Distant Revolutions: 1848 and the Challenge to American Exceptionalism

272 Pages·2009·2.9 MB·English

by  Timothy Mason Roberts

Distant Revolutions
Jeffersonian America
Jan Ellen Lewis, Peter S. Onuf, and Andrew O’Shaughnessy, Editors
Distant Revolutions
1848 and the Challenge
to American Exceptionalism
Timothy Mason Roberts
University of Virginia Press
Charlottesville and London
University of Virginia Press
© 2009 by the Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper
First published 2009
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Roberts, Timothy Mason, 1964–
Distant revolutions : 1848 and the challenge to American
exceptionalism / Timothy Mason Roberts.
p. cm. — (Jeffersonian America)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8139-2799-2 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-8139-2818-0
(e-book)
1. United States—Intellectual life—1783–1865. 2. Europe—History—
1848–1849. 3. Revolutions—Europe—History—19th century. 4. National
characteristics, American. I. Title.
E166.R63 2009
973.6—dc22
2008046795
For Emily
Nations, as individuals, who are completely innocent in their own
esteem, are insu≠erable in their human contacts.
—Reinhold Niebuhr, The Irony of American History
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
1. The Ambivalence of Americans Abroad 21
2. The Rise and Fall of the 1848 Revolutions in American Public
Culture 42
3. The Presidential Campaign of 1848: Competing Rhetorics
of Revolution 63
4. American Reform: Transatlantic Inspiration 81
5. The Conservative Christian Alliance 105
6. Secession or Revolution? The South and the Crisis of 1850 125
7. Louis Kossuth and the Campaign of 1852 146
8. The Antislavery Movement as a Crisis of American
Exceptionalism 168
Epilogue: From 1848 to 1863 187
Chronology of Events, 1848–1854 193
Notes 197
Bibliography 219
Index 249

Acknowledgments
I have accrued many debts in writing this book. Most recently I am obli-
gated to Richard Holway at the University of Virginia Press, who accepted
the manuscript but who challenged me to rethink and to clarify what
the work says about antebellum America. Also to Dick’s credit, readers
whom he contacted provided timely and useful critiques of the work. I
am indebted to Andre Fleche and, in particular, to Carl Guarneri, whose
thoughtful critique of the book’s organization and argument improved it
dramatically.
Other individuals read earlier versions or parts of the work and shared
their suggestions and wisdom with me. I am grateful in this regard to
Charles Capper, Neil Jumonville, Edward Kohn, Cadoc Leighton, Larry
Reynolds, Andrew Robertson, Frank Towers, Major Wilson, and the late
Duncan MacLeod. I also especially thank Daniel Walker Howe, who su-
pervised my work as a graduate student and who has continued to o≠er
critique, advice, and encouragement. Dan’s scholarship and mentoring are
both exemplary.
Several institutions provided fi nancial support for this project. I wish
to thank the Virginia Historical Society, the University of Oxford Modern
History Faculty, the London Historical Society, and Bilkent University for
providing research fellowships. I also thank various libraries and archives
for allowing me materials to study and space to work. These include the
Divinity School Library of Duke University; the Houghton Library at Har-
vard University; the Kansas State Historical Society; the Library Company
of Philadelphia; the Library of Congress; the Library of Manchester Col-
lege, Oxford; the Massachusetts Historical Society; the New York Public
L ibrary; the Strozier Library at Florida State University; the Tennessee
State Library and Archives; the South Carolina Historical Society; the
Southern Historical Collection at the University of North Carolina–
ix