The nineteenth century was the heyday of furious contention between
American political parties, and Joel Silbey has recaptured the
drama and substance of those battles in a representative safmpling
of party pamphlets. Political parties mapped the landscape of
electoral and ideological warfare, constructing images of
themselves and of their adversaries that resonate and echo the
basic characteristics of America's then reigning sets of ideas. The
nature of political controversy, as well as the substance of
politics, is embedded in these party documents, which both united
and divided Americans. Unlike today's party platforms, these
pamphlets explicated real issues and gave insight into the society
at large. Andrew Jackson's Democrats, Millard Fillmore's Whigs,
Abraham Lincoln's Republicans, and other, lesser-known parties are
represented here. The pamphlets demonstrate how, for this
fifty-year period, political parties were surrogates for American
demands and values. Broad in scope, widely circulated, catalysts
for heated debate over the decades, these pamphlets are important
documents in the history of American politics.
In a brilliant monograph-length introduction, Silbey teases out
and elucidates the themes each party stressed and took as its own
in its fight for the soul of the nation.
General
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