Political Trials in an Age of Revolutions : Britain and the North Atlantic, 1793-1848 / edited by Michael T. Davis, Emma Macleod, Gordon Pentland.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Davis, Michael T., Editor.

Macleod, Emma., Editor.

Pentland, Gordon., Editor.

Series:

Palgrave Histories of Policing, Punishment and Justice, 2946-6083

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Corrections.

Punishment.

Criminology.

Crime--Sociological aspects.

Crime.

Great Britain--History.

Great Britain.

World politics.

Imperialism.

Prison and Punishment.

Crime Control and Security.

Crime and Society.

History of Britain and Ireland.

Political History.

Imperialism and Colonialism.

Local Subjects:

Prison and Punishment.

Crime Control and Security.

Crime and Society.

History of Britain and Ireland.

Political History.

Imperialism and Colonialism.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (398 pages).

Edition:

1st ed. 2019.

Place of Publication:

Cham : Springer International Publishing : Imprint: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

Summary:

This collection provides new insights into the 'Age of Revolutions', focussing on state trials for treason and sedition, and expands the sophisticated discussion that has marked the historiography of that period by examining political trials in Britain and the north Atlantic world from the 1790s and into the nineteenth century. In the current turbulent period, when Western governments are once again grappling with how to balance security and civil liberty against the threat of inflammatory ideas and actions during a period of international political and religious tension, it is timely to re-examine the motives, dilemmas, thinking and actions of governments facing similar problems during the 'Age of Revolutions'. The volume begins with a number of essays exploring the cases tried in England and Scotland in 1793-94 and examining those political trials from fresh angles (including their implications for legal developments, their representation in the press, and the emotion and theperformances they generated in court). Subsequent sections widen the scope of the collection both chronologically (through the period up to the Reform Act of 1832 and extending as far as the end of the nineteenth century) and geographically (to Revolutionary France, republican Ireland, the United States and Canada). These comparative and longue durée approaches will stimulate new debate on the political trials of Georgian Britain and of the north Atlantic world more generally as well as a reassessment of their significance. This book deliberately incorporates essays by scholars working within and across a number of different disciplines including Law, Literary Studies and Political Science.

Contents:

Frontmatter: Preface; Geoffrey Robertson, QC

Introduction; Michael T. Davis, Emma Macleod and Gordon Pentland

Part I. The 1790s

1. The English and Scottish State Trials of the 1790s Compared; Emma Macleod

2. 'Subverting the Settled Order of Things': The Crime of Sedition in Scotland, 1793-1849; Lindsay Farmer

3. The Newspaper Press, Sedition and the High Court of Justiciary in Late Eighteenth-Century Edinburgh; David G. Barrie and Joanne McEwan

4. The English and Scottish State Trials of the 1790s Compared; Emma Macleod

5. Sermons of Sedition: The Trials of William Winterbotham; James Epstein

6. The Noise and Emotions of Political Trials in Britain during the 1790s; Michael T. Davis

7. Literary Justice: Representing the London Treason Trials of 1794; Nancy E. Johnson

8. Political trials and the suppression of popular radicalism in England, 1799-1820; Katrina Navickas

9. State Trials, Whig Lawyers and the Press in Early Nineteenth-Century Scotland; Gordon Pentland

10. 'Some Examples Should Be Made': Prosecuting Reform Bill Rioters in 1831-32; Steve Poole

Part III. The North Atlantic World

11. Political Trials, Terror and Civil Society: the Case of the Revolutionary Tribunal in Paris, 1793-94; Mike Rapport

12. Hero or Villain? The Treason Trial of Aaron Burr (1807); Jack Fruchtman

13. Irish Political Trials, 1793-1848: Associationalism, Emotion and Memory; Martyn Powell

14. State Trials in Post-Revolution British North America; Barry Wright.

ISBN:

9783319989594

3319989596