cost of it. but he did do that. and it was a great example, i thought, of him being not this egotistical artist but asking for help. >> any other questions? >> we're out of time. >> thank you all so much for being here. if you have other questions, we'll be on stage. you're watching american history tv. every weekend on c-span 3, explore our nation's past. american history tv on c-span 3, created by america's cable television companies and today we're brought to you by these television companies who provide american history to viewers as a public service. if you like american history tv, keep up with us during the week on facebook, twitter and youtube. learn about what happened this day in history and see preview clips of upcoming programs.

follow us at c-span history. ing for the american revolution, similar uprisings occurred throughout latin america and were celebrated in the united states along with its own july 4th holiday. up next, author of "our sister republics" the united states in an age of american revolutions explains how americans saw these revolts as an affirmation of their ideals. video. caitlin: i am delighted to join in as part of the museums virtual july 4 celebration, and in honor of the impending holiday i want to start off the bit of time travel. we are going to travel back to hundred years to july 4, 1820. here to help paint the picture, is that image of what a july 4 celebration looks like.

i am cheating because this images is from 1819, not 1820. but i chose it because it is in philadelphia, and it gives a sense of some of the activities people would typically engage in at an independence day party. there would have been music and we have a fiddler. the art military guys marching in the background. another thing that would have happened at these festivals, as in the tent on the left, white men, in particular, would have gathered for big dinner parties, where they would eat special holiday delicacies, like turtle soup perhaps, which was what it sounded like. in the south, barbecue was common. if you lived in part of the country where you had saved snow and ice from winter, which new englanders could do, and they

exported ice to other parts of the country and the world, maybe you would be lucky enough to taste a little bit of ice cream. so, white men-and i will say more in a minute about white white men in particular-would sit at these dinner parties, and raise their glasses and toast the causes they care about most. now, if we were in person today, as originally planned before covid, i would ask at this point, what you thought some of the more common july 4 toasts were, and i have posed this question to my students. they always come up with lots of very good and correct answers. toasts were to the fourth of july, the declaration, the constitution, the revolution, veterans, to political and military leaders like george washington, adams, jefferson, depending on the location of the crowd and political affiliations. all of these are toasts it is

fair to say we might expect from a group of white american men in 1820. of course they're going to toast the declaration on independence day. but what most struck me, as i started to look at july 4 celebrations, was that in the decade that followed the war of 1812, 1816-1825, toasts to latin america were very common. people would raise their glasses , and drink too as they put it, our sister republics of south america. this is where the title of my book comes from. according to one newspaper editor posts to south america were second in number only to toasts to the revolution, the constitution, and the fourth itself. sometimes july 4 parties would fly the stars and stripes,

alongside flags from places like columbia and peru. july 4 orators would stand before huge crowds, and sing the praises of latin america, and latin american potential to waves of thunderous applause. so, what is going on? when i first realized the scope of this popular interest in latin america, i was genuinely stunned. i was living in philadelphia at the time i put the pieces together. i remember walking down locust street, in a state of baffled excitement, because i think we americans today tend to assume we are more global, more engaged with the rest of the world, then previous points in our history. in some ways, in terms of the speed and instead to nady -- speed and quickness of connections, that may be true

but i think we have forgotten how globally minded, and house spherically minded -- how hemispherically minded, we were. to explain why latin america had such a place of prominence at fourth of july subbasins -- fourth of july celebrations 200 years ago, what we called the american revolution was the first strike in a hemispheric age of american revolution. in hot sentry that unfolded between the shot heard round the world in 1775, and the independence of bolivia, in 1825, most of the western hemisphere broke away from europe. the u.s., obviously, followed by the independence of haiti in 1804. in the 1810s and 1820's, brazil and the entire spanish-american mainland, broke away from spain

and portugal. so, everything from mexico and colombia, to chile and peru, all becoming independent, which means this half-century from 1775-1825 really was a broader age of american revolutions. it is a staggering geopolitical transformation that takes place in a relatively small swath of time. my research focuses on the second half of that 50 year window, and how the independence wars in latin america shaped the united states. i'm going to do three main things and my talk today. first i will say more about the, why. white people in the early u.s. were so excited about latin american independent. second, i'm going to talk about what this popular enthusiasm tells us about early u.s. understandings of race, and revolution, and republicanism.

finally, i will talk about why this popular enthusiasm for latin american independence, started to decline around the nation's 50th birthday, in 1826, helping to bring this age of american revolutions to a close. i will dive now into the first quite, about the, why. white people in the early u.s. were so excited about latin american independence? to answer that question, let me show a few other manifestations of this excitement. we can turn to maps, like this one, from a popular children's geography textbook. as you see, it is portraying the entire western hemisphere, as one united continent, not two continents of north and south america, as we tend to do today. this would have been something that schoolboys and schoolgirls throughout the country would have been taught.

we could also turn to songs, like this one. this is, bolivar, in honor of simon bolívar, known as the liberator of much of northern south america. he has that and now often referred to as, the george washington of south america. you can see this is bolivar, a peruvian battle song sung by mr. howard with unbounded applause at tatum theater in new york city. you can see this is published in philadelphia, a few blocks from independence hall. there were 20 songs like this, written in honor of south american independence. more evidence of this excitement about latin america, turned from bolivar songs to hats. these are newspaper ads for bolivar hats i pulled from

around the country. i searched far and wide for an actual image of a bolivar hat but i can tell from verbal descriptions these would have been straw hats, with broad rims, lots of feathers, popular among women and girls, in the early united states. so, this is inspiring women's fashion choices. you might reasonably be saying ok, this is interesting, but how do we note this evidence is not just cherry picked, right? how do we know the average american really cares about latin american independence? two kinds of evidence are quantifiable. they give us a sense of how widespread this interest was. first, was july 4 celebrations, and we will come back to this picture for a second. i can give you numbers on this, and i should explain the reason we know, what happens at july 4 parties, is that the people who

organized the celebrations, would write up transcripts of everything that was said and done, and then send those transcripts to their local newspaper editors, who would then publish it. i should specify, it is not everything said and done in this report, because we know from other sources, letters, diaries, that would actually happen at july 4 celebrations, was that the ceremonial gunshots and cannon fire, which you get a sense of, represented in kids playing with toy firearms, did not mix well. the fireworks, too, not mix with the excessive amounts of alcohol consumed at the celebrations, so there were accidents, injuries. the drinking rate at this moment was approaching an all-time high for american history. so we should think of these july 4 celebrations as idealized versions of what white americans

thought should have happened, on independence day. identify white americans because black americans were not usually allowed to participate at these early july 4 celebrations, because there your presence increasingly struck white people as inherently threatening on a day meant to celebrate freedom. and i will get back to african american views and abolitionist views of latin america and a little bit, but for now, this is to say that july 4 toasts tell us about white men's views in particular. so i looked at almost 900 july 4 parties, from throughout the country, and calculated the percentage of parties every year, that included toasts to latin american independence. here, after my number crunching is what i came up with.

the key take away is in the decade that followed the war of 1812, well over half of july 4 parties included toasts to latin america. the way i concluded that number is very conservative. anecdotally, newspaper editors about local stripes said that toasts to latin america were all but universal. this is one of the main points i make in the book. that on the country's most self-consciously patriotic holiday, the one day of the year people are gathering and self-conscious exploration of the ties that bind them together as a country and a people, americans are looking abroad to these foreign revolutions. they are looking abroad, to define who they are at home. latin american independence was not only a national craze, in other words, it was also a nationalistic praise. -- craze.

the reason was, people in the united states. latin american revolutionaries were imitating the united states. they were happy to give themselves credit for everything good that seemed to be happening south of the border. so, u.s. observers saw latin american independence as proof, that their own ideals really poor universal as they had toys maintained since 1776, and that made them proud. it made them feel important in a global and almost cosmic sense. so in celebrate and latin american independence, people in the u.s. were also celebrating themselves. and it is quite ironic, because, to be clear on this, latin americans were not, for the most part, imitating united states. there independence wars, stems more immediately from different causes, specifically from the chaos of europe's napoleonic wars. other historians have shown insofar as latin american elites

looked abroad for inspiration, they were turning more commonly, in most cases, to great britain, for inspiration and for aid. we also know that latin american s of african descent looked more commonly to haiti. but, in the u.s., modesty has never really than a national virtue. so, people here were confident that they were the ones who deserved credit for inspiring latin americans to revolt. in their defense, latin american s totally played into this. if you read the expert -- excerpt posted on the museum's website, you know there were dozens of revelations in the u.s. during this time, often in philadelphia, with an blocks where the museum stands today. and they were hoping to get aid and diplomatic recognition. so they went around the country, telling u.s. audiences, exactly what they wanted to hear. they would essentially say, we

love the u.s. and wants me just like the united states. can you please just give us a little bit of money, so we can be sure to succeed in our efforts? and u.s. audiences, though they really get the money up front, they ate up the idea that they were responsible for these independence movements, they really liked to believe that. that is how we end up with a newspaper advertisement like this one, for all of our hats. -- bolivar hats. this is probably not what it bolivar hat would have looked like, probably just a stock image of what a newspaper printer would've had. this ad is strategically placed by a new york city hat salesman undo 29, 1825, a few days -- on june 29, 1825, a few days before new yorkers are going to gather on independence day.

the salesman goes on to say reader should buy his bolivar hats to wear to fourth of july parties to showcase your u.s. patriotism, by wearing a hat that honors a spanish-speaking south american-statesman. that is because, to show support for latin america, is to show support for the united states. all of this is to state july 4 toasts are the first quantifiable evidence i turned to. the second quantifiable evidence i looked at, to study popular u.s. thinking about latin america was this, a page from the 1850 u.s. census. as you see at the top, it says, free inhabitants in blank. in the county of florence, state of illinois. lawrence county illinois, in the eastern part of the state, a

community of farmers. it is so rural, there's not a town name and it just goes by the county. on september 30, 1850, william christie, assistant marshall. this census taker went from farm to farm knocking on doors and saying, who lives here? what are their names? what are their ages? it is the in person version of the electronic 2020 census we hopefully filled out in the past several months. this is how was done 200 years ago, more labor-intensive in the data collection. the next slide will zoom in on the last household, so we can read it. we see here, james knab's head of household, 59-year-old, now. -- male. nothing listed in the color column which by 19th century standards means he has white. he has real estate and is born in maryland.

underneath him, his wife barbera. and underneath that, his son, named, bolivar. he is 25 years old born around 1825 here in illinois, a farmer like his father. it is interesting his younger brother is named hamilton, which gives you a sense of the parent's priorities here. the bigger point, for now, is that little bolivar nabb, was one of many. by 1830, i found 200 baby bolivar's, crying and slobbering their way to the united states. i like to call this the bolivar baby boom. one thing i like about this bolivar baby boom, is that it is coming from others as well as fathers, so we get a sense of women's engagement in latin american independence.

we also get a sense of geographic range. as you see here, these are not just east coast urbanites, their midwestern farmers in this case, they are southern slaveholders. in some cases, we see free black men, who take on the name all of our, at -- bolivar, as a last name when they win their freedom or independence. i found a free like mother who names her son simon bolivar. for now come the point is that these baby bolivars, really represent a cross-section of the country. not only to their mothers and fathers have access to information on latin america, which they are probably getting through newspapers and word-of-mouth. but, they are emotionally and personally invested in what is happening there, to the extent that they are naming their sons, and sometimes themselves, after this spanish-speaking catholic revolutionary.

i should add, this is more than just rhetoric. this is more than just superficial excitement. because people in the u.s. actually do several concrete things, in support of latin american independence. i scoured diplomatic archives in the u.s. and latin america, as well as thousands of pages, and the u.s. congressional record. i found three concrete things that resulted partly from this popular enthusiasm. first, thousands of u.s. citizens took up arms for latin american independence, usually as privateers, but sometimes they enlist directly in insurgent navies in latin america. second, i found u.s. merchants and manufacturers were one of the rebels'biggest foreign suppliers of arms and munitions. second to great britain.

third, the united states became the first country in the world, to extend formal diplomatic recognition, to mainland spanish america, which happens in 1822, and to brazil, in 1824. that is the context for the 1823 on road doctrine, in which -- monroe doctrine, in which the u.s. famously declares the western hemisphere off-limits to further colonization attempts. i do not want to exaggerate the extent of this military or diplomatic support for latin america, because, to be clear, the united states never does for latin america, what france had done for the united states. this is one reason spanish america's independence wars took

so much longer than the united states did, was so much more destruction. the united states got game changing foreign eight on generous terms, where spanish americans did not. if we think about the different trajectories of united states and spanish america after independence, this structural factor is a key part of the reason spanish americans did not have a really powerful foreign ally like the united states had heard all of this is, to say, the popular enthusiasm for latin american independence, is one factor that helps to bend u.s. policy in a direction that, on balance, helps latin american revolutionaries, albeit in a cautious and limited way. all of that said, my book is less about this kind of high-level diplomacy, and it is more about what the popular excitement about latin american

tells us about the early united states. let's turn now directly to this question. what does this hemispheric excitement tell us about the early u.s.? it is the question that drives my book. there are three big points i want to make here. the first is a point i already made, about how the inter-american excitement was a key driver of u.s. nationalism after the war of 1812, because americans are so excited to think they have inspired latin american's revolution and it makes them feel very important. but i will acknowledge that at some level, if you zoom out to the big picture here, what i have told you so far, may not seem all that surprising. i mean, here we have a set, a foreign revolutions, waged by people who call themselves americans, and who occasionally invoke the u.s. example. so, of course people in the united states are excited about

it. i think there is a sort of intuitive logic to what i have been telling you so far. if anything is surprising about all of this, it is probably the sheer scope of interest in latin america at a grassroots and sometimes quantitative level. so, at this point i want to throw in a wrinkle, and explain why i think this story is also qualitatively interesting. this is the second key point i make in the book. and the second key point i want to of the size today is this hemispheric excitement thrives amidst obvious religious, and especially racial differences. for one thing, u.s. observers rarely dwelled on latin american s'catholicism. it is as if republican spread abroad was so exhilarating that it overshadowed concerns about religion. still, more importantly to my research, spanish americans in

particular, were implementing gradual antislavery measures, during their independence as part of their military strategy. they were also in some places elevating elite men of color to positions of military and political authority. so, to put that another way, spanish americans, at least purported to be building multiracial republics, in word and rhetoric, if not always in deed. and these developments are widely understood in the u.s. newspapers, almost universally, reported on spanish-american antislavery efforts and related measures. yet, the popular jubilation about latin america continued for years as it had before, even in the deep south. this is probably the most surprising thing i found in all of my research. i had expected white u.s. observers to recoil at news of spanish-american antislavery,

much as they had done with the slave result in -- slave revolt in haiti in the 1890's that led to independence. instead, u.s. reaction to spanish-american antislavery bridge between nonchalance and outright support. for the sake of time i will give one example of what this looks like. in 1816, simon bolivar on the left ear, famously sailed to the republic of haiti in search of aid. while he is there, he meets with haiti's president, and he obliges and gives simon bolivar various forms of material aid, on the condition that simon bolivar then promised to end slavery, and all of the land he clause away from spain -- claws away from spain. bolivar, more or less at least in the moment, agrees to this

condition. i proceed by sampling 128 u.s. newspapers from 1816, when news of bolivar's haitian alliances washing up on u.s. shores. over 90% of u.s. newspapers reported on this development, which wasn't international, interracial -- which was an international, interracial antislavery alliance mobilizing just south of the u.s. border. more surprisingly, u.s. editors are not reporting on this alliance out of fear or hatred, because most of the reports were positive. even slaveholding editors in the deep south seemed unfazed by bolivar's haitian alliance, and some even praised bolivar as republican hero. in georgia, the local editor who was a slaveholder and a majority

black enslaved count wrote in this newspaper, the georgia journal, that the progress of the revolution in south america, resembled so much our own nations struggle for freedom, even though, in the this georgia editor matter-of-factly reminder readers, general bolivar retired to many followers to the island of haiti, saint mingo, -- saint domingo, where he organized revolution. this editor was more excited about bolivar, organizing revolution, then his promise to free the slaves. he is shrugging his shoulders saying whatever bolivar has to do to an independence from spain, is ok with me. as far as i can tell, reader seemed satisfied with this report, and with similar ones as well. because they continue to toast

spanish america, a couple of days later at their july 4 celebrations, and the editor went on to serve as mayor as well as a u.s. representative. so, what is going on? how can this slaveholding georgia editor have this nonchalant and even supportive reaction to bolivar's haitian alliance? instead of panicking, he is equating bolo art with the tradition of 1776. there are scores of seven -- similar examples here. i will give two reasons that white americans are nonchalant about spanish antislavery. one reason is that emancipation and most of spanish america, was painstakingly, painfully, gradual. it resembled the same model a lot of northern states in the united states, including pennsylvania, implemented in the

wake of their own revolution. in fact, the same model thousands of white southerners were still talking about and considering. so, spanish-american emancipation differed from haitian emancipation in that sense. that came on the heels of a slave uprising. and to white u.s. audiences, spanish america's gradual model was reassuringly familiar, a model that white people in the u.s. knew firsthand and often understood. a second reason that spanish-american emancipation did not raise many eyebrows in the united states, was that spanish america was generally far enough away that it existed as an abstraction more than as a reality in the eyes of u.s. readers. it was generally far enough away it did not seem to pose the same kind of immediate threat that the slave revolt in nearby haiti

had seemed to do before. we can talk about how mexico fits in here. but for the most part, you can think of spanish america as a kind of laboratory in which these insurgents could work out different solutions to this problem, of having slavery in a republic, without -- people in the u.s. could observe that laboratory, without feeling immediately threatened by whatever happened there. so, newspaper editors were undaunted by reports that spanish americans were building these stenciling multiracial republics. and readers seem to have been undaunted as well. even in the south, the baby bolivar boom continues, the july 4 toasts continue. u.s. observers'got moral instinct seems to be a was reasonable and perhaps admirable for american republics to end slavery, maybe not in this republic are this lifetime, but

someday, somewhere. as the kentuckian slaver, henry clay, put on the floor of congress in 1820, and the heat of the missouri crisis, when the nation was potentially, possibly going to divide along sectional lines, clay stands on the floor of congress and says that, in some particulars, the people of south america, were in advance of us. granada, colombia, venezuela and buenos aires, had all emancipated their slaves. as a side note to all of this, if i had a photo with higher resolution, we could zoom in on this document that clay is holding. it is a copy of an 1821 house resolution, that clay successfully sponsored. it essentially said that the house of representatives supported latin american independence alongside the people of the united states. in choosing to pose for this

portrait, with this statement's hemispheric republican solidarity, clay is showing how central support for latin american independence was to his own political identity. back to this issue of race and revolution. what is so interesting to me is at home, united states was undeniably and increasingly a white man's republic. but when the same white men look abroad to spanish america, the extensively gala terrien and universalist narrative of 1776, prevailed. i mean, the narrative about inalienable rights, and self-evident truths, and all men being created equal. that is the strain of revolutionary thought -of which there were many -that ultimately underlay the popular enthusiasm for spanish america and its extensively multiracial republics.

they are essentially saying ok, yes, this, too, is what we stand for. we can get behind these antislavery catholic republics in spirit, even if ending slavery nationwide is not exactly what we want to push for here and now. obviously, there were big exceptions to this tendency to focus on shared republican principles, over racial difference. but, for now, i want to briefly foreshadow what comes next, by pointing out one major weakness, of this universalist optimism. that is, that, yes, u.s. editors collective emphasis on shared republican principles over racial difference, constituted a kind of universalism at a gala terrien is a. -- and he gala terrien is a. -- egalitarianism.

but the reason spanish america a gala terrien is -- gala terrien -- egalitarianism not concern governments. there were less concerned with deeper questions of social equality. so they could accept spanish-american antislavery but they did not think too hard to -- about what we mean to implement similar measures at home here and now. interestingly, one group who really took spanish america's antislavery tendency seriously, or antislavery activists who held up spanish america as a model for the united states. unlike most white americans see u.s. as the model for spanish america, antislavery activists reverse that equation. antislavery, to make that connection, is probably what free black people had in mind when they named themselves and their sons after simon bolívar,

his antislavery tendencies. here is the cover page, the masthead on the first issue of freedom's journal, the first black-edited, owned, and operated, and all of u.s. history. you can see this column. they are explaining explicitly, why they think it is important to have this newspaper, what they want to contribute, their vision. sure enough, in this first column of the first issue of the first black edited newspaper in american history, the editors talk about spanish america as evidence that multiracial republics are possible. as you can see here, they write, has the eternal decree gone forth that race alone are to remain in the state, while knowledge and civilization are shedding their and livening

raise over the rest of the human family? the establishment of the republic of haiti, after years of sanguine warfare, and subsequent progress in the arts of civilization, and the advancement of liberal ideas in south america, where despotism has given place to free government, and where many of our brethren fill important civil and military stations, proves the contrary. so, spanish america is fundamental to their vision of what is possible for american nations to achieve. i have looked at all the issues of this newspaper, which ran through 1829. over half of them continue to reference latin america in some way or other. i should clarify, abolitionists take on spanish america turns out to be overoptimistic. spanish america had not successfully established racial equality.

and, slavery itself proved stubbornly resistant in spanish america as in the united states. for many reasons, partly because the lack of accurate information, u.s. abolitionists offer a more positive spin. two recap, the first key points i make in my book, if latin american independence fueled u.s. nationalism, after the first half-century of revolution is him, -- revolution in the united states, was an age of american revolutions. not only because latin americans were casting off european rule, but because so many people in the united states saw these efforts as glorious tropical reprises of 1776. people remain abstractly committed to the egalitarian

principles of their own independence war. it is those same principles that allow them to embrace a group of foreign revolutionaries whose battles were at once anticolonial, and antislavery. so, popular enthusiasm for spanish america reveals the persistence of some of those older, revolutionary ideals about inalienable rights and self-evident truths. but, of course, as i mentioned, this is happening at a time when human bondage -slavery-is spreading and deepening at home. sure enough, that kind of sanguine, egalitarian rhetoric, was under siege by the mid-to-late 1820's. this brings me to the third and final point i make in the book, and i want to briefly make before stopping for questions. that is, in this period on the

graph, where the popular enthusiasm for latin america begins to decline, precipitously. there are a lot of reasons for this change, most have to do with a wave of political instability throughout latin america, that leaves a lot of u.s. onlookers feeling disillusioned and disappointed. but as the u.s. historian, i am more interested in another reason for the declining excitement. that is, this drop off in hemispheric enthusiasm represents the beginnings of a shift away from that earlier period of universalist and egalitarian revolutionary ideals, and a shift to a newer era of a validly white u.s. staff of avowedly what white u.s. exceptionalism. a firsthand on an issue of hemispheric policy. the democratic party first started to coalesce by

intentionally picking a fight over latin america. the issue, in a nutshell, was that u.s. had just been invited to send delegates to the first ever inter-american congress, to be held in panama, in 1826. rising democrats argued, united states the united states should not send delegates to the panama congress. they give a lot of reasons, one of the key reason southern democrats gave was, in their view, spanish america's new republics were to antislavery, to radical, and to black. for the first time, and thousands of pages of congressional debates of 1810-1826 that i looked at, rising southern democrats started using spanish america has eight lack and and radicalized foil, against which to portray the united states and its own revolution as uniquely

moderate, uniquely successful, and uniquely white. that kind of rhetoric had been virtually nonexistent in congress, and rare in u.s. newspapers, before 1826. what changes in 1826? why do some of the southern democrats start adopting racial invective against spanish america? the time was ripe for it. let me know 1826 was the 50th anniversary of the nation's first day, the revolutionary generation was passing away, a new generation was taking home, and it is this moment of great national soul-searching. think about what the u.s. looks like by 1826. there was a growing gap between, on one hand, the nations egalitarian rhetoric of inalienable rights and self-evident truths. and on the other hand, the increasingly unequal reality,

not least, as slavery spread through the south. the growing gap between rhetoric and reality, was not sustainable. something has to give. there are only two ways a gap like that can close. you can change the reality to live up to the rhetoric, which is what antislavery activists were pushing for, to make the nation live up to those high, egalitarian ideals. or you can just change the rhetoric to match the reality, or you could openly champion racial inequality, rather than tiptoeing around it. you could give voice to the prejudice, that was obviously already there. and that is what these emerging southern democrats start to do. to give one example before wrapping up, we can look at virginia senator john randolph, who stood on the floor of contract -- congress, in debates over latin america and said these principles, that all men were born free and equal, i

could never ascend to for the best of reasons, he said. because it is not true. enough went on to call the declaration of independence eight pernicious falsehood, so as we approach another fourth of july it is important to reflect on how these idea of equality and rights have been contested in american history, including by politicians like randolph, who played to popular prejudice, in newly unabashed ways, and with explosive effects. sure enough, randolph's rhetoric caught on in southern and democratic newspapers, and it is one reason for the decline in hemispheric to lie fourth toasts -- july 4 toasts and baby bolivar naming. in the war of mexico, the united states provoked a war with what had recently called assist

republic. you see the explosive effects of this kind of rhetoric and the civil war itself. in conclusion, if u.s. observers in the 1810s and early 1820's, had the sense of patriotic identity from republicanism's spread into new and largely nonwhite places, by the nation's 50th birthday, some members of a new generation, or using spanish america to define a narrower nationalism, one that proclaims the nation's uniqueness, rather than its universality. >> you are watching american history tv, every weekend on c-span three. explore our nation's past. american history to be on c-span3, crated by america's table -- cable television companies. today, we are brought to buy that cable television companies who provide american history tv as a service to viewers.

>> from the books of thomas jefferson to the parities of saturday night live, how popular culture influences presidents and help presidents leave imprints on the culture. here is a preview. >> saturday night live is a mixed bag for presidents. it came out during the ford administration. ford had this unfortunate propensity to stumble a couple of times, even though he was perhaps the best athlete to ever be president, and was drafted by the nfl in football. but ford was relentlessly mocked for his clumsiness and stumbling. they asked him to go on saturday night live and he wisely said no, but his press secretary, who was a funny guy come a professional comedian, as washington folks go, agree to go on the show. one of the saturday night live writer said, she intentionally made this gets as raunchy as

possible that night, because she knew the president would be watching,. that is not necessarily the kind of thing you want. the presidential impersonations have helped shape how we think of presidents. phil hartman is ronald reagan, and plays him as a befuddled guy reading with girl scouts, not knowing what is going on. the second the public leaves he becomes this hardcharging business leader doing complex math in his head and converting currencies, and speaking foreign languages and telling everyone to do things large and in charge, and i thought that was a great depiction of reagan. sometimes, s&l does not really know what to do with candidates -- snl does not know what to do with candidates, like obama. they did not want to make too much fun of him so they never really got out guiding philosophy of how to mock him. we saw the and recent piece in the washington post, how jim carrey's bided impersonation

does not really sell it and is not really funny because he cannot really figure out what to make fun of and he kind of plays biden as this clint eastwood cowboy, which is not the biden i was seeing on the campaign trail. so, if it not true to the person, then it is not going to work. i will say perhaps the best impersonation on the technical level was dana carvey's of george h died be a bush. -- george hw bush. when he loses reelection, he invites carvey to come to the christmas party to do the impersonation, which i thought was a nice farewell for the staff, showing he was a good sport. >> learn more about presidents and pop culture on the presidency, sunday at 8:00 p.m. eastern, 5:00 p.m. pacific, here on american history tv. >> american history tv is on social media. follow us, at c-span history.

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coverage, eyewitness accounts, archival films, lectures and college classrooms, and visits to museums and historic places, all weekend, every weekend, on c-span3. >> the largest stone fort in the united states at the mouth of sits at the mouth of the chesapeake bay near virginia. up next, fort munro museum robin reed gives us a tour showcasing , the history from the colonial era to its completion. and its role in the american civil war. robin: welcome to fort munro the in the very pleasant place that we call point comfort. we call it old point comfort it . it is here that over 400 years of history have occurred. some would say even thousands of years. we are inside the casemate