Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
PART 1. FIRST ENCOUNTERS
The Meaning of America
Utilizing the Native Labor Force
New World Fantasies
Labor Needs
The Black Legend
A Critique of the Slave Trade
PART 2. EUROPEAN COLONIZATION NORTH OF MEXICO
Justifications for English Involvement in the New World
A Rationale for New World Colonization
England's First Enduring North American Settlement
Life in Early Virginia
Race War in Virginia
Indentured Servitude
The Shift to Slavery
Regional Contrasts
The Pilgrims Arrive in Plymouth
Reasons for Puritan Immigration
The Idea of the Covenant
Servitude in New England
Mounting Conflict with Native Americans
Native Americans as Active Agents
Puritan Economics
King Philip's War
Struggles for Power
An Indian Slave Woman Confesses to Witchcraft
The Sin of Slaveholding
English Liberties
PART 3. A LAND OF CONTRASTS
Mercantilist Ideas
New Netherlands: America's First Multicultural Society
New Netherlands Becomes New York
Indian Affairs
The Schenectady Massacre
Persecution of the Quakers
The Quaker Ideal of Religious Tolerance
South Carolina
Georgia
English Liberties and Deference
Queen Anne's War
Immigration and Ethnic Diversity
Indentured Servitude
Suspicion of Arbitrary Power
The Great Awakening
Fear of Slave Revolts
America as a Land of Opportunity
PART 4. THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR
British North America in 1775
A Soldier's Diary
Fasting and Repentance
The Capture of Québec
The Seven Years' War and the Growth of Antislavery Sentiment
The Fate of Native Americans
PART 5. THE AGE OF REVOLUTION
The Proclamation of 1763
The Stamp Act Crisis
The Townshend Acts
The Boston Massacre
The Regulators
Samuel Adams
The Boston Tea Party
American Resistance to Britain
The Battles of Lexington and Concord
Declaring Independence
Slavery and the American Revolution
Benedict Arnold's Treason
The War in the South
The Articles of Confederation
PART 6. CREATING A NEW NATION
Native Americans and the American Revolution
The Newburgh Conspiracy
Slavery in Postrevolutionary America
White Slavery
Relations with Britain
The Critical Period and Shays' Rebellion
Northwest Ordinance
Creating Republican Governments
The U.S. Constitution
Debates within the Constitutional Convention
The Three-fifths Compromise
Fugitive Slaves and the Constitution
A Proslavery Document?
Ratification Debates
The New Republic
The Birth of Political Parties
The Haitian Revolution
The Citizen Genet Affair
The Whiskey Rebellion
Washington's Farewell Address
The Quasi-War with France and the XYZ Affair
Jeffersonian Republicanism
The Jeffersonians in Power
REPEAL OF THE JUDICIARY ACT OF 1801
Judicial Review:
Louisiana, Expansion, and Disunionist Conspiracies:
Slavery and Race in Jeffersonian America:
The American Eagle, the French Tiger, and the British Shark:
The Dambargo of 1807:
The Road to War:
The "War Hawks":
Clearing the Land of Indians:
Missionary Work and Indian Policy:
PART 7. ANTEBELLUM AMERICA
SHIFTS IN SENSIBILITY: FAMILY, GENDER ROLES, RELIGION, AND THE RISE OF HUMANITARIANISM
The Emergence of the Republican Family:
Republican Motherhood:
Religious Liberalism and Evangelical Revivalism:
Disestablishment:
ORIGINS OF THE AMERICAN REFORM TRADITION
Dueling:
Education:
Colonization:
Postward Nationalism and Division:
1818 AND 1819: WATERSHED YEARS IN AMERICAN HISTORY
The Second Bank of the United States:
McCullough v. Maryland:
Acquiring Florida:
The Monroe Doctrine:
The Missouri Crisis:
Slavery and Sectionalism:
The Underground Railroad:
The Rise of the Second Party System:
The Election of 1824:
POWER AND IDEOLOGY IN JACKSON'S AMERICA
Nullification and the Bank War:
Political Democratization and the Dorr War:
Party Competition and the Rise of the Whigs:
Antebellum Reform: The Shift to Immediatism:
Abolition and Slavery:
Nat Turner's Insurrection:
Narrative and Testimony of Sarah M. Grimké:
Testimony of Angelina Grimké:
A Proslavery New Yorker:
From Antislavery to Women's Rights:
MANIFEST DESTINY
Gone to Texas:
Texas Annexation:
Mounting Sectional Antagonisms:
The Amistad Affair:
Political Antislavery:
The Free Soil Party:
The Mexican War:
THE ESCALATING CONFLICT OVER SLAVERY
The Compromise of 1850:
Mass Immigration:
The Know-Nothings and the Disintegration of the Second-Party System:
AMERICA AT MIDCENTURY
Revival of the Slavery Issue:
Bleeding Kansas:
Bleeding Sumner:
The Dred Scott Decision:
The Gathering Storm:
Harpers Ferry:
The Secession Crisis:
PART 8. CIVIL WAR
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF NAMES
The Emancipation Proclamation:
Gettysburg:
TOWARD RECONSTRUCTION
The Nature and History of the Gilder Lehrman Collection:

About the Author

David Brion Davis is Sterling Professor of History and Director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University. His work has won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the Albert J. Beveridge Award, and the Bancroft Prize, among many other honors. He lives in Orange, Connecticut.

Steven Mintz is Professor of History at the University of Houston. He has published works on slavery, American reform movements, and the history of the American family. He lives in Houston.

Reviews

"A revealing, fascinating view of early America told through the words of the historical figures."--Albuquerque Tribune
"Intriguing."--Richmond Times-Dispatch
"The Boisterous Sea of Liberty is an invaluable resource, not o mention an eye-opener to those who believe all history is written in stone."--Denver Post
"With their new book, The Boisterous Sea of Liberty, David Brion Davis and Steven Mintz remove history from its Ivory Tower and return it to the general public....The book seems alive, full of the voices and sounds of proclamations long defunct."--New Haven Advocate
"I have used this book now for three semesters and I love it. This is the only book I use in my American History I survey class."--Dr. Bruce Walker, Ottawa University
"The closest thing we have to an American primer covering the centuries from the age of exploration through the Civil War. It belongs in the library of anyone who is interested in our past."--Sean Wilentz, Princeton University
"There is simply no better way to understand the first three-and-a-half centuries of what became the United States than to read this book. Nowhere will readers find more awe-inspiring erudition, a richer diversity of perspectives, or a more powerful portrayal of the people who created this country..."--Edward Ayers, University of Virginia
"[The editors] have created an overwhelmingly informative volume: their own interpretive commentary holds together the quotes they select, some world-famous [and] some revealingly obscure."--Publishers Weekly
"This compilation of primary source material strives mightily to provide a balanced view of great events from different perspectives....The commentary by Davis and Mintz...provides the necessary context for each category of documents. Although this collection can stand alone as engrossing reading material, it can also prove invaluable as a research tool...."--Booklist