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America's Great Debate
- Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise that Preserved the Union
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 17 hrs and 21 mins
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Publisher's summary
The Mexican War introduced vast new territories into the United States, among them California and the present-day Southwest. When gold was discovered in California in the great Gold Rush of 1849, the population swelled, and settlers petitioned for admission to the Union. But the U.S. Senate was precariously balanced with 15 free states and 15 slave states. Up to this point, states had been admitted in pairs, one free and one slave, to preserve that tenuous balance in the Senate. Would California be free or slave? So began a paralyzing crisis in American government, and the longest debate in Senate history.
Fergus Bordewich tells the epic story of the Compromise of 1850 with skill and vigor, bringing to life two generations of senators who dominated the great debate. Luminaries such as John Calhoun, Daniel Webster, and Henry Clay - who tried unsuccessfully to cobble together a compromise that would allow for California's admission and simultaneously put an end to the nation's agony over slavery - were nearing the end of their long careers. Rising stars such as Jefferson Davis, William Seward, and Stephen Douglas - who ultimately succeeded where Clay failed - would shape the country's politics as slavery gradually fractured the nation.
The Compromise saved the Union from collapse, but it did so at a great cost. The gulf between North and South over slavery widened with the strengthened Fugitive Slave Law that was part of the complex Compromise. In America's Great Debate, Fergus Bordewich takes us back to a time when compromise was imperative, when men swayed one another in Congress with the power of their ideas and their rhetoric, and when partisans on each side reached across the aisle to preserve the Union from tragedy.
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The J. G. Randall Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Illinois and associate editor of North and South magazine, Bruce Levine presents a gripping chronicle of the cultural and economic upheaval the South experienced during and after the Civil War. Drawing upon a treasure trove of diaries, letters, newspaper articles, and government documents, Levine offers a unique perspective on the old South's demise through the voices of those who lived through the conflict.
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Merely ok. . .
- By Steve E. on 03-19-13
By: Bruce Levine
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'Mr. President'
- George Washington and the Making of the Nation's Highest Office
- By: Harlow Giles Unger
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 6 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Although the framers gave the president little authority, Washington knew whatever he did would set precedents for generations of his successors. To ensure their ability to defend the nation, he simply ignored the Constitution when he thought it necessary and reshaped the presidency into what James Madison called a "monarchical presidency." Modern scholars call it the "imperial presidency."
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A political genius
- By Michael on 03-28-17
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Year of Meteors
- Stephen Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, and the Election that Brought on the Civil War
- By: Douglas R. Egerton
- Narrated by: Michael Scherer
- Length: 13 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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In early 1860, pundits across America confidently predicted the election of Illinois senator Stephen A. Douglas in the coming presidential race. Douglas, after all, led the only party that bridged North and South. But the Democrats would split over the issue of slavery, leading Southerners in the party to run their own presidential slate. This opened the door for the upstart Republicans, exclusively Northern, to steal the Oval Office. Dark horse Abraham Lincoln, not the first choice even of his own party, won the presidency with a record-low 39.8 percent of the popular vote.
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Excellent! Buy it today!
- By Anonymous User on 01-07-22
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Fateful Lightning
- A New History of the Civil War and Reconstruction
- By: Allen C. Guelzo
- Narrated by: Brian Holsopple
- Length: 26 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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In Fateful Lightning, two-time Lincoln Prize-winning historian Allen C. Guelzo offers a marvelous portrait of the Civil War and its era, covering not only the major figures and epic battles, but also politics, religion, gender, race, diplomacy, and technology. He examines the strategy, the tactics, and the logistics of the Civil War and brings the most recent historical thinking to bear on emancipation, the presidency and the war powers, the blockade and international law, and the role of intellectuals, North and South.
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The worst part of this book is it's title
- By Rodney on 11-19-13
By: Allen C. Guelzo
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Jefferson and Hamilton
- The Rivalry That Forged a Nation
- By: John Ferling
- Narrated by: Bo Foxworth
- Length: 18 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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The decade of the 1790s has been called the "age of passion". Fervor ran high as rival factions battled over the course of the new republic - each side convinced that the other's goals would betray the legacy of the Revolution so recently fought and so dearly won. All understood as well that what was at stake was not a moment's political advantage, but the future course of the American experiment in democracy. In this epochal debate, no two figures loomed larger than Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton.
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Brilliant
- By Laird Williams on 05-10-23
By: John Ferling
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Lion of Liberty
- Patrick Henry and the Call to a New Nation
- By: Harlow Giles Unger
- Narrated by: William Hughes
- Length: 9 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Known to generations of Americans for his stirring call to arms, “Give me liberty or give me death,” Patrick Henry is all but forgotten today as the first of the Founding Fathers to call for independence, the first to call for revolution, and the first to call for a bill of rights. If Washington was the “Sword of the Revolution” and Jefferson, “the Pen,” Patrick Henry more than earned his epithet as “the Trumpet” of the Revolution for rousing Americans to arms in the Revolutionary War.
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A Decent Book on an Amazing Character
- By David I. Williams on 05-13-13
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The War Before the War
- Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War
- By: Andrew Delbanco
- Narrated by: Ari Fliakos
- Length: 13 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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For decades after its founding, America was really two nations—one slave, one free. There were many reasons why this composite nation ultimately broke apart, but the fact that enslaved black people repeatedly risked their lives to flee their masters in the South in search of freedom in the North proved that the "united" states was actually a lie. Fugitive slaves exposed the contradiction between the myth that slavery was a benign institution and the reality that a nation based on the principle of human equality was in fact a prison-house in which millions of Americans had no rights.
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Great promise greater disappointment
- By Amazon Customer on 12-09-18
By: Andrew Delbanco
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Adams vs. Jefferson
- The Tumultuous Election of 1800
- By: John Ferling
- Narrated by: Jack Garrett
- Length: 11 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Award-winning author John Ferling is a leading authority on the American Revolution. His entertaining and enlightening histories have greatly improved our understanding of early America and the Founding Fathers. Now Ferling opens a window to the past and explores the contentious presidential election of 1800.
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Outstanding work of interpretive history
- By D. Littman on 11-01-04
By: John Ferling
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The Birth of Modern Politics
- Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, and the Election of 1828
- By: Lynn Hudson Parson
- Narrated by: Milton Bagby
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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The 1828 presidential election, which pitted Major General Andrew Jackson against incumbent John Quincy Adams, has long been hailed as a watershed moment in American political history. It was the contest in which an unlettered, hot-tempered southwestern frontiersman, trumpeted by his supporters as a genuine man of the people, soundly defeated a New England "aristocrat" whose education and political resume were as impressive as any ever seen in American public life.
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a very good popular history book
- By D. Littman on 01-29-10
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James Madison
- By: Richard Brookhiser
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Eminent historian Richard Brookhiser presents a vivid portrait of James Madison, the “Father of the Constitution” and one of America's greatest statesmen.
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OK book but not a biography
- By Joel Mayer on 08-05-12
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Very Informative
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General Benedict Arnold's failed attempt to betray the fortress of West Point to the British in 1780 stands as one of the most infamous episodes in American history. In the light of a shining record of bravery and unquestioned commitment to the Revolution, Arnold's defection came as an appalling shock. Contemporaries believed he had been corrupted by greed; historians have theorized that he had come to resent the lack of recognition for his merits and sacrifices. In this provocative book, Stephen Brumwell challenges such interpretations and draws on unexplored archives to reveal other crucial factors that illuminate Arnold's abandonment of the revolutionary cause he once championed.
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In 1789, James Madison and James Monroe ran against each other for Congress-the only time that two future presidents have contested a congressional seat. But what was at stake, as author Chris DeRose reveals in Founding Rivals: Madison vs. Monroe, the Bill of Rights, and the Election That Saved a Nation, was more than personal ambition. This was a race that determined the future of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the very definition of the United States of America.
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The Ku Klux Klan, which celebrated historian Fergus Bordewich defines as “the first organized terrorist movement in American history,” rose from the ashes of the Civil War. At its peak in the early 1870s, the Klan boasted many tens of thousands of members, no small number of them landowners, lawmen, doctors, journalists, and churchmen, as well as future governors and congressmen. And their mission was to obliterate the muscular democratic power of newly emancipated Black Americans and their white allies, often by the most horrifying means imaginable.
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Good, not great
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After the Civil War
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Returning to the turbulent days of a nation divided, best-selling author and acclaimed historian James Robertson explores 70 fascinating figures who shaped America during Reconstruction and beyond. Relentless politicians, intrepid fighters, cunning innovators - the times called for bold moves, and this resilient generation would not disappoint.
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Just a southern lost cause book
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Democracy and Its Alternatives
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The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle called man a political animal. But what did he mean by that? What is democracy? How do democracies differ from one another? How do they stack up against their alternatives, like dictatorship? And can democracy survive the many challenges it faces today? To answer these questions, look no further than Democracy and Its Alternatives. Political science, history, and current affairs rolled into one, these 24 lectures investigate democratic government in theory and practice.
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Very Informative
- By Racheal Dorsey on 12-20-22
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Bound for Canaan
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The Civil War brought to a climax the country's bitter division. But the beginnings of slavery's denouement can be traced to a courageous band of ordinary Americans, black and white, slave and free, who joined forces to create what would come to be known as the Underground Railroad, a movement that occupies as romantic a place in the nation's imagination as the Lewis and Clark expedition.
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The Heroic Missing Piece
- By Paul Frandano on 03-03-17
By: Fergus Bordewich
What listeners say about America's Great Debate
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Douglas
- 03-03-18
Excellent. Very detailed. Entertaining.
I read this book immediately after finishing a book on the Texas revolution and a book on the presidency of James K. Polk. This really helped me get familiar with the period. The period between the presidencies of Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln is know for being a time when American politics were dominated by powerful congressmen. Fergus Bordewich paints a very detailed portrait of those men and the extraordinary work they did to help keep the Union of America together for another decade before the Civil War.
Something I found interesting was that Bordewich began the book on a very personal note, explaining what drew him to the subject. He talks about reading a quote from Daniel Webster--who is often portrayed as a friend of the abolitionist movement--in which the famous politician vigorously defends the Fugitive Slave Act. The author was puzzled at the contradictory elements. Thus, he was inspired to write about the famous Compromise of 1850. Not surprisingly, Bordewich discovers--as the reader will as well--that American politics were (as always) extremely complicated.
I did enjoy the author's introductory thoughts. I found his tone to be a bit annoying. He often writes as a critic looking back and judging events from 200 years ago by the standards of today, rather than as a classical historian. This is made even worse by the narrator's exaggerated style. I got used to both the author and the narrator after a short time. Speed listeners will have no trouble with this book or the narrator.
The author does a tremendous job of taking repetitive, monotonous congressional happenings and turning it into an exciting story. There are many dramatic moments. I thought Bordewich did a very good job of getting inside the heads of the various key players. He also offers a splendid wrap up and conclusion, explaining how these events would come to impact things in the future, and what things might have been like had the compromise not occurred.
One humorous thing I will remember about this work is Bordewich falling in love with the word, "fairly." The author uses the word not as it is mostly used today, to indicate justice or to mean "pretty good," but to emphasize surprise or extreme. As in: "Mary was delighted by the present and fairly beamed."
Anyway, at one point during the book, Bordewich uses the word in that sense continuously over the course of a few chapters, and then really doesn't use it much again. It was interesting.
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- The Mindfulness Guru
- 05-09-24
Beautifully written and well-narrated
This is one of the best books I’ve read on slavery and its many attempts to address the issue leading up to the Civil War. The good moves quickly, without sacrificing details, and forms a logical, accessible narrative.
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- Brad Stirrat
- 11-11-15
Dissappointing
The overall arc of the narrative is flat. The author here has created a kind of "scenic cruise" thru American history. It lacks any dramatic structure that might breath more life into the sheer details of the debate. Lots of interesting vignettes, but lacks a narrative force to pull the reader thru the story. Avoid it unless this is an area you are keen to get into the weeds on.
The narrator did an OK job, good enough for short or medium listens, but not strong enough to foster engrossing longer listens of over an hour.
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