The First Reconstruction: Black Politics in America from the Revolution to the Civil War

"It may be difficult to imagine that a consequential electoral black politics evolved in the United States before the Civil War--as of 1860, the overwhelming majority of African Americans remained in bondage. Yet free black men, many of them escaped slaves, steadily increased their influence in U.S. electoral politics over the course of the early American republic. Despite efforts to disfranchise them, black men voted across much of the North, sometimes in numbers sufficient to swing elections. In this meticulously researched book, Van Gosse offers a sweeping reappraisal of the formative era of American democracy from the Constitution's ratification through Lincoln's election, chronicling the rise of an organized, visible black politics focused on the quest for citizenship, the vote, and power within the free states"--

Author: Van Gosse
Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Published: 08/01/2022
Series: The John Hope Franklin African American History and Culture
Pages: 760
Weight: 2.1lbs
Size: 9.20h x 6.10w x 1.60d
ISBN: 9781469672533