presents an historical background to help us understand the rise of radicalism in the United States today. --Adapted from publisher description This is the first comprehensive history of pre–Civil War American radicalism, mapping the journeys of the land reformers, Jacksonian radicals, and militant abolitionists who paved the way to the failed slave revolt at Harpers Ferry in 1859. Offering new and fascinating insights into the cast of characters who created a homegrown socialist movement in America—from Thomas Paine’s revolution to Robert Owen’s utopianism, and from Thomas Skidmore’s agrarianism to George Henry Evans’s industrial workers’ reforms— Long Road to Harpers Ferry captures the spirit of the times. Showing how class solidarity and consciousness became more important to a generation of workers than notions of American citizenship, the book offers a fascinating historical background to help us understand the rise of radicalism in the United States today. A history of home-grown American radicalism in the 19th century.