The Slave Power Conspiracy and the Paranoid Style

E-203. Very Good. Hardcover. Hardcover. 8vo. Published by Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, LA. 1969. 97 pgs. First Edition/First Printing. DJ has light shelf-wear present to the DJ extremities. Bound in cloth boards with titles present to the spine. Boards have light shelf-wear present to the extremities. Previous owner's name present to the title page. Text is clean and free of marks. Binding tight and solid. Prior to the Civil War both the North and South rallied energetic support for the causes of abolitionism and slavery by evoking the imagery of subversive conspiracies. In this fascinating study, Pulitzer Prize~winning author David Brion Davis examines these alleged conspiracies within the concept of the paranoid style~a psychological device for projecting various symbols of evil on an opponent to build emotional unity through a common sense of alarm and peril. Although it appeared much earlier, the author notes, conspiratorial imagery had become a formalized staple in the political rhetoric of both the North and South by the late 1850's and was appropriated by eminent statesmen and journalists as well as fanatics. Southern slaveholders claimed that abolitionists were using the fight against slavery to subvert law, order, and morality. Abolitionists preached that the nation had fallen under the dominion of an expansionist Slave Power which conspired to enslave the world. Professor Davis examines the origins of conspiratorial imagery and analyzes its impact and its broader historical implications. The author's perceptive treatment of this intriguing concept is not confined entirely to the Civil War, nor does he define the paranoid style as uniquely American. He emphasizes that actual conspiracies~from the Aaron Burr conspiracy to that of the American Communist Party~ have seldom been as significant as the movements against alleged conspiratorial groups. The Slave Power Conspiracy and the Paranoid Style represents a significant new perspective on this period of American political history. EB; 8vo 8" - 9" tall .