Beyond Party: Cultures of Antipartisanship in Northern Politics before the Civil War (Reconfiguring American Political History) - Hardcover

Voss–hubbard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0801869404 ISBN 13: 9780801869402

Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002

Synopsis

Captivating disgruntled voters, third parties have often complicated the American political scene. In the years before the Civil War, third-party politics took the form of the Know Nothings, who mistrusted established parties and gave voice to anti-government sentiment.

Originating about 1850 as a nativist fraternal order, the Know Nothing movement soon spread throughout the industrial North. In Beyond Party, Mark Voss-Hubbard draws on local sources in three different states where the movement was especially strong to uncover its social roots and establish its relationship to actual public policy issues. Focusing on the 1852 ten hour movement in Essex County, Massachusetts, the pro-temperance and anti-Catholic agitation in and around Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, and the movement to restrict immigrants' voting rights and overthrow "corrupt parties and politicians" in New London County, Connecticut, he shows that these places shared many of the social problems that occurred throughout the North―the consolidation of capitalist agriculture and industry, the arrival of Irish and German Catholic immigrants, and the changing fortunes of many established political leaders.

Voss-Hubbard applies the insights of social history and social movement theory to politics in arguing that we need to understand Know Nothing rhetoric and activism as part of a wider tradition of American suspicion of "politics as usual"―even though, of course, this antipartyism served agendas that included those of self-interested figures seeking to accumulate power.

About this title

Review:

"Voss-Hubbard offers not only a persuasive explanation for the rise and fall of the Know-Nothings but also provides valuable insights into the political culture of the pre-Civil War North."

(Keith Ian Polakoff History: Reviews of New Books)

"Voss-Hubbard's contribution to understanding the Know Nothings is to explore at the local level the working of that antiparty spirit among Know Nothings... Suggestive and interesting."

(Mark E. Neely Jr. Journal of the Early Republic)

"Voss-Hubbard argues that the antipartisanship of the Know Nothings made a major contribution to the emergence of the Republican party. This welcomed book ought to encourage further study of antebellum politics in Connecticut."

(Lawrence B. Goodheart Connecticut History)

"Beyond Party begins a new strand of Civil War historiography, and that is a major achievement."

(Frank Towers Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography)

"A penetrating study of political culture in the mid-1850s... This book is the very rare historical monograph that is more than the sum of its parts."

(Choice)

"In what is the most valuable and illuminating part of his book, Voss-Hubbard follows Know-Nothing leaders into state legislatures after their political triumph to see exactly how the antiparty party dealt with governmental responsibility."

(Stephen E. Maizlish Journal of American History)

"In this most interesting and cogent book, Mark Voss-Hubbard recognizes the pragmatic functions of much antiparty rhetoric... His evidence also brings new understanding of the forces underlying major political realignment, confirms the high level of popular engagement in politics at such moments, and reemphasizes the power of the partisan imperative in the mid-nineteenth century."

(Donald J. Ratcliffe American Historical Review)

"Voss-Hubbard's meticulous attention to the Know Nothings' local roots and antiparty spirit offers intriguing insights on pre–Civil War political developments."

(Vernon Volpe Annals of Iowa)

"Voss-Hubbard provides a detailed analysis at county level of the rapid and realigning political changes that were underway. He details with skill the culture from which they came."

(Philip John Davies Journal of American Studies)

"A shrewd interpretation of the Know Nothings and the world they tried to win. Voss-Hubbard speaks across disciplinary lines to all students of parties and antiparties in the nineteenth century."

(Michael Kazin, Professor of History, Georgetown University)

About the Author:

Mark Voss-Hubbard is an assistant professor of history and graduate program coordinator at Eastern Illinois University.

About this edition

• Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0801869404
• ISBN 13: 9780801869402
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 272