Subject: History / United States / Revolutionary Period (1775-1800)

Subject: History / United States / Revolutionary Period (1775-1800)

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Making the Frontier Man

|9780822947875|Violence, White Manhood, and Authority in the Early Western Backcountry| For western colonists in the early American backcountry, disputes often ended in bloodshed and death. Making the Frontier Man examines early life and the origins of lawless behavior in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio from 1750 to 1815. It provides a key to understanding why the trans-Appalachian West was prone to violent struggles, especially between white men. Traumatic experiences of the Revolution and the Forty Years War legitimized killing as a means of self-defense—of property, reputation, and rights—transferring power from the county courts to the ordinary citizen. Backcountry men waged…

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Distribution of Wealth and Income in the United States in 1798

|9780822985211|Lee Soltow examines wealth and income in the United States during the Federal period, at a time when state constitutions were formed, national tax laws written, and policies for banking, credit, and debt first formulated. Soltow bases his study on the national census of 1798, which catalogued nearly every piece of property in the United States -land, dwellings, mills, and wharfs-in order to levy the First Direct Tax. He complements this with information from the 1790 and 1800 United States censuses, and with data gathered fifty years before and after this time, to offer an exhaustive survey of the distribution…

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The Department of War, 1781–1795

|9780822983750|Harry M. Ward examines the formative years of the Department of War as a microcosm of the development of a centralized federal government. The Department of War was unique among early government agencies, as the only office that continued under the same administrator from the time of the Confederation to government under the Constitution. After the peace was established with Britain, citizens were suspicious of keeping a standing army, but administrator Benjamin Lincoln's efficient administration did much to dispel their fears. Henry Knox was the second Secretary, and he faced the problem of maintaining peace on the frontier, as his…

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