The Political Culture of the American Whigs

by Daniel Walker Howe

Howe studies the American Whigs with the thoroughness so often devoted their party rivals, the Jacksonian Democrats. He shows that the Whigs were not just a temporary coalition of politicians but spokesmen for a heritage of political culture received from Anglo-American tradition and passed on, with adaptations, to the Whigs' Republican successors. He relates this culture to both the country's economic conditions and its ethnoreligious composition.

Genres: History, American History, Politics, The United States Of America, Philosophy, Americana

416 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

A specialist in the intellectual and religious history of the United States during the antebellum era, Daniel Walker Howe was Rhodes Professor of American History Emeritus at Oxford University in England and Professor of History Emeritus at the University of California, Los Angeles. He received the Pulitzer Prize for History for What Hath God Wrought, his most famous book. He was president of the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic in 2001 and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Howe graduated from East High School (Denver, Colorado), and received his Bachelor of Arts at Harvard University, magna cum laude in American History and Literature in 1959, and his Ph.D. at University of California, Berkeley in 1966.

Howe's connection with Oxford University began when he matriculated at Magdalen College to read Modern History in 1960; he took his M.A. in 1965. In 1989–1990, he was Harmsworth Visiting Professor of American History at Oxford and a Fellow of Queen's College. In 1992, he became a permanent member of the Oxford History Faculty and a Fellow of St Catherine's College, Oxford until his retirement in 2002. Brasenose College elected him an Honorary Member of their Senior Common Room.

Reviews

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book makes the Whigs interesting, if not downright fascinating-- something I did not expect to say. It's a detailed (but not boring) explanation of the party's politics, philosophy, and culture. I highly recommend it.

[Ben Rothman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lively account of a dead political party.

[William Hamilton · Rating 5 out of 5]

"To the extent that we continue to face issues like the conservation or exploitation of resources, the integration or separatism of ethnicity, morality in the media, responsibility in the use of alcohol and drugs, and the reaction to unjust wars, the Whigs and their times will never seem totally alien."

Daniel Walker Howes portrait of the political culture of the American whig party is highly illuminating. At once progressive and highly conservative, at once champions of social justice and defenders of social hierarchy, Whig leaders were the personification of an American ethic of ordered liberty. The transformation of the United States from an amalgamation of different state entities into a consonant and identifiable Nation State, with a readily acknowledgeable national character, owes itself to the project of which the Whig party was the champion. From Henry Clays "American System", to Henry C. Careys Nationalist Economics, to Horace Manns realization of a public school system, the Whigs created the foundation for a truly national culture. But there was one essential obstacle, that created not just sectionalism that was intolerant of this whiggish national culture, but furthermore stood as the central division within the Whig party that would ultimately lead to their collapse. This issue is of course that of slavery.

While Howes book is not about slavery, nor even does it focus on the Whig reaction to slavery, it becomes clear that the question of slavery represented the fundamental divide that challenged Whiggery's dedication at once to both progress and order. While some of the fiercest abolitionists made up the members of the whig party, they were at once furthermore dedicated to a respect for the law and for social hierarchy. Under the context of industrialization, where inequality was indeed rising, however the rising tide lifted all boats, this paradoxical nature of whiggery was not so much of a challenge among relations between different classes of whites. But when the southern system of slavery not only posed an existential challenge to whig morality, but furthermore, represented backwards slide from the economic progress that constituted the basis of the whig social order, the conservative and progressive nature of whiggery faced its utmost challenge. No surprise is it then, that the Whig movement had all but collapsed under the weight of the controversial Kansas-Nebraska act of 1854. But with all of its sentiments and social power, the Whiggish attitude cultivated generations of Americans, and one particular American, Abraham Lincoln, to reconcile these challenges and bring this chapter of contradiction to a close.


Daniel Walker Howe's work is a technical masterpiece. Setting the stage with the context and the foundations of the Whig party, he moves on to take a closer work at some of the key associated figures. But more than giving biographical information, Howe uses the character of these American heroes to demonstrate the true personality of the Whig party and its ethos. You will leave this book feeling not just that you have knowledge of some historical figures, but as if you met them personally, and perhaps even discovered their soul. A sense not just of the figures themselves, but what God used them for within the context of their time, as something bigger than just themselves. While Howe occasionally dabbles in brief general remarks on the figures in the book using terms of Freudian-Marxist psychoanalysis, extremely popular during the moment in which he wrote this book, this is not distracting or offensive in the slightest, nor does it play a prominent role within the work whatsoever. In truth, his Freudian-Marxist psychoanalytic asides are so sparse, and so general, that really if anything they are just suggestions for future analysis that amount to little more than food for thought. Howes writing is clear, focused, and the different chapters and scope of this work work beautifully both as a whole and as fragments. Any of the chapters would be enjoyable isolated as essays. Yet however, as a coherent full, this is one of the better designed historical books I have read. One is certain not to regret their purchase, nor time spent reading this book.

The Political Culture of the America Whig Party is a certified work of genius. While far from the popularity of a work such as the "Age of Jackson", this book is of the highest standard for understanding American politics of the 19th Century. I am immensely thankful for his careful citation of his sources, the clearness of his writing, and the framing and scope that he embarked on. Any reader interested in the American Whig Party or the politics of this era is sure to enjoy and learn a great deal from this phenomenal book. 5/5

[Sarah Hammond]

ALL rec

[Don Incognito]

SECOND REVIEW - September 25, 2017

The Political Culture of the American Whigs should not be the only book you read to learn about the 19th-century Whig party.

The key to the book's huge limitation is in the title: the phrase "political culture." It's erroneous: the book is about the philosophical and intellectual predispositions of the Whigs, not any aspect of their politics. I read it five or six years ago, but frankly I remember that their was relatively little discussion of the Whigs in politics. If that's what you really want to know, you will be disappointed. From this book you will learn learn such interesting things as the nature of Abraham Lincoln's poetry (which the author snobbishly judges second-rate or amateurish) and the eccentricities of Massachusetts statesman Rufus Choate.

The book takes great care to avoid discussing topics that would make the Whigs look bad, such as "internal improvements" or why the Whig Party fell apart before the Civil War. The author obviously writes from a sympathetic viewpoint.


_______________________________________
First Review - 2011

This is an essential book on the 19th-century American Whig party. It explains what the Whig party was; what it stood for; what it did in politics; who its opponents were, how and why it officially died out (but unofficially survived in its similar successor, the Republican Party) and who its prominent members were.

Although highly informative, it is obviously biased in favor of the Whigs. It doesn't whitewash them, but has little or nothing critical to say about them. For instance, it makes little or no attempt to explore the downside of their strong belief in "internal improvements" (essentially, using government subsidies to stimulate economic development in ways they liked). The only time the Whigs really look bad in this book is when it explains why the Whig party fell apart. That was over slavery: the Whig Party opposed slavery, but was willing to compromise on it in order to keep the Union from fracturing; but when the sectional conflicts became too intense to be saved through compromise, the Southern Whigs--many of whom were rich slaveholders--sided with the South and openly expressed white supremacist views. The Northern Whigs were just as resolutely anti-slavery, and the irreconcilable opposition split the party. The Southern Whigs mostly became Democrats, while the Northern Whigs formed the Republican party, whose only substantial policy difference from the Whigs was refusing to compromise on slavery.

This book told me what I wanted to know about the Whigs. Now if only I can find a similarly illuminating book about the 19th-century Democrats and their viewpoint.

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brief but fascinating introduction to an almost forgotten pillar of America's political and social development in the 19th century. The chapter on Lincoln is especially interesting, clarifying the impossibility of understanding Lincoln without understanding the Whig system that shaped his personal and professional development.

[Mrjeffreymiller · Rating 5 out of 5]

fantastic - a great well rounded view on antebellum political history.