European University Institute Library

Dangerous ground, squatters, statesmen, and the antebellum rupture of American democracy, John Suval

eng

Includes bibliographical references and index

illustrations

index present

non fiction

Dangerous ground

electronic resource

dictionariesbibliography

1257402929

John Suval

Oxford scholarship online.

squatters, statesmen, and the antebellum rupture of American democracy

The squatter - defined by Noah Webster as 'one that settles on new land without a title' - had long been a fixture of America's frontier past. In the antebellum period, white squatters propelled the Jacksonian Democratic Party to dominance and the United States to the shores of the Pacific. In a bold reframing of the era's political history, John Suval explores how Squatter Democracy transformed the partisan landscape and the map of North America, hastening clashes that ultimately sundered the nation. With one eye on Washington and the other on flashpoints across the West, this book tracks squatters from the Mississippi Valley and cotton lands of Texas, to Oregon, Gold Rush-era California, and, finally, Bleeding Kansas. The sweeping narrative reveals how claiming western domains became stubbornly intertwined with partisan politics and fights over the extension of slavery.--, Provided by publisher

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