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The Work of Eugene Genovese James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions JamesSlavery Madison and Program Southern History: The in AmericanWork Ideals of and Eugene Institutions Genovese A One-Day Conference Cosponsored by the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization and the Center for African American Studies at Princeton University Friday March 25, 2011 Aaron Burr Hall 219 James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison Presented by the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions Cosponsored by the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization and the Center for African American Studies at Princeton University Slavery and Southern History: The Work of Eugene Genovese James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions Slavery and Southern History: The Work of Eugene Genovese Was the American Civil War (the War for Southern Independence) a civilizational struggle? In the sectional struggle that cost more than 600,000 American lives, was the wage-labor North or the slaveholding South the historical aberration? Which side had the strongest case that they were fighting to uphold the values of the American Revolution? If the defense of slavery precipitated southern secession, what did the majority of adult southern men and women, who were non-slaveholders, fight for? In what sense was the Civil War (War for Southern Independence) a struggle over conflicting interpretations of the Bible and the meaning of Christian civilization? Was the greatest conflict in United States history in essence a clash between capitalist and non- capitalist systems? How did southern slave society differ from other slaveholding societies? Did the master-slave relation foster a set of beliefs and values that put the antebellum South in, but not of, an expanding, globalizing capitalist system? If the antebellum South existed as a modern, progressive slaveholding republic, what were the essentials of its worldview and its legacy for the United States? Did the antebellum South generate a distinctive conservative tradition and what is the relevance of that tradition to current problems of liberty, justice, and limited government? To discuss these questions so central to our national history, the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions presents a conference on the work of Eugene SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN HISTORY: THE WORK OF EUGENE GENOVESE James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions D. Genovese, one of the most influential historians of his generation and the foremost historian of slavery in the antebellum South. Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made (1974), a monumental work of historical scholarship, remains the most penetrating study ever written of the master- slave relation in the Old South. More recently, Genovese has authored and co-authored (with his late wife Elizabeth Fox-Genovese) a remarkable trilogy of books, The Mind of the Master Class (2005), Slavery in White and Black (2008), and Fatal Self-Deception (2011) that has sensitively and painstakingly reconstructed the political thought of southern slaveholders. We are pleased to bring together a distinguished group of scholars to assess Dr. Genovese’s contributions to the study of slavery, conservative political thought, and American history. The conference is cosponsored by the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization and Princeton University’s Center for African American Studies. SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN HISTORY: THE WORK OF EUGENE GENOVESE James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions Conference Schedule 9:45 a.m. Welcome by Robert P. George, Director of the James Madison Program 9:50 a.m. Introduction by Robert L. Paquette, Director of the Alexander Hamilton Institute 10:00 – 11:45 a.m. EUGENE GENOVESE ON RELIGION AND SLAVERY Chair: Lisa N. Drakeman, James Madison Program, Princeton University Presenter: E. Brooks Holifield, Emory University Respondents: H. Lee Cheek, Athens State University Douglas Ambrose, Hamilton College 1:15 – 3:00 p.m. EUGENE GENOVESE ON SLAVERY AND THE MASTER-SLAVE RELATIONSHIP Chair: Alan C. Petigny, James Madison Program, Princeton University; University of Florida Presenter: Mark Smith, University of South Carolina Respondents: Robert L. Paquette, Hamilton College Fay A. Yarbrough, University of Oklahoma SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN HISTORY: THE WORK OF EUGENE GENOVESE James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions 3:15 – 4:45 p.m. EUGENE GENOVESE ON THE MEANING OF SOUTHERN CONSERVATISM Chair: Thomas (Tad) Watson Brown, Jr., President, Watson-Brown Foundation Presenter: Mark Malvasi, Randolph-Macon College Respondents: John Shelton Reed, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, David Moltke-Hansen, University of South Carolina Conference Discussants David Chappell, Rothbaum Professor of Modern American History, University of Oklahoma Stacey Horstmann Gatti, Assistant Professor of History, Long Island University Susan E. Hanssen, Garwood Visiting Fellow, James Madison Program; Associate Professor of History, University of Dallas Darren M. Staloff, Professor of History, City College of New York SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN HISTORY: THE WORK OF EUGENE GENOVESE James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions Participants Conference Participants Douglas Ambrose is Professor of History at Hamilton College, where he has taught since 1990. He is a charter Fellow of the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization in Clinton, NY. His publications include Henry Hughes and Proslavery Thought in the Old South; “Of Stations and Relations: Proslavery Christianity in Early National Virginia,” in Religion and the Antebellum Debate Over Slavery, edited by John R. McKivigan and Mitchell Snay; “Sowing Sentiment: Shaping the Southern Presbyterian Household, 1750-1800,” Georgetown Law Journal Volume 90 no. 1 (November 2001); and The Many Faces of Alexander Hamilton: The Life and Legacy of America’s Most Elusive Founding Father, a volume he co-edited with Robert W. T. Martin. Professor Ambrose holds a Ph.D. in History from the State University of New York at Binghamton. Thomas (Tad) Watson Brown, Jr. is President of Watson- Brown Foundation, Inc., founded in 1970 and based in Thomson, Georgia, with the mission of improving education in the American South by funding its schools and students, preserving its history, encouraging responsible scholarship, and promoting the memory and values of our spiritual founders. He serves as Chairman of the Georgia College and State University Foundation, and is a Trustee of the Georgia Humanities Council, the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation, and the Augusta Museum of History. Mr. Brown is Director of Mercer University Press and a member of the President’s Advisory Board at Wofford College in Spartanburg, Virginia. He received his B.A. in History form Florida State University in 1988. SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN HISTORY: THE WORK OF EUGENE GENOVESE James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions H. Lee Cheek, Jr. is Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of Political Science and Religion at Athens State University. His books include Political Philosophy and Cultural Renewal; Calhoun and Popular Rule; Calhoun: Selected Speeches and Writings; Order and Legitimacy; an edition of Calhoun’s A Disquisition on Government; a critical edition of W. H. Mallock’s The Limits of Pure Democracy; a monograph on Wesleyan theology; and an edition of Francis Graham Wilson’s classic study, A Theory of Public Opinion. Professor Cheek’s current research includes completing an intellectual biography of Francis Graham Wilson, a study of the American Founding, and a book on Patrick Henry’s constitutionalism and political theory. He is Founder and Director of the Wesley Studies Society, and currently serves on the editorial boards of Humanitas, the Political Science Reviewer, and The University Bookman. Professor Cheeks is a Senior Fellow of the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization and a Fellow of the Academy of Philosophy and Letters. He received his Ph.D. from The Catholic University of America. SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN HISTORY: THE WORK OF EUGENE GENOVESE James Madison Program In American Ideals and Institutions Princeton University 83 Prospect Avenue Princeton, NJ 08540 609-258-5107 http://princeton.edu/sites/jmadison James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions Lisa N. Drakeman is a member of the Advisory Council of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions and of the Graduate School Leadership Council, was Co-Chair of Princeton’s Religion Department
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  • 1 the Eugene D. Genovese and Elizabeth Fox-Genovese Library
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