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Article: For the People: American Populist Movements from the Revolution to the 1850s.(Book review)
- Article from:
- The Journal of Southern History
- Article date:
- May 1, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 Southern Historical Association. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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For the People: American Populist Movements from the Revolution to the 1850s. By Ronald P. Formisano. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, c. 2008. Pp. [x], 315. $35.00, ISBN 978-0-8078-3172-4.)
Between the Revolutionary and Civil War eras, a stubbornly tenacious populism--one spawned from "the people's" contempt for a corrupt, ruling elite--defined American political culture. Such populist movements were driven by both reactionary and progressive ideologies and goals that often coexisted within one movement to defend the sovereignty of "the people" from an entrenched, self-serving, and corrupt leadership. As the eighteenth century came to an end, ...