Mastering America

Robert Bonner earned his A.B. at Princeton University and his PhD at Yale University. He has held teaching positions at the University of Southern Maine, Michigan State University, and Amherst College, and currently teaches at Dartmouth College. He is the author of Colors and Blood: Flag Passions of the Confederate South (2002) and The Soldier's Pen: Firsthand Impressions of the American Civil War (2006), as well as articles in Journal of Southern History, Civil War History, and Reviews in American History.

'The American Civil War was, above all, a contest over competing nationalist claims to independence and union. In this fascinating book Robert Bonner offers the first in-depth analysis of the intellectual framework for the South's claim to nationhood. It is an impressive display of research and interpretation that casts an entirely new light on the debates over slavery, race, region, and nation. As we approach the sesquicentennial of the Civil War, this is a book everyone with an interest in the subject will want to read.' Don H. Doyle, University of South Carolina

• Part I. The Geopolitics of Mastery: 1. Slaveholders' stake in the American empire; 2. The compound republic and the cause of the south; Part II. The Contours of Proslavery Americanism: 3. Republican masters and American mission; 4. Reformed masters and the gospel of nationhood; 5. Fragments of the past, histories for the future; 6. Yankees as apostates and allies in the American 1850s; Part III. Confederate Nationhood and the Revolutions of War: 7. The anatomy of confederate nationhood; 8. Reckoning with confederate purpose; 9. Liberty, slavery, and the burdens of confederate nationhood.