Dominion of Memories: The Decline of the Virginia Dynasty

Historically Speaking July/August 2008 Historically Speaking July/August 2008 M)I. K No. 6 Contents Dominion ofMemories:2 The Decline of the Virginia Dynasty Susan Dunn BookReview: Imaginative Constructions 5 ofthe Nation Michael Kämmen PivotalMoments in WorldHistory6 Three Interviews Conducted by DonaldA. Yenca 77» Importance ofMyths inAmerican Politics 10 Rk* Shenkman Looking Back on Bertram WyattBrown 's Southern Honor. ARoundtable Ale and Southern Honor13 Edward E. Baptist Setting the Ternis ofthe Debate14 Stephen Berry 77» Scope ofSouthem Honor15 Orrite Vernon Burton 77» LegacyofBertram Wyatt-Brown's 16 Southern Honor Kenneth S. Greenberg Honorable Dispatches from South17 Carolina; or, WhatSome Graduate Students Think ofSouthern Honor Mark M. Smith The End of World War Il inAsia:19 An Interviewwith SirMax Hastings Conducted by DonaldA. Yerxa Evangelical Churches Crossing22 the Ethnic Divide Kathleen Garces-Fotey Manifestos torHistory. AReview Forum A ReviewofManifestosfor History25 Alan Mega Commentson Manifestos for History27 OavldA. HoMnger Some Reflections on Manifestos29 for History Bruce KuMlck "Wftar te to Be Done?"Manifestos for30 History andthe Mission ofHistory Today John H. ZamrnMo The Passingofa Generation33 Mark Be* 77» "ParanoidStyle"Redux: Leftists,35 Historians, andConspiracy Theory JohnA-Grigg Making Sense ofAmerican Culture m the 38 1970s: An Interviewwith Thomas Hine Conducted byRanda«J. Stephens Letters39 Dominion of Memories: The Decline of the Virginia Dynasty Susan Dunn In the late autumn of 1824 Thomas Jefferson made his way slowly down the steps of his home, quickening his pace as he approached his friend, die Marquis de Lafayette. The two men had not seen each other for more than three decades. "Let me once more have the happiness of talking over with you," Jefferson had expectandy written to Lafayette a few months earlier, "your first labors here, those I witnessed in your own country, its past & present afflictions and future hopes." They embraced and wept as Lafayette's official entourage of cavalry and American dignitaries looked on. The "Nation's Guest," Lafayette had recendy begun an official, ceremonial tour of all twenty-four states. He found the eighty-one-year-old Jefferson "much aged" but "marvelously well" and "in full possession of all die vigor of his mind and heart." At sunset, just as they were finishing dessert, James Madison, now seventy-four, joined them. Madison later commented that Lafayette appeared in fine health and spirits but so much increased in bulk and changed in aspect that he hardly recognized him. Well, for his part, Lafayette had trouble recognizing Virginia. Having just visited die "delightfully situated" New Haven, die "beautiful village" of Cambridge in Massachusetts, the bustling, dynamic city of New York, Lafayette and his secretary, Auguste Levasseur, could not but notice, "at every step," die relative backwardness and poverty of Virginia. It had taken diem six hours to travel twenty-five miles from Richmond to Petersburg. Along die way, they saw isolated towns, sleepy villages, depleted soil. The cause seemed only too clear to diem, as did me remedy. Only when Virginia comprehended "her true interests better" and abolished slavery, Levasseur believed, would it catch up to the Northeast. It was also the sunset of die Virginia Dynasty . Four of die first five American presidents were Virginians; but after Monroe, only one odier Virginian occupied die office. John Tyler ascended to die presidency in 1841; when he died two decades later, he was a member of the Confederate Provisional Congress and a citizen of the Confederate States of America. Virginia's eclipse was visible on die Supreme Court, too. Four Virginians , led by die great Chief Justice John Marshall , served on the high court during die first decades of die young republic. But between 1841 and 1971, when Lewis Powell was appointed, only one Virginian would occupy a seat on die courtPeter Daniel, who voted widi die majority in die Thomas Jefferson. Etching by Mlchal Sokolnicki, created between 18001816 . Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division [reproduction number. LC-USZC4-7084). Dred Scott case that helped precipitate die Civil War. The days when intrepid, daring Virginians led thirteen backwater colonies in a war against die mightiest power on die planet were becoming a distant memory, and their fiery patriotism a dying ember. The delegates streaming into Philadelphia in September 1774 for the...