Description
Book SynopsisOriginally published in 1982. Despite a necessary preoccupation with the Revolutionary struggle, America's Continental Congress succeeded in establishing itself as a governing body with nationaland internationalauthority. How the Congress acquired and maintained this power and how the delegates sought to resolve the complex theoretical problems that arose in forming a federal government are the issues confronted in Jack N. Rakove's searching reappraisal of Revolution-era politics. Avoiding the tendency to interpret the decisions of the Congress in terms of competing factions or conflicting ideologies, Rakove opts for a more pragmatic view. He reconstructs the political climate of the Revolutionary period, mapping out both the immediate problems confronting the Congress and the available alternatives as perceived by the delegates. He recreates a landscape littered with unfamiliar issues, intractable problems, unattractive choices, and partial solutions, all of which influenced congressi
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Preface
Part I. Resistance and Revolution
Chapter 1. Resistance Without Union, 1770-1774
Chapter 2. The Creation of a Mandate
Chapter 3. The First Continental Congress
Chapter 4. War and Politics, 1775-1776
Chapter 5. Independence
Chapter 6. A Lengthening War
Part II. Confederation
Chapter 7. Confederation Considered
Chapter 8. Confederation Drafted
Chapter 9. The Beginnings of National Government
Chapter 10. Ambition and Responsibility: An Essay on Revolutionary Politics
Part III. Crises
Chapter 11. Factional Conflict and Foreign Policy
Chapter 12. A Government Without Money 2
Chapter 13. The Administration of Robert Morris 2
Part IV. Reform
Chapter 14. Union Without Power: The Confederation in Peacetime
Chapter 15. Toward the Philadelphia Convention
Notes
A Note on Primary Sources
Index
