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Many are aware that gerrymandering exists and suspect it plays a
role in our elections, but its history goes far deeper, and its
impacts are far greater, than most realize. In his latest book,
Brent Tarter focuses on Virginia's long history of gerrymandering
to uncover its immense influence on the state's politics and to
provide perspective on how the practice impacts politics
nationally.Offering the first in-depth historical study of
gerrymanders in Virginia, Tarter exposes practices going back to
nineteenth century and colonial times and explains how they
protected land owners' and slave owners' interests. The
consequences of redistricting and reapportionment in modern
Virginia-in effect giving a partisan minority the upper hand in all
public policy decisions-become much clearer in light of this
history. Where the discussion of gerrymandering has typically
emphasized political parties' control of Congress, Tarter focuses
on the state legislatures that determine congressional district
lines and, in most states, even those of their own districts. On
the eve of the 2021 session of the General Assembly, which will
redraw district lines for Virginia's state Senate and House of
Delegates, as well as for the U.S. House of Representatives,
Tarter's book provides an eye-opening investigation of
gerrymandering and its pervasive effect on our local, state, and
national politics and government.
Histories of Virginia have traditionally traced the same
significant but narrow lines, overlooking whole swathes of human
experience crucial to an understanding of the commonwealth. With
Virginians and Their Histories, Brent Tarter presents a fresh, new
interpretive narrative that incorporates the experiences of all
residents of Virginia from the earliest times to the first decades
of the twenty-first century, affording readers the most
comprehensive and wide-ranging account of Virginia's story. Tarter
draws on primary resources for every decade of the Old Dominion's
English-language history, as well as a wealth of recent scholarship
that illuminates in new ways how demographic changes, economic
growth, social and cultural changes, and religious sensibilities
and gender relationships have affected the manner in which
Virginians have lived. Virginians and Their Histories interweaves
the experiences of Virginians of different racial and ethnic
backgrounds and classes, representing a variety of eras and
regions, to understand what they separately and jointly created,
and how they responded to economic, political, and social changes
on a national and even global level. That large context is
essential for properly understanding the influences of Virginians
on, and the responses of Virginians to, the constantly changing
world in which they have lived. This groundbreaking work of
scholarship-generously illustrated and engagingly written-will
become the definitive account for general readers and all students
of Virginia's diverse and vibrant history.
This is the only modern comprehensive constitutional history of any
state, and as a history of Virgina, it is one of the oldest and
most complex. Virginia’s state legislature is the Virginia
General Assembly, which was established in July 1619, making it the
oldest current lawmaking body in North America. Brent Tarter’s
Constitutional History of Virginia covers over three hundred years
of Virginia’s legislative policy, from colony to statehood,
revealing its political and legal backstory. From the very
beginning in 1606, when James I chartered the Virginia Company to
establish a commercial outpost on the Atlantic coast of North
America, through the first two decades of the twenty-first century,
the fundamental constitutions of the colony and state of Virginia
have evolved and changed as the demographic, economic, political,
and cultural characteristics of Virginia changed. Elements of the
colonial constitution influenced the character of the state’s
first constitution in 1776, and changing relationships between the
people and their government, as well as relationships between the
state and federal governments, have influenced how the state’s
constitution has evolved. Tarter explores that evolution and taps
into its relevance to the people who have lived and still live in
Virginia.
The story of secession-the prelude to perhaps the most dramatic
chapter in American history-has typically been told on a grand
scale. In Daydreams and Nightmares, historian Brent Tarter uses a
smaller, more intimate lens, sharing the story of one Virginia
family who found themselves in the middle of the secession debate
and saw their world torn apart as the states chose sides and went
to war. George Berlin was elected to serve as a delegate to the
Virginia Convention of 1861 as an opponent of secession, but he
ultimately changed his vote, later defending his decision in a
speech in his hometown of Buckhannon, Upshur County, and had to
flee for his safety when Union soldiers arrived. Berlin and his
wife, Susan Holt Berlin, were separated for extended periods-both
during the convention and, later, during the early years of the
Civil War. The letters they exchanged tell a harrowing story of
uncertainty, bringing to life for the modern reader an extended
family that encompassed both Confederate and Union sympathizers.
This is in part a love story. It is also a story about ordinary
people caught up in extraordinary events. Although unique in its
vividly evoked details, the Berlins' story is representative of the
drama endured by millions of Americans. Composed during the
nightmare of civil war, the Berlins' remarkably articulate letters
express the dreams of reunion and a secure future felt throughout
the entire, severed nation. In this intimate, evocative, and often
heartbreaking family story, we see up close the personal costs of
our larger national history.
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