The formative period of the United States, running roughly from
1789 to 1829, has become remote and perhaps overly idealized.
While the administrations of George Washington, John Adams,
James Madison, James Monroe and John Quincy Adams set the
country on the path to modernity by resolving some nagging
problems left over from the Revolution, they failed to resolve
many crucial issues, such as slavery, the treatment of Native
Americans, and the consequences of industrial development.
Despite many common goals, the gentry's leadership was riven by
sectional friction, personal competition, and partisan bickering
that almost tore the nation apart during the War of 1812. This
work recounts the achievements and the failures, the progress
and the backsliding, and the high and low points of our
forefathers. First traced in the chronology and then explained
in the introduction, the history of our nation's formative years
is laid out in great detail. The several hundred dictionary
entries describe the more eminent perso