The Fourth of July Posted on July 4th
WHEN DID the great American venture really get rolling? Was it in July 1776 in Philadelphia, as we tell ourselves this day to the accompaniment of fireworks and other patriotic noise? Or was it in fact nearly 40 years later, during a chill January in a swampy place in the Deep South? Daniel Walker Howe would argue that it was the latter. Mr. Howe is a historian, the author of a book, “What Hath God Wrought,” describing the country’s dramatic, nearly incredible, expansion, which culminated in 1848 when it completed its leap from sea to sea by taking California from Mexico.
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