Contents:
1. Introduction: The Body Politic Part I - Foundings and the Problem of the Past 2. Notes on the States of America: Jeffersonian Democracy and the Production of a National Past 3. Becoming Unnatural: The Federalist's Techniques of Government Part II - Reconstruction and its Aftermath: The Relocation of the Past 4. Sexual Reconstruction: Gender, Political Friendship and the New Techniques of Citizenship 5. In the Beginning Was a Crime: Lynching, Rape and the Tragedy of American Political Thought 6. Postscript, Giving Reasons: Rethinking Toleration for a Plural World

In this text, Catherine Holland advances a thesis that challenges the dominant schools of thought concerning the liberal tradition in the United States. Organized around two founding moments - the American Revolution and ratification of the Constitution and the period of Reconstruction following the American Civil War - the book identifies a recurring, symbolic figure at the heart of American dilemmas of citizenship and nation, namely the human body.