SHEARites’ Perspective on the $20 Bill

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Andrew Jackson gets bumped from the $20 bill by Harriet TubmanUnless you spent 24/7 in an archive last week or went into isolation to put the finishing touches on your 2016 SHEAR conference paper, you know that the U.S. Treasury Department announced that it was replacing Andrew Jackson with Harriet Tubman on the front of the $20 bill.

The news was met with mixed reactions. Andrew Jackson VI blamed political correctness for his ancestor’s move to the back of the $20, while former U.S. senator Jim Webb made a similar argument: “This dismissive characterization of one of our great presidents is not occurring in a vacuum. Any white person whose ancestral relations trace to the American South now risks being characterized as having roots based on bigotry and undeserved privilege.” Former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan called the change “affirmative action raised to fanaticism, a celebration of President Obama’s views and values, and a recasting of our currency to make Obama’s constituents happy at the expense of America’s greatest heroes and historic truth.”

A number of SHEAR members weighed in via the media as well. Andy Burstein and Nancy Isenberg supported the change, remarking, “Ultimately, the question we face is how important an honest encounter with history is, versus how needful some will always be to cling to the rule of the patriarchs, to our long-dominant national mythology that consecrates the singularity of founder genius.” Dan Feller, chief editor of The Papers of Andrew Jackson, pointed out that “we don’t honor people on the currency just because they’re important. We do it because we admire them, or because they represent something we value.” Jackson, in other words, no longer represents American ideals. Catherine Clinton outlined the historiographical shift that now recognizes women’s contributions. “Historians and biographers, professors and students, pundits and theorists, and the inevitable legions of naysayers may find these critical moments challenging and often unsettling,” Clinton observed, “but they signal change is afoot.”

The alterations to the $20 bill, as well as to the back of the $5 and $10 bills, will take years to implement, and it seems likely that the debate over the decision will only add to the heated political discourse in which the nation is currently engaged.

SHEAR 2016: Graduate Research Seminars

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SHEAR is pleased to open registration for the 2nd annual graduate student research luncheon seminars.  Reserve your spot for a free catered luncheon facilitated by two senior scholars in the field on Friday, July 22, 2016.

These seminars permit grad students and senior faculty to discuss common themes, important areas of research, and the challenges faced by scholars in the field.  Conversations in each group may turn alternately to subjects like archives, methodologies, and important secondary literature in their area. Best of all, these seminars help participants to network amongst like-minded scholars, and to find potential partners for organizing panels for future conferences.

Eligibility:

  • The program and lunch are free, but you must be registered for the conference.
  • You need to be currently enrolled in a graduate program or have received an AY 2015-2016 degree.
  • If necessary, preference will be given to those who did not participate in last year’s graduate seminars and who do not already appear on the conference program.

Sessions:

  • Capitalism, Labor, and Political Economy with Ellen Hartigan-O’Connor (UC Davis) and Joshua Rothman (University of Alabama)
  • Slavery and Race Formation with Thavolia Glymph (Duke University) and Craig Steven Wilder (MIT)
  • Women, Gender, and Sexuality with Kathleen Brown (University of Pennsylvania) and Erica Armstrong Dunbar (University of Delaware)
  • Politics and Political Culture with Francois Furstenberg (Johns Hopkins University) and Rosemarie Zagarri (George Mason University)

Each session is limited to 12 students. We will try to assign participants to their first choice; but if that session fills early, we will try to accommodate participants in other sessions. For the best chance of participation, complete the form (found at the Annual Meeting tab on the SHEAR homepage) by June 1 and email a one-page dissertation abstract to ceastman@vcu.edu.

Harold D. Moser, 1938-2016

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Moser, Harold D.

Harold D. Moser, longtime editor of both the Daniel Webster and Andrew Jackson Papers projects, passed away on April 4, 2016. A published obituary notes his contributions to the field of documentary editing and the Early Republic:

Harold’s more than thirty-year career was under the aegis of the National Historical Publications and Records Commission’s (NHPRC’s) mandate to publish the papers of national political figures. From 1971 until 1979 he was a documentary editor and then editor of the correspondence series at the Daniel Webster Papers Project at Dartmouth College, Hanover, N.H., producing five volumes of Webster’s correspondence. From 1979 until his retirement in 2004 he was editor-director of the Papers of Andrew Jackson, first at the Hermitage in Nashville and then at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. Under his direction, the project published volumes 2-7 of the Jackson Papers. He also published two book-length bibliographies, of Daniel Webster and of President John Tyler.

As Dan Feller noted in posting the news to the Scholarly Editing Forum (SEDIT-L), “Harold introduced new editorial policies at the Jackson project, including the inclusion of a calendar, which have been retained in later volumes. Harold also oversaw the project’s physical removal from the Hermitage in Nashville to the campus of its institutional sponsor, the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, where it remains today.” In another SEDIT-L post, Charlene Bickford shared her memories of Moser:

I was so sorry to read about Harold Moser’s passing. The news caused me to reflect upon the unfortunate reality that when documentary editors retire, we often lose touch with them. I have strong memories of informal conversations with Harold during professional meetings–discussing and planning advocacy efforts. I remain grateful that he was such a strong and creative supporter in our seemingly never ending battles in defense of documentary editing and on behalf of the federal programs that assist our work. He was instrumental in the Tennessee Presidents consortium (the Andrew Jackson, James K. Polk, and Andrew Johnson papers), which worked to educate members of that state’s delegation in Congress and convert them into supporters of the cause of saving the NHPRC’s grants program. We can all be grateful for his activism in support of documentary editing.

The End of the Republic

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Taking the lead from the nation, which believes that nothing occurred between the Constitution and the Civil War, the Republic is coming to an end after a short tenure.

Let’s be honest–SHEARites have nothing to contribute to the nation’s historical illiteracy. Weighing in on 21st-century debates about race relations and immigration doesn’t really make sense. Modern-day presidential politics are so different from that of, say, the Jacksonian period that making comparisons would be absurd. And none of the historical figures of the period are cool enough to write a musical about.

So, we go gentle into that good night, not with a bang but with a whimper!