Remind you, a lot goes into this kind of an event and many people have worked very, very hard, harder than ive worked, to put all of this together. One of the people who could not be here was frank cogliano, because he got stuck in newark. Hell be here later this evening. His cochair is here and shes going to say a few words. Thank you. [applause] welcome. Im sorry that frank isnt here to join me for this further welcome. Just to say how wonderful it is to see everyone here and to work with such an Amazing Group of people. I especially want to thank annette and frank, my cochair, robin, without whom we would sees to function, and also to the Wonderful Program committee, one of whose members is sitting there many are in the audience tonight and they generously of time an talent to put this program together to go through the many proposals that we had. Weir looking forward to what is an exciting, interesting, varied diverse sheer with a lot of different panels and topics. Its a pleasure to see you, so ill let this plenary start. [applause] the title is selfexplanatory, living in the wake of the revolution. I thought we would start at the very, very beginning, and we have a set of speakers here who are perfectly positioned to talk about the various groups who, after being part of an empire, found themselves part of a new country that styled itself as a republic. Ill introduce the panelists all at once, and they will go in order of the program. First, Rebekah Brannan is an associate professor of history at James Madison university. Shell talk to us about the loyalists, which is her specialty. Her most recent book is from revolution to reunion. The reintegration of the South Carolina loyalists, university South Carolina press 2016. Kathleen duval is a professor of history at the university of north carolina, chapel hill. Shell talk about her specialty, native americans. Her latest book was independence lost, lives on the edge of the American Revolution, published in 2015 her next project is masters of the continent. How americans ruled north america into the 19th century. Then we have robert parkinson, an associate professor of history in the state of new york at binghampton. First book, common cause, creating nation and race in the American Revolution, and that was published in 2016. Hes currently working with the institute on sort of a shorter undergrad friendly version of this particular book. Although i thought it was undergraduate friendly anyway as it was. It depends on the undergraduate. His other book project is the heart of american darkness, which is a microhistory. David distinguished professor of history at the Graduate Center at the City University of new york. Hes written numerous books including slaverys constitution, from revolution to ratification, in the midst of perpetual the making of american nationalism, 1776 to 1820. His current book project is the odyssey of Phyllis Wheatley. Kay lewis is an assistant professor of history at howard university. Her first book, a curse upon the nation, race, freedom and extermination in america and the Atlantic World, was published in 2017. Shell talk about violence and notions of race, race war, during this particular period. I would remind you, when we get to the q a period, this is why im sort of running a mile a minute here, trying to give us time, when you ask questions, please come to the mic. This is being filmed. If you shout it out cspan will not be able to hear you and that would be unfortunate so remember to come to the microphone for the q a session. First well start with rebekah. [applause] thank you. So i would like to take seriously tonight the idea that they are not only living in the wake of revolution, they are living in the wake of war. And not just war, a civil war, and living through war has consequences. The revolutionary claimed the mantle of the people all the time. Yet they were always very well aware that many of the people were not actually with them. During the war for independence, the Continental Congress and the patriots at large come up with all kind of ways to persuade those who dont seem to be in agreement to basically sit down and be quiet. Stop causing trouble. Their if words often dont work with loyalists, they use the patriotcontrolled militias, a particularly terrifying police force. The military might, whatever the latest patriot political imperatives might be at that moment, the militia gets in peoples faces. They burn down crops. They plunder their way through Household Goods and enjoy finishing off the Liquors Stores in front of the people they are robbing and threatening family members to. Be fair, when the british have the upper hand, loyal i haves return the favor. Both sides confiscate property. Including land and slaves. Arrest people. Neither property nor personhood was secure. One thing i might suggest is that we, as a scholarly group, continue to think about what i see not just as me but other people thinking about, and thats this issue of the legacy of civil war. And the legacy of trauma from war. So i think of recent books like scars of independence, not only have loyalists and historians known of this issue of trauma for a long time but so have historians of slavery, and our copanelists, he recently had a blog on black perspectives, a blog about intergenerational trauma and its effects. We should think about how to integrate it into our understanding of police his tri. We should think about how to integrate it into whats motivating the people who have lived through the revolution. I think we dont think enough about what this means for peoples psyche. How do survivors of the civil war deal with the pain, uncertainty and the realization that society can seem very stable and yet they have lived through the moment when you rip the top a tough pandoras box and you realize you depend on societys stability and maybe it cant be taken for granted. The contributors were marked by the experience of civil war and the losers are even more marked by such experiences. And they were indeed scarred. Henry lawrence, one of the main negotiators of the treaty that actually ends the war observed in 1782 that, the minds of the people are sore. Linking this idea of trauma and mental displacement. In fact, he himself goes wildly from grief of his sons death to speculation about just how much money he had lost during the war. The state of his property. Other prominent people from South Carolina that ive studied also talk about the mental despair. One termed it a general doom, that sense of psychosis, but clear ptsd population wide. Another says all was devastation. Perhaps more colorfully one continental officer put it thusly. Wherever you turn, the weeping widow and fatherless child pour out their melancholy tales. And here, of course, im quoting the contributors, patriots, the loyalists are at least as scarred. Everywhere they go, when they become refugees in the diaspora, their trauma, their loss, becomes clear. Everyone had someone to blame for something, and they all wanted to find an outlet for their pain and were talking lots of people. And yet the actual realization is that while there are lots of loyalist refugees and they suffered tremendously, white loyal. S and black loyalists, and they become a thorn in the side of colonial governors absolutely everywhere else in the empire that they go, because apparently they became too american, and they want to make things different, everywhere they go, if we sort of do the best pack of envelope numbers were talking about half a Million People who are identified as loyalists in some way, they did something besides hide under their bed. Lets face it, there are a lot of disrespected people, too, and they try that strategy. The high numbers suggest about 60,000 of them become refugees and have to leave. And the low numbers suggest were talking more between 20 and 30,000. No matter how you spin this were talking about almost 450,000 who stay, having lost a civil war. So here are all these people. Here is an entire population suffering from trauma of war. Some of the refugees keep trickling back in long after the war is over. Now, the victorious patriots have to create a functional Political Union with the majority of people who had not wanted the new independent Political Union or who did not want or trust them as leaders and had made it clear during the war. Yet, the spoils of war go to the victors. Its in that context i find it especially remarkable that the United States managed to create a lasting Political Union and hold it together for decades. All with their former enemies in the mix and all while still being angry about absolutely everything they had suffered during the war for independent. And yet, they already believed that the highest value isnt revenge and the most useful value isnt revenge. For them, and even more importantly for the general races that come have them. One long islander put it especially well after the war when a questioner asked him if he was a wig or a tory. His response . I was for peace. And another gentlemen, ive written about at length, Christopher Gadsden puts it another way, he who forgives and forgets the most is the best citizen. There is trauma and yet there is the shared social understanding, the shared political imperative to move past trauma in order to create a functional union. And to my mind, remarkably, americans chose to embrace reintegration instead of endless punishments of loyalists, or even worse, divisive, unending relitigation of exactly what he had done what or who had been mysteriously unhelpful or absence at crucial moments. In fact, americans used this power to move forward. Ive looked a lot at the process of how loyalists convinced skeptical patriots to reintegrate them and ive looked a lot at some of the methods they used, and i think they are kind of telling in this issue of how do you live and rebuild in the context of trauma. There is an entire genre of literature coming out, its profoundly historical, the main proponents of transitional justice, historical, that, like the nuremberg trials, they have no relevance, i disagree. For instance, when you look not just at South Carolina that ive written about but state by side there is remarkable similarity in the kinds of ways that patriots and loyalists Work Together to punish loyalists while reintegrating them and moving forward so they practice civil incapacitations. Limited citizenship. You must prove yourself over time that even though you chose the losing side in the war, you are now a dependable and useful citizen. Obviously, its easier for white men to achieve the status than anyone else. But what they are doing is allowing people to rebuild reputations over time thereby convincing skeptical, angry, wounded traumatized patriots, that this is a doable project and these people are reclaimable. So they do these. When i say civil incapacitations, i mean things like restrictions on Voting Rights and the adoption of the constitution so the articles of confederation that finally sweeps away the last of the restrictions on voting for loyalists, and by 1790 loyalists are able to vote again. There are things like, one state says you cant be a teacher because you might give people the wrong ideas, i think. Others have restrictions on property. There are occupational restrictions that are eased over the 1780s. There is also perhaps more interestingly and controversially, reparations. Essentially they are playing reparations and in schemes around the world you find that reparations often play a role. One patriot legislator made it very clear in South Carolina, when he said, why should these people complain about paying 25 of their estate to us complain . I think any patriot would feel grateful to have gotten off having only lost 25 of their property. Okay. So he might have been exaggerating. Its very much the logic of reparations. We paid to make this world come into being, you can pay, too. And by paying, by sacrificing for this new nation by showing us that you, too, are joining a shared sacrifice albeit after the fact, we can begin to trust you. We can also begin to feel like you, too, have paid a little. And so this is one of the many kinds of reparations. By that i might mean we think about confiscation, which sounds awful. Ill confiscate all your property. And then give most of it back in most states or it mysteriously will not be sold and your family will be living on it seven years later when the next census comes, or ill make you pay a tax, and in South Carolina, its 12 to 25 depending on what the legislature thought of you, and in other states it ranges in essentially the same range from about 10 to about 25 to 30 of the tax on the total value of the estate. Of course, what that value is, is totally in the eyes of the permanent determining it. Whether they wish to be generous or harsh so its a very flexible system, shall we say, and the state mandates these payments, and, in many places, then conveniently forgets to collect the last half. So i might term all of these as functioning as reparations and having the same logic as reparations, but they never spell that out. Of course, i might add, here, too, as in other facets of the revolutionary world, the color line seems to be the hardest, fastest line in American Life because im talking about white loyalists. Black loyalists have much less pleasant choices. They overwhelming leave because, of course, what the white loyalists and white patriots want to do to reenslave them and use their bodies to either pay off revolutionary war soldiers, and they are literally capturing slaves in South Carolina and using them as bounties for the militia, or reenslave them to produce for the nation. In no case does this look good for black loyalists. They are forced into refugee status. They dont have this choice to stay. I would like to end here with one little speculation. Something i cant prove yet. And that is, the generation that lived through the civil war of the war for independence carried with them the enduring memories of these horrors of the civil war. They remembered the unpredictability and the destruction. Even those who had posed loyalists clemency in the 1780s including george washington, were motivated by concern for stability more than desire for revenge, what they wanted most and what they keep saying they want is a stable, even keeled, economically Successful Society in which white people could thrive and they want that for themselves and they want that for their children and they want that for their childrens children. Their arguments over how to ensure a stable democratic government that honored the wishes of the majority while still protecting property and minority rights were still part of this overall desire to have a Stable Society that was worth everything, all the trauma, they had gone through to get there. Yet consider that description again for a moment. Stable, even keeled and perhaps even harmonious. Does that sound like the recent scholarship on the early republic . It doesnt to me. Instead we talk about the early republics political culture as one of anger, constant dispute, and ever increasing levels of partisanship. Federalists and democratic republicans would savage each other in letters, then beat each other in and out of congress, thank you, jan freeman, and then shoot each other on the dueling field. Even keeled isnt the word i would have picked the rhetoric from the 1780s seems incredibly personal and divisive there. Seems to be nothing sacred that americans wouldnt say to each other and there seemed to be absolutely nobody that you couldnt end up not speaking to. And yet, when you read their letters in the public discourse, they dont celebrate. They justify many things with the constant invocation of failure, the fear of failure. They caution asked each other that we cant just keep attacking each other because the european monarchs are just waiting to scoop us up. They saw revolution expanding around the world and discovered they didnt always like that idea, right . The french revolution terrifies them for their lives and property and the haitian revolution terrifies them even more. You can almost read this trauma reemerged, i think, in the letters about whats happening in these french and haitian revolution. They say it could not happen here. It would not happen here. They sound smug on the one hand. Read more critically they are stretching for reassurance that it cant happen to them. Cant happen. Wont happen. A talisman against disaster, yet despite this partisan rhetoric, those who lived through the revolution managed to keep a lid on the conflict and keep it from spilling over into arms and i think perhaps part of the puzzle to why they can sound so angry, so incandescent at all times, and yet manage to avoid the final step of civil war for more than a generation, is partly they did have the lived memory of trauma. There is something chastening them, stopping them from the final step. Their trauma and lived memory of what it was like to live through a civil war helped them to hold a fragile memory together. Union together. [applause] i want to thank annette so much for being part of this panel. Eternally to robin and amy. When europeans and africans first came to the americas there were already hundreds here that fit that eras european definition of nation. A people and their land. The word nation comes from the latin word to be born. A people and their place of birth. In the era of the early American Republic a few centuries later native north americans were developing new forms of governance based on their own history and also in conversation with global trends. Indians were not the static opposition many in the United States wanted to believe. Today im going to talk about a couple of examples of native nations moving into the 19th century and also some efforts to bring together some of those native nations into larger confederacies to balance out the