Cities in America’s early republic developed on the edge of two worlds. The majority of these urban areas had been born in colonies that belonged to European powers, including England, France, Spain, and the Netherlands. In this colonial world, cities hugged the Atlantic coast and served the interests of Europe’s mercantile empires. After the American Revolution, however, urban areas developed in line with the interests of the United States, expanding geographically, economically, politically, socially, and culturally. The cities of the early republic were central to the first debates about the fate of the fast-changing republic. On 23 September 1800, on the verge of wresting power from the first generation of Federalist politicians, the Republican Thomas Jefferson wrote to his old friend Dr. Benjamin Rush that he viewed “great cities as pestilential to the morals, the health and the liberties of man.” Jefferson, ever the champion of the independent farmer, argued that cities “nourish some of the elegant arts; but the useful ones can thrive elsewhere, and less perfection in the others with more health virtue & freedom would be my choice.” As president, Jefferson tried to expand his agrarian empire of liberty by purchasing the Louisiana Territory from France in 1803, but he could not stay the growth of cities. After the War of 1812, Americans moved westward in unprecedented numbers and used trading hubs and cities to center and connect their own economic growth. The story of cities in America’s early republic thus unfolds in two parts: the first follows the American Revolution and is anchored by its participants’ belief that republican theories and individual virtue would tie the populace together; the second part is paced by the energy unleashed in the 19th century as liberalism and the boundless possibilities of market capitalism sent Americans across a continent, building, dispossessing, and re-envisioning what it meant to be American. This population remained predominantly rural over the course of the early republic, but the nation’s urban centers often anchored and drove change. While early histories focused more intently on urban development and city planning, recent studies have expanded into an eclectic mix of social history topics, including class development, political culture, immigration, religious development, urban slavery, gender relations, and sexuality. In the end, however, studies dedicated to specific cities have remained at the center of historical inquiry about urban development and life in America’s early republic. One yet unexplored avenue for study that might shift conceptualizations of urban spaces would be to examine dense indigenous population centers in the early republic. Looking at Tippecanoe or the southwestern pueblos, for instance, might alter the heavy association of the word urban with European cultures alone and open new conceptualizations of indigenous America and Euro-America.
The City-State of Boston: The Rise and Fall of an Atlantic Power, 1630–1865
