Born in Blood
Violence and the Making of America

Reveals how a political culture of violence centered on racial hierarchy has shaped the United States from its earliest days.

Scott Gac (Author)

9781316511886, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 18 January 2024

330 pages
24 x 16 x 2.7 cm, 0.76 kg

'Violent armed struggle is so ubiquitous in American history, however, that it would seem difficult to pin down as a coherent phenomenon. Where and when should the historian begin, for starters? … Gac chooses the Boston Massacre as his embarkation point … Upon this infamous episode Gac builds an analysis of a broad, longstanding phenomenon…' Jason Shaffer, Society for US Intellectual History

Born in Blood investigates one of history's most violent undertakings: The United States of America. People the world over consider violence in the United States as measurably different than that which troubles the rest of the globe, citing reasons including gun culture, the American West, Hollywood, the death penalty, economic inequality, rampant individualism, and more. This compelling examination of American violence explains a political culture of violence from the American Revolution to the Gilded Age, illustrating how physical force, often centered on racial hierarchy, sustained the central tenets of American liberal government. It offers an important story of nationhood, told through the experiences and choices of civilians, Indians, politicians, soldiers, and the enslaved, providing historical context for understanding how violence has shaped the United States from its inception.

Introduction. A system of violence: liberal society in the United States
Part I. Early Manifestations: 1. A revolution restrained
2. Life in the army of the continent
3. The code of American violence
Part II. Evolutions: 4. The 1850s: a people's government and the politics of belligerence
5. The United States greets John Brown
6. 1860: the undisputed election that sparked dispute
7. Emancipation's fury
Part III. Modern Traditions: 8. To 1877: American capitalism and the geography of violence
9. Layering law and resistance in the Great Strikes
10. Words and ropes: the postwar battles over racial order
Epilogue.

Subject Areas: History of the Americas [HBJK]