By Cecil W. Wooten (NHC Fellow, 1980–81) Although Cicero's Phillipics are his most mature speeches, they have received little attention as works of oratory. On the other hand, scholars in this century have considered Cicero's attitudes toward and dependence on Demosthenes to be an issue of importance. Cecil Wooten brings together these two concerns, linking Cicero's use … Continued
By ErasmusEdited by Nelson H. Minnich (NHC Fellow, 2004–05) This new volume of the CWE presents three of Erasmus' polemic works against Alberto Pio, Prince of Carpi. A leading diplomat of the period, patron of artists and humanists, and conservative Catholic, Pio continually angered Erasmus by criticizing him for his denunciations of church practices and … Continued
By HyperidesEdited and translated by Judson Herrman (NHC Fellow, 2006–07) Hyperides' Funeral Oration is arguably the most important surviving example of the genre from classical Greece. The speech stands apart from other funeral orations (epitaphioi) in a few key respects. First, we have the actual text as it was delivered in Athens (the other speeches, with the … Continued
Edited by Merrill D. Peterson (NHC Fellow, 1980–81) Now fully represented in this Library of America volume is the most comprehensive testimony of the writings of our third president and foremost spokesperson for democracy. Thomas Jefferson, a brilliant political thinker, is perhaps best known for the Declaration of Independence, but he was a man of … Continued
By Barbara Will (NHC Fellow, 2003–04)
Edited by Ezra Greenspan (NHC Fellow, 2011–12) Born a slave and kept functionally illiterate until he escaped at age nineteen, William Wells Brown refashioned himself first as an agent of the Underground Railroad and then as an antislavery activist and self-taught orator and author, eventually becoming a foundational figure of African American literature. The Library … Continued
In the 1850s abolition was not a widely embraced movement in the United States. It was considered radical, extreme, and dangerous. In “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” Frederick Douglass sought not only to convince people of the wrongfulness of slavery but also to make abolition more acceptable to Northern whites.
In telling his followers that their colony would be “as a city upon a hill,” Puritan leader John Winthrop was warning them about the cost of failure.
Native Americans were not included in the Treaty of Paris (1783), which concluded the American Revolution. The end of fighting presented them with a difficult path as they struggled to protect their homelands from their growing insignificance within the shifting international politics of eighteenth-century America.
In 1775 American independence was not a foregone conclusion. While there had been unrest and resistance in Massachusetts with scattered acts of support from other areas, no organized movement toward revolution existed across the Colonies. Virginia ranked among the largest, wealthiest, and most populous colonies in 1775, and her political and military support for independence … Continued