{"product_id":"mason-dixon-crucible-of-the-nation-9780674301535","title":"Mason-Dixon: Crucible of the Nation","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"Deeply researched and highly readable.\" --Eric Foner, \u003ci\u003eTimes Literary Supplement\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"A rich history of regional distinctions, especially as they shaped the antebellum Republic.\" --\u003ci\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"A fitting testament to a career marked by boundary-crossing curiosity and stalwart service to the historical profession...[a] splendid new history.\" --Richard Bell, \u003ci\u003eRegister of the Kentucky Historical Society\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Fascinating...does justice to the full sweep and complexity of American history by expertly tracing a century of change across one especially revealing patch of ground.\" --James H. Read, \u003ci\u003eAmerican Political Thought\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Erudite, gripping, and highly significant. Gray puts his talents as a historian of the American Revolution and the early republic to excellent use, persuasively arguing that the Mason-Dixon Line is worth seeing as a geopolitical border.\" --Kathleen DuVal, author of \u003ci\u003eIndependence Lost\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAcclaimed scholar Edward Gray offers the first comprehensive history of the Mason-Dixon Line, a border at the center of early American political contestation. Formalized in 1767 to fully and finally demarcate Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Delaware, the Line resolved a longstanding jurisdictional conflict that had provoked bloodshed among colonists and ensnared Lenape and Susquehannock populations. In 1780, Pennsylvania's Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery inaugurated a new phase, as the Line became a boundary between free and slave states and their distinct legal regimes. Then, with the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, the Line became a federal instrument to arrest freedom-seeking Blacks. Only with the end of the Civil War did the Line's significance fade, though it haunted the geography of Jim Crow. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eMason-Dixon\u003c\/i\u003e tells the gripping story of colonial grandees, Native American diplomats, Quaker abolitionists, fugitives from slavery, capitalist railroad and canal builders, US presidents, Supreme Court justices, and Underground Railroad conductors--all contending with the relentless violence and political discord of a borderland that transformed American history.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGray, Edward G.:\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e - Edward G. Gray (1964-2023) was the author of acclaimed books on the revolutionary era and the early American republic, including \u003ci\u003eThe Making of John Ledyard: Empire and Ambition in the Life of an Early American Traveler\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eTom Paine's Iron Bridge: Building a United States\u003c\/i\u003e. He was Professor of History at Florida State University.","brand":"Harvard University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51661040156946,"sku":"9780674301535","price":19.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_eeb6ede2-3324-4a1c-b4d1-51e5f810ca71.jpg?v=1760434588","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/mason-dixon-crucible-of-the-nation-9780674301535","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}