This vast southern empire : slaveholders at the helm of American foreign policy / Matthew Karp.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Karp, Matthew, 1981- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Slavery--Government policy--United States--History.

Slavery.

Slavery--Political aspects--United States--History.

Power (Social sciences).

History.

Slavery--Political aspects.

Slavery--Government policy.

United States--Foreign relations--1783-1865.

United States.

International relations.

United States--Politics and government--1783-1865.

Politics and government.

Power (Social sciences)--United States--History.

Diplomatic relations.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

360 pages : illustrations, maps ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 2016.

Summary:

A new portrait of the southern slaveholders who occupied the commanding heights of antebellum politics, this book explores the intimate relationship between American slavery and American power. From John C. Calhoun to Jefferson Davis, the South's leading statesmen understood the United States as the chief defender of bound labor in an Atlantic World still teetering between slavery and abolition. Overcoming traditional southern scruples about dangers of centralized authority, slaveholders harnessed the power of the United States to protect vulnerable slave regimes across the hemisphere, from Texas to Brazil.-- Provided by publisher

Contents:

Introduction: The world the slaveholders craved

Confronting the great apostle of emancipation

The strongest naval power on earth

A hemispheric defense of slavery

Slavery's dominoes: Brazil and Texas

The young Hercules of America

King cotton, Emperor slavery

Slaveholding visions of modernity

Foreign policy amid domestic crisis

The military South

American slavery, global power

Epilogue: the rod of empire.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780674737259

0674737253

OCLC:

942610278