The Jacksonian period under review in this dictionary served as a transition period for the United States. The growing pains of the republic's infancy, during which time Americans learned that their nation would survive transitions of political power, gave way to the uncertainty of adolescence. While the United States did not win its second war, the War of 1812, with its mother country, it reaffirmed its independence and experienced significant maturation in many areas following the conflict's end in 1815. As the second generation of leaders took charge in the 1820s, the United States experienced the challenges of adulthood. The height of those adult years, from 1829 to 1849, is the focus of the Historical Dictionary of the Jacksonian Era and Manifest Destiny. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of the Jacksonian Era and Manifest Destiny contains a chronology, an introduction, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 200 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, politics, economy, foreign relations, religion, and culture. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about this era in American history.

The brief period from 1829 to 1849 was one of the most important in American history. During just two decades, the American government was strengthened, the political system consolidated, and the economy diversified. All the while literature and the arts, the press and philanthropy, urbanization, and religious revivalism sparked other changes. The belief in Manifest Destiny simultaneously caused expansion across the continent and the wretched treatment of the Native Americans, while arguments over slavery slowly tore a rift in the country as sectional divisions grew and a national crisis became almost inevitable. The A to Z of the Jacksonian Era and Manifest Destiny takes a close look at these sensitive years. Through a chronology that traces events year-by-year and sometimes even month-by-month actions are clearly delineated. The introduction summarizes the major trends of the epoch and the four administrations therein. The details are then supplied in several hundred cross-referenced dictionary entries, and the bibliography concludes this essential tool for anyone interested in history.