CLHUMHI604 - The Making of the American Nation
The founding institutions of this nation have faced significant stress in recent years. How did these institutions, practices and principles emerge and evolve? How did we come to expect civilian control of the military, religious freedom, the primacy of laws rather than human beings, peaceful transfer of power, orderly elections, the Supreme Court as the final arbiter of our laws, the existence of political parties, the expansive role of the president? This class examines seven Virginians who shaped our nation—George Washington, George Mason, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe and John Marshall. They created a nation based on a constitution that, as Barack Obama said, “had embedded” in it a “North Star that would guide future generations; a system of representative government . . . through which we could better realize our highest ideals.” We also consider the founders’ faults, especially on the tragic issue of slavery, with repercussions that reverberate today.
Course Details
John B. Boles, Ph.D., the William Pettus Hobby Professor of History, Emeritus, at Rice University, editor emeritus of The Journal of Southern History and author of numerous books, has directed more than 60 Ph.D. students in southern history at Rice and serves on Rice’s Task Force on Slavery, Segregation and Racial Injustice. The Association of Rice Alumni has awarded him the Meritorious Service Award, the Distinguished Alumni Award and its gold medal. He has also received the Graduate Student Association Excellence in Teaching Award, the Presidential Mentoring Award and twice the George R. Brown Award for Superior Teaching. Dr. Boles holds a B.A. from Rice University and a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia, where he was a Thomas Jefferson Foundation Fellow and a Woodrow Wilson Dissertation Fellow. He has just completed writing a new book tentatively titled “Nation-Makers: Seven Virginians and the Creation of the United States.”
Online: Synchronous
This course will be delivered in a synchronous format online. Registered participants will receive login instructions to the course page, which will provide access to the virtual classroom link and other resources.
- The American Revolution
- Writing and Ratifying the Constitution
- Getting the New Government Underway
- The Evolution of the Presidency and Expansion of the Nation
- A Second War with Great Britain
- The Rise of the Supreme Court
- The Founders and the Issue of Slavery
Department of History, Rice University