Browsing by Subject "Washington, George"
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Item The memory of the American revolution in the politics of the civil war(2008-05) Crider, Jonathan B; Adams, Gretchen A.; Miller, M. Catherine; Stoll, MarkPoliticians, editors, and any number of ordinary Americans in the 1850s already understood the power of the American Revolution as a symbol. During the political crisis of the 1850s, they instinctively understood that by framing their appeals in the rhetoric of Revolutionary authority their reading public�s opinions might be swayed. For each of the editors, as for hundreds of others and for their thousands of readers, the memory of the Revolution was malleable. For the South and DeBow�s Review all the important men of the Revolution were Southern and Slaveowners providing critical leadership which required conservation. Under the careful hand of the editors of Harper�s Monthly, George Washington became a god-like figure whose wisdom was depoliticized and whose personal history of a slaveholder who eventually freed his own slaves was ignored in favor of personal character. The National Era recreated slaveholder Thomas Jefferson as the abolitionist�s greatest advocate by setting the precedent for the prohibition slavery in the territories as a harbinger of the country�s eventual elimination of the institution. As a tool for persuasion and a touchstone for validation, the memory of the American Revolution had a long history in American political rhetoric by the 1850s and came readily to mind in this latest crisis.