53 items
Duke University historian Laurent Dubois discusses slavery, culture, and ideology in the French colony of Saint-Domingue, which upon the triumph of its revolution in 1804 became the nation of Haiti—the first and only nation...
Washington Encourages a Prospective Immigrant: The Economic Potential of the States in 1796
During his second presidential term, George Washington enjoyed a lively correspondence with Sir John Sinclair, member of Parliament and leader of Britain’s scientific agriculture movement, on matters of mutual interest to the two...
The Declaration of Independence in Global Perspective
No American document has had a greater global impact than the Declaration of Independence. It has been fundamental to American history longer than any other text because it was the first to use the name "the United States of America":...
Alexander Hamilton: Witness to the Founding Era
This series of online exhibitions explores the importance of Alexander Hamilton to the founding of the United States. Each mini-exhibition features locations where Alexander Hamilton made history and documents written by or about him...
Henry Knox’s Order of March to Trenton, 1776
On Christmas Day in 1776 the American Revolution was on the verge of collapsing. Since the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American forces had been driven from New York City to Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, and reduced...
George Washington on the abolition of slavery, 1786
Of the nine presidents who were slaveholders, only George Washington freed all his own slaves upon his death. Before the Revolution, Washington, like most White Americans, took slavery for granted. At the time of the Revolution, one...
Jefferson on British aggression, 1815
In this letter in defense of American nationalism, Thomas Jefferson denounced the blustering of certain members of the British House of Lords who blamed the War of 1812 on US aggression. Jefferson’s letter followed a report from James...
Surrender of the British General Cornwallis to the Americans, October 19, 1781
These three documents—a map, a manuscript, and a print—tell the story of the surrender of British commander Charles Cornwallis to American General George Washington. In October 1781, the successful siege of Yorktown, Virginia, by...
Our New Country Needs New Money: Colonial Money Simulation
There certainly can’t be a greater Grievance to a Traveler, from one Colony to another than the different values their Paper Money bears. —an English visitor, ca.1742 Introduction Students use different kinds of paper money to...
Historical Context: The First National Census
Early in August 1790, David Howe, an assistant federal marshal, began the difficult task of counting all the people who lived in Hancock County, Maine. One of 650 federal census takers, charged with making "a...perfect enumeration.....
Historical Context: The Survival of the US Constitution
The United States has the oldest written national framework of government in the world. At the end of the twentieth century, there were about 159 other national constitutions in the world, and 101 had been adopted since 1970. While...
Revolutionary in America
The image is so clear in our minds, seen first in elementary school and reinforced countless times since: a few dozen gentlemen with powdered wigs and period suits (coats, waistcoats, and knee-length breeches) gathered in a large...
Guided Readings: Federalists and Jeffersonians
Reading 1 Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever he had a chosen people, whose breasts He has made His peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue. —Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia ...
Study Aid: The Articles of Confederation
Deficiencies of the Articles of Confederation No separate executive branch to carry out the laws of Congress No national judiciary to handle offenses against the central government’s laws or to settle disputes between states Congress...
Study Aid: Major Slave Rebellions
New York City, 1712 Like many later revolts, this one occurred during a period of social dissension among White colonists following Leisler’s Rebellion. The rebels espoused traditional African religions. Stono Rebellion, 1739 The...
The Battle over the Bank: Hamilton v. Jefferson
Background After months of battling and compromises, the US Constitution was finally sent to Congress by the Constitutional Convention on September 17, 1787. Through the ratification process and the first decade under the new...
Alexander Hamilton’s "gloomy" view of the American Revolution, 1780
By October 1780, in the midst of the American Revolution, Alexander Hamilton was discouraged by the apparent apathy of the American people and the ineffectuality of their elected representatives, as well as by the recent discovery of...
Aaron Burr, fugitive and traitor, 1804
On July 11, 1804, Vice President Aaron Burr shot former Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton in a duel in Weehawken, New Jersey. Nine days later he wrote this cryptic letter (partially in cipher) to his son-in-law, Joseph...
Hamilton’s Report on the Subject of Manufactures, 1791
When George Washington became president in 1789, he appointed Alexander Hamilton as his secretary of the Treasury. Hamilton’s vision for the economic foundation of the United States included three main programs: 1) the federal...
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