Historians have long contested the degree to which the central tenet of the Declaration of Independence—that all men are created equal—has manifested itself in American society and national policy. According to James L. Huston, many historians have focused too intently on class differences, slavery, and inequalities arising from ethnicity, sexuality, and gender, while overlooking important areas where notions of equality flourished during the century and a half after the Declaration’s signing. In The American and British Debate Over Equality, 1776–1920, Huston examines the egalitarian communities in rural northern America, particularly those enclaves that differed from the openly aristocratic cities and towns of the British Isles. In the aftermath of the American Revolution, British and American writers alike recognized that a growing philosophical rift divided the two nations: whereas Great Britain continued to embrace the inequality of its hierarchical class system, the United States professed allegiance to democratic ideals of equality—limited though these were by racial and gender norms of the day. Huston argues that the two countries engaged in an intellectual debate during the next century and a half over which ideal—equality or inequality—worked best in promoting social stability, political hegemony, and economic success. Exploring the effects of equality and inequality on many aspects of American life, he examines civil behavior, social customs, treatment of others, politics, education, religion, economic opportunity, and general public optimism. Drawing from decades of publications by American and British writers, Huston reveals the rhetorical strategies contemporary observers employed in defending or rejecting the organization of a society around broader notions of human equality. The American and British Debate Over Equality, 1776–1920 informs the modern debate over equality and inequality, not by theorizing and philosophizing, but by offering a glimpse into the practical applications of a functioning egalitarian society as compared to one that extolled monarchy and institutionalized inequality.

The American and British Debate Over Equality, 1776–1920 examines comparisons between American ideals of a classless society and the contrasting British class system, which accepted the existence of inequalities. When the United States declared political independence in 1776, they also announced repudiation of social institutions based on inequality, opting instead for (an ill-defined) equality. British travelers to the United States after 1776 and up to 1920 continuously wrote about how equality was faring in the United States and compared it to the operation of inequality in England, Scotland, and Ireland. They laid bare the actual outcomes of a system of equality versus one of inequality; this was no theoretical, intellectual exercise but instead constituted a recording of actual human practices. By the end of the nineteenth century, the defects of a system of inequality became clear in manners, social interchanges between income classes, general education levels, religious convictions, and the general energy of a people. The exploration of these nineteenth-century comparisons has great relevance for today's persistent debates about social inequities and their solutions.

Equality is in crisis. Our world is filled with soaring inequalities, spanning wealth, race, identity, and nationality. Yet how can we strive for equality if we don't understand it? As much as we have struggled for equality, we have always been profoundly sceptical about it. How much do we want, and for whom? Darrin M. McMahon's Equality is the definitive intellectual history, tracing equality's global origins and spread from the dawn of humanity through the Enlightenment to today. Equality has been reimagined continually, in the great world religions and the politics of the ancient world, by revolutionaries and socialists, Nazis and fascists, and post-war reformers and activists. A magisterial exploration of why equality matters and why we continue to reimagine it, Equality offers all the tools to rethink equality anew for our own age. 'Fascinating' - New York Times

An in-depth study of American social movements after the Civil War and their lessons for today by a prizewinning historian The Civil War unleashed a torrent of claims for equality—in the chaotic years following the war, former slaves, women’s rights activists, farmhands, and factory workers all engaged in the pursuit of the meaning of equality in America. This contest resulted in experiments in collective action, as millions joined leagues and unions. In Equality: An American Dilemma, 1866–1886, Charles Postel demonstrates how taking stock of these movements forces us to rethink some of the central myths of American history. Despite a nationwide push for equality, egalitarian impulses oftentimes clashed with one another. These dynamics get to the heart of the great paradox of the fifty years following the Civil War and of American history at large: Waves of agricultural, labor, and women’s rights movements were accompanied by the deepening of racial discrimination and oppression. Herculean efforts to overcome the economic inequality of the first Gilded Age and the sexual inequality of the late-Victorian social order emerged alongside Native American dispossession, Chinese exclusion, Jim Crow segregation, and lynch law. Now, as Postel argues, the twenty-first century has ushered in a second Gilded Age of savage socioeconomic inequalities. Convincing and learned, Equality explores the roots of these social fissures and speaks urgently to the need for expansive strides toward equality to meet our contemporary crisis.

Winner of the New Scholar’s Book Award from the American Educational Research Association The abolitionist movement not only helped bring an end to slavery in the United States but also inspired the large-scale admission of African Americans to the country’s colleges and universities. Oberlin College changed the face of American higher education in 1835 when it began enrolling students irrespective of race and sex. Camaraderie among races flourished at the Ohio institution and at two other leading abolitionist colleges, Berea in Kentucky and New York Central, where Black and white students allied in the fight for emancipation and civil rights. After Reconstruction, however, color lines emerged on even the most progressive campuses. For new generations of white students and faculty, ideas of fairness toward African Americans rarely extended beyond tolerating their presence in the classroom, and overt acts of racial discrimination grew increasingly common by the 1880s. John Frederick Bell’s Degrees of Equality analyzes the trajectory of interracial reform at Oberlin, New York Central, and Berea, noting its implications for the progress of racial justice in both the nineteenth and twenty-first centuries. Drawing on student and alumni writings, institutional records, and promotional materials, Bell interrogates how abolitionists and their successors put their principles into practice. The ultimate failure of these social experiments illustrates a tragic irony of abolitionism, as the achievement of African American freedom and citizenship led whites to divest from the project of racial pluralism.

This A-to-Z encyclopedia surveys the history, meaning, and enduring impact of the Declaration of Independence by explaining its contents and concepts, profiling the Founding Fathers, and detailing depictions of the Declaration in art, music, and literature. A comprehensive resource for understanding all aspects of the Declaration of Independence, which marked the formal beginning of the colonies' march toward the creation of the United States of America, this encyclopedia contains more than 200 entries examining various facets of the Declaration of Independence and its enduring impact on American law, politics, and culture. It details key concepts, principles, and intellectual influences that informed the creation of the document, reviews charges leveled in the Declaration against the British crown, summarizes the events of the first and second Continental Congresses, profiles influential architects and signers of the Declaration, discusses existing copies of the Declaration, explains the document's influence on other governments/nations, covers historic sites related to the document, and discusses depictions of the document and its architects in American art, music, and literature over time.

From a distinguished historian, a detailed and compelling examination of how the early Republic struggled with the idea that “all men are created equal” How did Americans in the generations following the Declaration of Independence translate its lofty ideals into practice? In this broadly synthetic work, distinguished historian Richard Brown shows that despite its founding statement that “all men are created equal,” the early Republic struggled with every form of social inequality. While people paid homage to the ideal of equal rights, this ideal came up against entrenched social and political practices and beliefs. Brown illustrates how the ideal was tested in struggles over race and ethnicity, religious freedom, gender and social class, voting rights and citizenship. He shows how high principles fared in criminal trials and divorce cases when minorities, women, and people from different social classes faced judgment. This book offers a much-needed exploration of the ways revolutionary political ideas penetrated popular thinking and everyday practice.