Bibliograph

Heirs of the founders, the epic rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun and Daniel Webster, the second generation of American giants, H.W. Brands

Type

Label

Heirs of the founders, the epic rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun and Daniel Webster, the second generation of American giants, H.W. Brands

Language

eng

Bibliography note

Includes bibliographical references and index

resource.biographical

collective biography

Illustrations

illustrations

Index

index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

Heirs of the founders

Nature of contents

bibliography

Oclc number

1023859927

Responsibility statement

H.W. Brands

Sub title

the epic rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun and Daniel Webster, the second generation of American giants

Summary

In the early 1800s, three young men strode onto the national stage, elected to Congress at a moment when the Founding Fathers were beginning to retire to their farms. Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, a champion orator known for his eloquence, spoke for the North and its business class. Henry Clay of Kentucky, as dashing as he was ambitious, embodied the hopes of the rising West. South Carolina's John Calhoun, with piercing eyes and an even more piercing intellect, defended the South and slavery. Together these heirs of Washington, Jefferson and Adams took the country to war, battled one another for the presidency and set themselves the task of finishing the work the Founders had left undone. Their rise was marked by dramatic duels, fierce debates, scandal and political betrayal. Yet each in his own way sought to remedy the two glaring flaws in the Constitution: its refusal to specify where authority ultimately rested, with the states or the nation, and its unwillingness to address the essential incompatibility of republicanism and slavery. They wrestled with these issues for four decades, arguing bitterly and hammering out political compromises that held the Union together, but only just. Then, in 1850, when California moved to join the Union as a free state, "the immortal trio" had one last chance to save the country from the real risk of civil war. But, by that point, they had never been further apart

Table Of Contents

Prologue: January 1850 -- The spirit of '76 -- To build a nation -- The people's government -- Next to our liberty -- Temptations of empire -- The fatal compromise

Target audience

adult

Classification