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Disunion Among Ourselves tells the story of the deep political
divisions that beset the Continental Congress during the American
Revolution. So fractious were the founders' political fights that
they feared the War of Independence might end in disunion and civil
war. Typically, accounts of the Revolution highlight the might of
the British armed forces as the chief obstacle to achieving
American independence. In fact, the greatest danger to the nascent
Union-from the First Continental Congress in 1774 until the war's
end in 1783-was powerful regional chauvinism and government
infighting that threatened to break apart the Continental Congress.
If the states should separate, armed civil conflict seemed
inevitable due to vast unsettled financial disputes between the
states as well as, crucially, the unresolved ownership of 300
million acres of fertile land in the trans-Appalachian West
obtained from King George III in the Treaty of Paris in 1783.
Instead of disbanding into separate regional confederacies, which
many considered the most natural outcome of the Revolution, the
founders united for the sake of liberty and self-preservation. To
achieve this, they forged grueling compromises, including the
resolution for independence in 1776, the Mississippi-Fisheries
Compromise of 1779, and the ratification of the Articles of
Confederation in 1781. Today, in the second decade of the 21st
century, many Americans have lost faith in politics and a polarized
government. Disunion Among Ourselves has inevitable resonances with
our present era of political hyperpolarization. It fills a critical
gap in our historical understanding of the Revolution while at the
same time serving as a touchstone for contemporary politics,
reminding us that the founders overcame far tougher times than our
own through commitment to ethical constitutional democracy and
compromise. They succeeded in part by transcending the baser angels
of their natures to the higher national interest.
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