Teachers responsible for a class in early American history often find themselves asking: When does American history begin? What does "America" include? Is this a story only of the English colonies, or is it the story of the settlement and displacement of many races, nationalities, and regions across two American continents, Europe, and Africa? This issue of History Now takes the broadest approach to such questions, examining what historians call "The Atlantic World," the four continents linked by the Atlantic Ocean. In "Three Worlds Meet: Europe, Africa, and the Americas" our...

George Washington’s fame rests not upon his words but upon his deeds. Therefore, his First Inaugural Address is sometimes overlooked. This is unfortunate because the words he delivered on Thursday, April 30, 1789, not only launched the new Constitution but also established important and lasting precedents that later presidents have honored and followed. General George Washington began the month of April 1789 in a pessimistic mood, however. Although he knew he would soon become the first President of the United States, the Revolutionary War hero dreaded the job. On the morning of...

Everything that American children of my generation knew—or thought they knew—about Indians, or Native Americans, came from Saturday afternoon cowboy and Indian movies. We knew that they talked funny; they all lived in teepees; they were skilled horseback riders; and they hunted buffalo. Mostly, they painted their faces with war paint and tried to kill our favorite cowboy hero and innocent settlers who were trying to farm the land or herd the cattle. We did not know better then; today we do. This is due in large measure to the careful and thoughtful work of historians,...

In July 1861, Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederate States of America, was exulting over the victory of his troops at the first Battle of Manassas (or Bull Run) and calling it a sign of eventual triumph in the war as a whole. One of his brigade commanders, Richard S. Ewell, demurred. The South, he reportedly cautioned his president, was only beginning “a long, and, at best, doubtful struggle.” However there was one measure that would secure Southern independence, he added. When Davis asked what that might be, Ewell replied, “Emancipating the slaves and arming them.”[1...

In 1763 Americans toasted their King and their Mother Country. Twenty years later, they celebrated their independence from both. The story of the birth of our nation is a fascinating one—complex, surprising, triumphant and tragic. It has too often been told in simplistic terms, but in this issue of History Now our scholars grapple with the ambiguities that define this critical moment in our past. In "Lockean Liberalism and the American Revolution" Isaac Kramnick traces the origins of American political thought in the writings of England’s premier political philosopher, John Locke...