Guides to Historic Events in America – serie

This contextual narrative of the 70-year history of the woman suffrage movement in the United States demonstrates how an important mass political and social movement coalesced into a political force despite class, racial, ethnic, religious, and regional barriers.Votes for Women! provides an updated consideration of the questions raised by the mass movement to gain equality and access to power in our democracy. It interprets the campaigns for woman suffrage from the 1830s until 1920, analyzes the impact of the Nineteenth Amendment, and presents primary documents to allow a glimpse into the minds of those who campaigned for and against woman suffrage.The book's examination of the 70-year woman suffrage campaign shows how the movement faced enormous barriers, was perceived as threatening the very core of accepted beliefs, and was a struggle that showcased the efforts of strong protagonists and brilliant organizers who were intellectually innovative and yet were reflective of the great divides of race, ethnicity, religion, economics, and region existing across the nation. Included within the narrative section are biographies of significant personalities in the movement, such as militant Alice Paul and anti-suffragist Ida Tarbell as well as more commonly known leaders Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.

This history of the 1787 Constitutional Convention uses a chronological narrative format to capture the complexity, messiness, and unfolding daily drama behind the writing of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the role of contingency in that process.The Framers of the U.S. Constitution designed a novel republican form of government to replace the failing Confederation, one that would divide power between the federal government and the states, launching a new phase of the American "experiment" in representative democracy. Not until the end of the American Civil War, nearly a century later, would it become clear, as Abraham Lincoln put it in his Gettysburg Address, "that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."The Constitutional Convention of 1787: A Reference Guide provides an invaluable guide covering the background to the convention, the convention itself, the ratification of the Constitution, and the adoption of the Bill of Rights. In addition to the narrative itself, the story of the convention is supplemented with a detailed chronology, a rich selection of primary source documents, 15 biographical sketches of convention delegates, and a comprehensive bibliographical essay. Based largely on primary sources, the book also weighs in on some of the historiographical debates that have taken place among scholars about the convention.

Drawing on the most recent scholarship, The Civil Rights Movement provides a concise overview of the most important social movement of the 20th century and will expand readers' understanding of the fight for racial equality.Ideal for research, this one-stop reference provides a unique introduction to the Civil Rights Movement as it includes its development, issues, and leaders. Six essays capture the drama and conflict of the struggle, covering, among other topics, the origins of the movement, the role of women, the battle for racial equality in the North, and the lasting effects of the protests of the 1950s and 1960s. Ready-reference features include a chronology, a bibliography, photographs, and biographical profiles of 20 activists, from Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X to Ella Baker and Angela Davis. The book also contains a selection of primary sources, including presidential addresses, Supreme Court decisions, and FBI reports on Malcolm X and Stokeley Carmichael. Based on the latest scholarship in the field, this guide gives readers all of the analysis and reference sources they need to expand their understanding of the Civil Rights movement.

This highly readable and valuable resource revisits the personalities and events that sparked the cultural revolutions synonymous with the 1960s. It considers the forces that shaped the decade and made it a unique era, beginning with an introductory historical overview that provides context and perspective.Focusing on social and cultural history, the book explores the New Left, the antiwar movement, the counterculture, and the pivotal year of 1968. It also includes extensive reference materials such as a comprehensive timeline, biographical profiles of key figures, primary documents, a glossary of terms, and an annotated bibliography for further study.

This reference provides background information about the Watergate crisis and discusses its significance to U.S. politics today.Relatively insignificant at first glance, the Watergate crisis led to the downfall of a president and emerged as the most important constitutional crisis since the Civil War. Journalists and the media were instrumental in shedding light on Watergate and exposing political corruption at the highest levels of government. Watergate became part of American popular culture and synonymous with presidential corruption. This book surveys the background of the Watergate crisis and links it to contemporary American politics.The first part of the book provides a narrative overview and examination of the Watergate crisis, with a consideration of what happened and why, and the relevance of Watergate to today's political issues. The book considers such topics as political corruption and impeachment, the role of the media, and the abuse of presidential power. The book also offers biographical sketches of key players in the Watergate crisis, a chronology, glossary, primary source document excerpts, and an annotated bibliography.

The United States, often described as a nation of immigrants, has the most diverse population in the world. Immigration remains one of the most complex and contentious political, cultural, and social issues in the country. Much of today’s policy stems from the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965, championed by President John F. Kennedy to establish a new preference system for legal immigration.This comprehensive volume explains the six major eras of immigration legislation, examines how and why laws evolved, and profiles the key actors and organizations shaping immigration policy today. It outlines the precursor laws to the 1965 Act, how they fell short, and the motivations and political context behind the Act’s passage. The book also considers where U.S. immigration law may be headed in the near future.In addition, it explores the intended and unforeseen impacts of the 1965 Act on the American economy, demographics, and society at large. A curated selection of primary documents, government data, and scholarly sources supports this authoritative overview of immigration policy in the United States.

Documenting the history of the American women's rights movement from 1945 through the 2016 election, this reference offers a crucial and objective look at the changing strategies, goals, and challenges of American feminists.Many aspects of women's lives in the mid-twentieth century—including legal subjugation to their husbands, limitations in education and employment, and restrictions on sexual and reproductive autonomy—are unthinkable today. Women's lives improved only through the concerted action of several generations of activists, whose work lies at the center of this volume. This book traces women's changing relationships to family, work, education, government, and sexuality from 1945 through the 2016 election.The book begins with an overview essay that places the women's rights movement in its historical context. This is followed by a chronology offering concise profiles of key events. A series of chapters then discusses the history of the women's rights movement since 1945 and what the movement has accomplished. Biographical entries profile key figures involved in the movement, and a selection of primary source documents gives first-hand accounts of the movement. An annotated bibliography directs readers to additional sources of information.

Ronald Reagan’s presidency marked a pivotal shift in American politics, culture, and global relations. His conservative revolution in the 1980s reshaped the nation and helped bring about the end of the Cold War, leaving a lasting legacy that still influences the United States today.This book explores Reagan’s rise from Hollywood actor to powerful political leader. It traces how he challenged traditional Republican values and implemented policies that transformed the country’s social and political landscape.Key issues such as abortion, gay rights, law and order, tax cuts, deindustrialization, and the Religious Right are examined to show how they contributed to Reagan’s legislative successes. The book also highlights his masterful use of public relations, including the iconic “morning in America” campaign, showcasing his ability to shape public opinion through media.

Full of true stories more dramatic than any fiction, The Underground Railroad: A Reference Guide offers a fresh, revealing look at the efforts of hundreds of dedicated persons—white and black, men and women, from all walks of life—to help slave fugitives find freedom in the decades leading up to the Civil War.The Underground Railroad provides the richest portrayal yet of the first large scale act of interracial collaboration in the United States, mapping out the complex network of routes and safe stations that made escape from slavery in the American South possible. Kerry Walters' stirring account ranges from the earliest acts of slave resistance and the rise of the Abolitionist movement, to the establishment of clandestine "liberty lines" through the eastern and then-western regions of the Union and ultimately to Canada. Separating fact from legend, Walters draws extensively on first-person accounts of those who made the Railroad work, those who tried to stop it, and those who made the treacherous journey to freedom—including Eliza Harris and Josiah Henson, the real-life "Eliza" and "Uncle Tom" from Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.

This succinct and readable account of the heated debate over the expansion of slavery provides readers with a thorough understanding of how the Civil War was precipitated.This book vividly depicts and clearly explains the events in the decades leading up to the Civil War that resulted from the controversy over expansion of slavery into the western territories. The chapters describe how this single issue drove a wedge through the country and spawned the creation of several new political parties, including the Republican Party; caused furious congressional debates; sparked violence in Kansas; increased sectional discord between North and South; and allowed Abraham Lincoln to rise from relative obscurity to become the first Republican president of the United States. The work also supplies two-dozen thumbnail sketches of the period's greatest statesmen and less-than-great presidents, including individuals such as James Buchanan, John C. Calhoun, Salmon P. Chase, Henry Clay, Stephen Douglas, and William Henry Seward.

Including extensive, balanced information, keen insights, and helpful research tools, this book provides a valuable resource for students or general readers interested in American policy, diplomacy, and conduct during the Cold War.The Cold War not only comprised the dominant theme in American foreign policy during the second half of the 20th century; its influence was also imbedded into American culture. The half-century duration of the Cold War was an extended learning period during which the United States found that it could no longer remain an isolationist nation in a complex, quickly evolving, and dangerous world. This book covers the entire scope of the Cold War, from its background and origins before and after World War II to the collapse of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991, providing coverage of key events and concepts, such as the containment policy, McCarthyism, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Vietnam War, détente, and nuclear arms policies. The single-volume work also provides an annotated bibliography, primary documents, and biographies of key personalities during the Cold War, such as John Foster Dulles, J. Edgar Hoover, George F. Kennan, Henry Kissinger, Edward R. Murrow, and Ronald Reagan.

This illuminating overview explains political parties in the early 19th century, comparing and contrasting that era with the modern-day political climate.In this chronological examination of the Democratic Party's origins, award-winning author Mark R. Cheathem traces the development of both the Democratic Party and the second American party system from its roots in the Jeffersonian Republicans in the 1790s to its maturation during Andrew Jackson's presidency in the 1830s. The book explores the concept of politics and its effects on the national government of the early American republic.This historical reference is filled with fascinating facts and anecdotes about 19th-century politics in the United States, most notably how Martin Van Buren acted as the architect of the Democratic Party; what factors contributed to the Democrats' rise to power; and how the Bank War created the second American party system, pitting the Democrats against Whigs. Content features key political writings from the period, portraits and political cartoons of the time, and a helpful chronology detailing influential events.

This fascinating guide documents the transformation of government from passive observer to active participant and ally of the American people during the late-19th and early-20th centuries.The progressive impulse that energized the United States between 1890 and 1920 forever altered the nature of American government and its relation to its citizens. This book was written to reveal the challenges Americans faced during the Progressive Era and to show how their responses helped transform the nation. Combining a narrative on the era with biographies of key participants, significant primary sources, and an annotated bibliography, the topically organized volume offers a lively contextual guide to one of the great turning points in American history.In addition to covering the major political events of the era, the guide provides profiles of prominent Progressive figures such as Eugene V. Debs, Mother Jones, Margaret Sanger, Jacob Riis, and W.E.B. DuBois. Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and the National Progressive Agenda are covered, as are the Muckrakers, the African American struggle for equal rights, the women's suffrage movement, and efforts to better the conditions of factory workers. The guide also details the rise of the American Empire as the United States took its place on the world stage. The most recent historiography is interwoven throughout.

Providing an exciting narrative of Reconstruction based on current scholarship, historical sources, as well as interpretive essays on special topics, this book offers real insight into a controversial and critical period in American history.Reconstruction: A Reference Guide covers the entire period of Reconstruction (1863–1877) with a special emphasis on the struggle for social and political equality in the post-Civil War South. The book's analytical essays, selection of primary documents, and biographies of key participants give readers an understanding of social, political, and economic changes that occurred during this important period as well as provide opportunities to explore more specific issues and debates. Synthesizing and building on the work of recent scholars, the book documents how the central struggles of Reconstruction revolved around the meaning of freedom for former slaves. The essays describe how a new and sometimes deadly conflict over equal rights and racial justice raged throughout the South in the post-Civil War period and generated a constitutional crisis in the nation's capital as former slaves created alliances with sympathetic whites and sought to build a biracial democracy in the former Confederacy. Readers will not only understand the facts and events of the period, but will also be introduced to historical sources and key interpretive debates.

An indispensable resource for investigating America's War for Independence, this book provides a comprehensive yet concise narrative that combines the author's original perspectives with the latest scholarship on the subject.Without the War for Independence and its successful outcome for the patriots, the course of American development—our institutions, culture, politics, and economics—would have run in radically different directions. From any perspective, the War for Independence was one of the seminal events of national history. This book offers a clear, easy-to-read, and complete overview of the origins of the imperial crisis, the course of the war, and the ultimate success of the movement for independence. It also emphasizes the human cost of the struggle: the ferocity of the fighting that stemmed from the belief among participants on all sides that defeat was tantamount to cultural, political, and even physical extinction.The narrative encompasses the author's original insights and takes advantage of the newest scholarship on the American Revolution. The book includes primary documents and biographical sketches representative of the various participants in the revolutionary struggle—for example, private soldiers, senior officers, loyalists, women, blacks, and Indians—as well as famous speeches and important American and British official documents. The edited documents offer readers a sense of the actual voices of the revolutionary struggle and a deeper understanding of how primary documents serve historians' narration and interpretation of long-ago events. The result is a new synthesis that brings a deeper understanding of America's defining struggle to an informed public readership as well as college and high school students.

Documenting the history of the American women's rights movement from 1945 through the 2016 election, this reference offers a crucial and objective look at the changing strategies, goals, and challenges of American feminists.Many aspects of women's lives in the mid-twentieth century—including legal subjugation to their husbands, limitations in education and employment, and restrictions on sexual and reproductive autonomy—are unthinkable today. Women's lives improved only through the concerted action of several generations of activists, whose work lies at the center of this volume. This book traces women's changing relationships to family, work, education, government, and sexuality from 1945 through the 2016 election.The book begins with an overview essay that places the women's rights movement in its historical context. This is followed by a chronology offering concise profiles of key events. A series of chapters then discusses the history of the women's rights movement since 1945 and what the movement has accomplished. Biographical entries profile key figures involved in the movement, and a selection of primary source documents gives first-hand accounts of the movement. An annotated bibliography directs readers to additional sources of information.

Ronald Reagan’s presidency marked a pivotal shift in American politics, culture, and global relations. His conservative revolution in the 1980s reshaped the nation and helped bring about the end of the Cold War, leaving a lasting legacy that still influences the United States today.This book explores Reagan’s rise from Hollywood actor to powerful political leader. It traces how he challenged traditional Republican values and implemented policies that transformed the country’s social and political landscape.Key issues such as abortion, gay rights, law and order, tax cuts, deindustrialization, and the Religious Right are examined to show how they contributed to Reagan’s legislative successes. The book also highlights his masterful use of public relations, including the iconic “morning in America” campaign, showcasing his ability to shape public opinion through media.

This highly readable and valuable resource revisits the personalities and events that sparked the cultural revolutions synonymous with the 1960s. It considers the forces that shaped the decade and made it a unique era, beginning with an introductory historical overview that provides context and perspective.Focusing on social and cultural history, the book explores the New Left, the antiwar movement, the counterculture, and the pivotal year of 1968. It also includes extensive reference materials such as a comprehensive timeline, biographical profiles of key figures, primary documents, a glossary of terms, and an annotated bibliography for further study.

The United States, often described as a nation of immigrants, has the most diverse population in the world. Immigration remains one of the most complex and contentious political, cultural, and social issues in the country. Much of today’s policy stems from the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965, championed by President John F. Kennedy to establish a new preference system for legal immigration.This comprehensive volume explains the six major eras of immigration legislation, examines how and why laws evolved, and profiles the key actors and organizations shaping immigration policy today. It outlines the precursor laws to the 1965 Act, how they fell short, and the motivations and political context behind the Act’s passage. The book also considers where U.S. immigration law may be headed in the near future.In addition, it explores the intended and unforeseen impacts of the 1965 Act on the American economy, demographics, and society at large. A curated selection of primary documents, government data, and scholarly sources supports this authoritative overview of immigration policy in the United States.

Full of true stories more dramatic than any fiction, The Underground Railroad: A Reference Guide offers a fresh, revealing look at the efforts of hundreds of dedicated persons—white and black, men and women, from all walks of life—to help slave fugitives find freedom in the decades leading up to the Civil War.The Underground Railroad provides the richest portrayal yet of the first large scale act of interracial collaboration in the United States, mapping out the complex network of routes and safe stations that made escape from slavery in the American South possible. Kerry Walters' stirring account ranges from the earliest acts of slave resistance and the rise of the Abolitionist movement, to the establishment of clandestine "liberty lines" through the eastern and then-western regions of the Union and ultimately to Canada. Separating fact from legend, Walters draws extensively on first-person accounts of those who made the Railroad work, those who tried to stop it, and those who made the treacherous journey to freedom—including Eliza Harris and Josiah Henson, the real-life "Eliza" and "Uncle Tom" from Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.

This history of the 1787 Constitutional Convention uses a chronological narrative format to capture the complexity, messiness, and unfolding daily drama behind the writing of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the role of contingency in that process.The Framers of the U.S. Constitution designed a novel republican form of government to replace the failing Confederation, one that would divide power between the federal government and the states, launching a new phase of the American "experiment" in representative democracy. Not until the end of the American Civil War, nearly a century later, would it become clear, as Abraham Lincoln put it in his Gettysburg Address, "that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."The Constitutional Convention of 1787: A Reference Guide provides an invaluable guide covering the background to the convention, the convention itself, the ratification of the Constitution, and the adoption of the Bill of Rights. In addition to the narrative itself, the story of the convention is supplemented with a detailed chronology, a rich selection of primary source documents, 15 biographical sketches of convention delegates, and a comprehensive bibliographical essay. Based largely on primary sources, the book also weighs in on some of the historiographical debates that have taken place among scholars about the convention.

This reference provides background information about the Watergate crisis and discusses its significance to U.S. politics today.Relatively insignificant at first glance, the Watergate crisis led to the downfall of a president and emerged as the most important constitutional crisis since the Civil War. Journalists and the media were instrumental in shedding light on Watergate and exposing political corruption at the highest levels of government. Watergate became part of American popular culture and synonymous with presidential corruption. This book surveys the background of the Watergate crisis and links it to contemporary American politics.The first part of the book provides a narrative overview and examination of the Watergate crisis, with a consideration of what happened and why, and the relevance of Watergate to today's political issues. The book considers such topics as political corruption and impeachment, the role of the media, and the abuse of presidential power. The book also offers biographical sketches of key players in the Watergate crisis, a chronology, glossary, primary source document excerpts, and an annotated bibliography.