The Frontier, the Union, and Stephen A. Douglas (review)

72CTVTL WAR HISTORY transformation, the ideological cleavage, the moral clash, the abyss between free and slave labor, the religious and ethnic hostility—all of which operated profoundly to mold antebellum politics (and its leaders)— are given at best glancing attention. In addition, Peterson asks his reader to accept on faith his statement that Webster, Clay and Calhoun "were representatives, spokesmen, ultimately personifications, of their respective sections: East, West, and South" (5). Can we derive the consciousness of a people from the goals and aspirations of the leaders? What of the diversity of voices that "East, West, and South" subsumes? The tight spotlight on three statesmen leaves too much that is crucial in the shadows. In a very real sense, they were not the cause but the result of basic changes elsewhere. That does not deny their individual genius and efficacy, but the zigs and zags of the leaders was only a part of politics and politics only a part of the broad transformation of antebellum America. This is not to say that Peterson's study is a frothy, lightweight pageturner . It is a serious, substantial work that instructs as well as delights. To criticize it for incompleteness is perhaps unfair. Nonetheless, its reticence about the impersonal but powerful developments that molded American politics and its single-minded devotion to individual "greatness " may mislead unwary readers, especially lay readers who will rightfully be drawn to The Great Triumvirate. James L. Roark Emory University 7"Ae Frontier, the Union, and Stephen A. Douglas. By Robert W. Johannsen. (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1989. Pp. xix, 313. $34.95.) During his long career Robert W. Johannsen has been one of the leading historians of the 185Os. In addition to his well-known biography of Stephen A. Douglas, which won the Francis Parkman Prize, he has edited a collection of Douglas's letters and written Frontier Politics and the Sectional Conflict. He has also written on the Mexican War and published an edition of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates. The essays in this collection illustrate the interests that informed his books and show his remarkable command of the history between the start of the Mexican War and the Civil War. Thirteen of these fifteen essays are reprinted as originally published and are so placed that the subject of one generally flows easily into the subject of the next. The two new pieces, given as addresses in 1978 and 1986, end the work. This collection is more unified than similar publications because the author's work has concentrated on sectionalism in the 185Os, in which the major issues proved to be highly interconnected. This also means there is frequent repetition—this may BOOK REVIEWS73 bother some readers, but it should not be irksome because much of the overlap serves to emphasize important points that need repetition. Johannsen notes in his preface that these essays focus on "slavery, secession, and the nature of the Union [which] came to dominate political thought and activity during the decade of the 185Os" (ix). One of the key figures in this debate, of course, was Stephen Douglas, and his policy of popular sovereignty and its precise meaning is a major theme of these essays. It is clear that Johannsen has a more positive view of Douglas than most historians have; the Little Giant was not a mere opportunist, nor was he any more racist than most of his countrymen. Perhaps because my own state celebrated its centennial in 1989, I am also struck by another theme, perhaps unintended, which is that many states have a fascinating history prior to statehood that has been largely overlooked. Territorial history is a field with plenty of empty spaces. Douglas was a western man, looking always to the future of the inland empire. Thus he favored western expansion, railroads, free land, and especially self-government. Oregon was one of the first tests of popular sovereignty, and when Douglas introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act, he seemed to Oregonians to be supporting their quest for self-government. They overlooked the slavery question and instead saw "an affirmation by the national government of their right to self-government no matter where they happened to be living...