History

In Revolutionary Backlash, Rosemarie Zagarri examines the changing perception of women’s involvement in the political sphere from immediately after the American Revolution until Andrew Jackson’s presidency. The Revolution itself “profoundly changed the popular understanding of women’s political status and initiated a widespread, ongoing debate over the meaning of women’s rights” (p. 2). Their essential role in securing American victory “created new opportunities for women to participate, at least informally, in party and electoral politics” (p. 2). Many women took advantage of these opportunities and actively engaged in American political culture through the early Federal period, but a conservative backlash developed by 1830 that undermined any political advancement of women. Zagarri uses the writings of political women and wives, their letters, ladies’ magazines, July 4 orations, fiction, satire, newspapers, legislative records, and political pamphlets to uncover the elite and popu...

In 1701, Pennsylvanians committed themselves to a religious tolerant colony. As result, thousands of religiously and ethnically diverse migrants arrived and settled in the colony. Philadelphia became a crowded, multi-ethnic and multi-denominational city, in which the residents struggled to ...