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The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and…
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The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War (vuoden 2019 painos)

Tekijä: Andrew Delbanco (Tekijä)

JäseniäKirja-arvostelujaSuosituimmuussijaKeskimääräinen arvioMaininnat
2174123,606 (4.48)4
Explains how fugitive slaves escaping from the South to the northern states awakened northerners to the true nature of slavery and how the Compromise of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Act divided the nation and set it on the path to civil war.
Jäsen:MsMaizie
Teoksen nimi:The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War
Kirjailijat:Andrew Delbanco (Tekijä)
Info:Penguin Books (2019), Edition: Illustrated, 480 pages
Kokoelmat:Oma kirjasto
Arvio (tähdet):
Avainsanoja:Fugitive Slave Act, African American history, law

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The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War (tekijä: Andrew Delbanco)

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näyttää 4/4
When 13 dinky colonies in Great Britain’s empire decided to throw off the chains unreasonable taxation and lack of representation in Parliament, many revolutionaries identified themselves with creating an enduring democracy dedicated to equality and the pursuit of liberty.

But those men who were tasked with the job of bringing the colonies together knew that it was a temporary accommodation to last at least until the war with Britain was won. Not all were equal to those signatories of the Declaration of Independence, nor did it become more equal when The Constitution enshrined the property rights of slave-owners.

The revolutionaries from the southern colonies had every intention of maintaining the institution of slavery, while the northern revolutionaries had no intention at all of admitting slavery into their colonies, now “states.”

So from the beginning, the so-called “United” States of America were never “united” on a fundamental tenant of the union, that of all men being equal before the eyes of God.

We assume that the northerners didn’t want slavery because it was an affront to God, but many northerners didn’t want the slaves (read: blacks) among their society. And largely Irish immigrants in New York and Boston didn’t want the competition for jobs. Northerners in fact were great beneficiaries of the system of slavery. Northern mills processed slave-picked cotton. Northern banks loaned money to slave enterprises. And Northern ladies drank coffee with slavemade sugar.

Early in the new United States there were relatively few vocal opponents of slavery on purely religious grounds, but even these people had a hard time convincing themselves that black slaves were the equal of whites.

One bone of contention was whether the blacks were humans or property. If they were human they deserved due process under the new laws of the federation. If they were property, then blacks who escaped slavery were subject to the laws of property.

Generally speaking, property doesn’t run away. But this property did run away. And frequently. Most slaves didn’t get very far. A few did.

This book, “The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America’s Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War’” by Andrew Delbanco, follows the progress of laws enacted to return slaves to their owners, and laws created by northern states to thwart the intent of fugitive slave laws.

It is a mirror on the times.

There is much debate over what eventually brought about the American Civil War. Professor Delbanco makes a pretty strong case that it was the Mexican-American War that lit the fuse that blew the accommodation apart. America inherited so much land in winning that war. Whether liberated Texas and California should be slave states. And there was the earlier Louisiana Purchase. Whether Kansas should a slave state. Whether Missouri or Nebraska should be free-soil.

The flow of capital and immigrants into the liberated territories fueled discontent. Land speculators in Texas sold cotton-growing land. White prospectors flooded into California. Trying to separate the demands of capital vs. the humanitarian grounds for abolishing slavery becomes complex and maybe ultimately inseparable.

Southern states initially planned on the Federal Government guaranteeing their property rights with runaways. Northerners didn’t want the federal government interfering in what they saw as state matters. (Sounds eerily familiar, no?)

Moreover, the revolutionary government created the Senate as a balance to the popular sovereignty of northerners. As long as there were equal representation between slave and non-slave states in the union, southerners had no fear of losing their birthright. Thus the pressure to create an equal number of slave states in the new territories. If the north, with their vastly growing populations were given more free states, then they would create more legislation favourable to their ends, and keep the Supreme Court packed with nominees to uphold decisions friendly to their objectives. (This also sounds eerily familiar.)

Anybody familiar with Isabel Wilkerson’s outstanding “The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration” knows that when large numbers of the ex-slaves and their progeny finally made their way to the northeast, to the northern Midwest and to California, white communities reacted by building societal walls to their integration: separate schools, separate housing, and whites-only unions. That is where the more modern version of equal before the law and the eyes of God eventually led America.

Much of this story is told from the side of the northern sensibility, as in: it was obvious that slavery was morally wanting and that northern expansion was pressuring the south to acquiesce. What shouldn’t be lost on the reader is that the North agreed and benefitted by the confederation with the south. In a very clear way the North owed its freedom to the south. Without demanding the end to slavery.

America's curious libertarian streak ends these days when the talk turns toward reproductive rights. The very same people who champion "states rights" and hands-off government demand the state outlaw abortion. In the antebellum south, landowners wanted to preserve their independence AND gov't intervention to preserve their rights.

Much is made today of the political divide between urban and rural voters, perhaps the coastal elites vs. the heartland if you believe in it. It is directly analogous with North vs. South in antebellum America. But that would obscure the similarities in their attitudes toward the real disenfranchised.

The Civil War ended the precincts of slavery, but America still wrestles with the aftermath. ( )
  MylesKesten | Jan 23, 2024 |
5639. The War Before the War Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War, by Andrew Delbanco (read 12 Jul 2019) This 2018 book examines the provision in Article 4 of the Constitution which dealt with the matter of fugitive slaves. The author says without that provision the slave states would not have ratified the Constitution. As opposition to slavery rose in the nation that provision and the laws enacted pursuant thereto led to the dilemma: should the law and the constitution be obeyed despite the abhorrent insult to one's conscience. The whole tortured history is recited and examined in this book and I am pretty well convinced that only a war as long as the Civil War and as decisive as the Civil War could resolve the difficulty. Much in the book was not new to me but the matter is carefully examined and convincingly shows that only a war as definitive as the Civil War turned out to be could have solved the matter in freedom's favor. The book is persuasive and made me appreciate yet again the wisdom of Lincoln and marvel at the good fortune this country had in having him become president. ( )
  Schmerguls | Jul 12, 2019 |
This is a well documented history about the background of the fights over slavery in the period before the Civil War. I teach at a junior college and I learned a lot of information about things like the character Captain Ahab in Moby Dick was modeled after the ardent pro slavery advocate John C. Calhoun. I also learned much about Henry Clay and Daniel Webster who were crucial in the debates. Any student of history will find value reading this book. ( )
  muddyboy | Apr 22, 2019 |
Most history books covering the period from the Revolution to the Civil War are written from the white person's perspective. Whether looking at it from the south or the north, pro- or antislavery, events are often told as if African Americans sat silently awaiting their rescue. I love that this book flips all that upside down, showing us how slaves and free blacks both worked together and clashed during this period. We're shown how and why the Fugitive Slave Act was enacted, the resulting problems for all citizens, and the ever-widening divide between the southerners clinging to their right to "own" people and the northerners growing inability to look away. And, maybe most importantly, we're shown how African Americans rose up and demanded change.

Throughout the narrative, the author makes some compelling references to current events, inadvertently reminding us that maybe we haven't moved as far from our dark past as we'd like to think. He gives us much to think about, not least of which being how a country founded on freedom and personal liberty could ever legitimize the right to own another person.

While the subject matter is dense and complex, the writing style is engaging. I felt like I was transported back to this tumultuous time.

I'd like to see this book as required reading for every high school student. And maybe those students should then pass the book on to their parents. We need to acknowledge the fissures that divided our country have shifted but haven't healed. This book goes a long way to showing us the how and why.

*I received an advance copy from the publisher, via NetGalley, in exchange for my honest review.* ( )
  Darcia | Oct 22, 2018 |
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Explains how fugitive slaves escaping from the South to the northern states awakened northerners to the true nature of slavery and how the Compromise of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Act divided the nation and set it on the path to civil war.

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