Political Parties In American History 1828 1890

"The selections in these anthologies are indicative of the attention that historians and the general public are giving to political parties, recognizing their essential role in democratic society. This history of parties, once narrowly defined as elections, has in recent years been reconsidered and altered. The study of party history has become the study of behavioral patterns in American society. Each volume in this series achieves a balance from the point of view of topics and of periods. Both the influence of individuals and that of the electorate at large are discussed; the impact of foreign and domestic issues is presented; and the party at the state and national level is critically examined."--Jacket.

"The selections in these anthologies are indicative of the attention that historians and the general public are giving to political parties, recognizing their essential role in democratic society. This history of parties, once narrowly defined as elections, has in recent years been reconsidered and altered. The study of party history has become the study of behavioral patterns in American society. Each volume in this series achieves a balance from the point of view of topics and of periods. Both the influence of individuals and that of the electorate at large are discussed; the impact of foreign and domestic issues is presented; and the party at the state and national level is critically examined."--Jacket.

This three-volume series of comprehensive anthologies probes the growth and evolution of American political parties through the writing of leading contemporary historians and scholars.

The nineteenth century was the heyday of furious contention between American political parties, and Joel Silbey has recaptured the drama and substance of those battles in a representative sampling of party pamphlets. Political parties mapped the landscape of electoral and ideological warfare, constructing images of themselves and of their adversaries that resonate and echo the basic characteristics of America’s then reigning sets of ideas. The nature of political controversy, as well as the substance of politics, is embedded in these party documents which both united and divided Americans. Unlike today’s party platforms, these pamphlets explicated real issues and gave insight into the society at large. Andrew Jackson’s Democrats, Millard Fillmore’s Whigs, Abraham Lincoln’s Republicans, and other, lesser-known parties are represented here. The pamphlets demonstrate how, for this fifty-year period, political parties were surrogates for American demands and values. Broad in scope, widely circulated, catalysts for heated debate over the decades, these pamphlets are important documents in the history of American politics. In an excellent Introduction, Silbey teases out and elucidates the themes each party stressed and took as its own in its fight for the soul of the nation.

Chronicles the history of the Democratic party, discussing its formulation by Andrew Jackson, its influence over a young nation, and the fundamental ideals of the oldest political party in the united States.