In the public eye: Matthew Stanley’s “The Ragged Edge of Freedom”

Against the Current, by Paul Buhle:

“…Would-be farmers and merchants streamed in during the first half of the 19th century, often traversing westward and northward from the upper South, bringing along their genetic Anglo-Saxonism and their cultural politics. These regions carried subsurface coal waiting to be mined for the rising industrial machine….Political advocates of “free white labor” against potential competition of a geographically advancing slave system found their way into the Freesoil Party, a precursor to the Republicans. Democrats, for their part, believed that the safety of the Republic depended upon the defense of slavery in the South. Abolitionists and social reformers of all kinds, with a wide Yankee following augmented by many recent German immigrants, sought to take things beyond the uneasy accommodation of white populations to each other across existing political lines. In Wisconsin and in Chicago most notably, these would include “Abe’s Boys” enrolling in the army of the Union. Not so in the Southern Illinois, two hours’ drive from my hometown. The whites who immigrated northward from the near South, largely uneducated and lacking skills, came to be considered almost a species in themselves. Journalists at mid-century began to treat them with a relish shown a few decades earlier, in the popular press, about the ‘New Southwest’ created by the purchase of Louisiana…..” Read more…

Midwest Book Review:

“A seminal and groundbreaking study…Exceptionally well written, documented, organized and presented, “The Ragged Edge of Freedom” is an deftly crafted and unreserved recommended addition to community and college/university library American Political/Economic History collections and supplemental African-American History curriculum studies lists.” More here…