Books published by publisher University of Kansas

Five months after the election of Abraham Lincoln, which had revealed the fracturing state of the nation, Confederates fired on Fort Sumter and the fight for the Union began in earnest. This documentary reader offers a firsthand look at the constitutional debates that consumed the country in those fraught five months. Day by day, week by week, these documents chart the political path, and the insurmountable differences, that led directly—but not inevitably—to the American Civil War.At issue in these debates is the nature of the U.S. Constitution with regard to slavery. Editor Dwight Pitcaithley provides expert guidance through the speeches and discussions that took place over Secession Winter (1860–1861)—in Congress, eleven state conventions, legislatures in Tennessee and Kentucky, and the Washington Peace Conference of February, 1861. The anthology brings to light dozens of solutions to the secession crisis proposed in the form of constitutional amendments—90 percent of them carefully designed to protect the institution of slavery in different ways throughout the country. And yet, the book suggests, secession solved neither of the South’s primary concerns: the expansion of slavery into the western territories and the return of fugitive slaves.What emerges clearly from these documents, and from Pitcaithley’s incisive analysis, is the centrality of white supremacy and slavery—specifically the fear of abolition—to the South’s decision to secede. Also evident in the words of these politicians and statesmen is how thoroughly passion and fear, rather than reason and reflection, drove the decision making process.

Even as we marvel at the grandeur of our constitutional system, we can't resist tinkering with it. Amending America tells the dramatic story of how, over the past 206 years, the American people have reshaped the Constitution to meet the country's changing needs. It describes how we have adopted 27 amendments since 1789-and debated and rejected 10,000 more.A provocative examination of one of America's most important yet least-known democratic tools, Amending America brings to life events in our history that continue to resonate today as, as various politicians have set their hearts on amendments to balance the budget, to ban abortion, or to allow school prayer."A wonderful book. . . . A magnificent treasure trove of American history."—Arthur R. Miller, Bruce Bromley Professor of Law, Harvard Law School."A skillfully rendered, comprehensive, and engaging study of Article V's procedures for amending the Constitution."—Washington Post "Instructive and fascinating. The book is thorough, erudite, and packed with the anecdotes that make our political past so enjoyable to review."—Minneapolis Star Tribune."Admirably illuminates the complex and remarkable history of the American people's repeated attempts to amend the Constituion, and captures that history's enduring significance."—William E. Nelson, author of The Fourteenth Amendment: From Political Principle to Judicial Doctrine "Will amply repay its readers. Scholars of American constitutional development should find the book a useful addition to their shelves; general readers should find it an interesting and enjoyable way to learn about some often overlooked aspects of American history."—Sanford Levinson, History Book Club News."Invaluable for just about anybody seeking to understand the contradictions of our approach to constitutional government."—Herbert S. Parmet, author of Richard Nixon and His America."An intelligent, carefully researched, and highly readable account."—Detroit News."The authors have made our country's charter the centerpiece of a suspenseful and still-unfolding national adventure."—Norfolk Virginian-Pilot and Ledger-Star."An anecdotal guide to the debates and conflicts over each amendment."—Publishers Weekly."A thoughtful history of the amendments ot the Constitution and an excellent delineation of issues debated by modern constitutional scholars."—Kirkus Reviews."An excellent work about an often-ignored issue. Recommended for all libraries."—Library Journal."A fresh and reassuring picture of a living, flexible document strong enough to accept constant challenge and occasional change. The amending process, used wisely, helps meet the needs of an evolving nation. This is an unusual survey of this always-timely process."—Anniston (Alabama) Star "For a book with such a weighty subject, Amending America is surprisingly entertaining and humorous."—Alan Mass in the New York Law Journal.

Through much of the 1990s, a newly hatched snake wreaked political havoc in the South.When North Carolina gained a seat in Congress following the 1990 census, it sought to rectify a long-standing failure to represent African American voters by creating, under federal pressure, two "majority-minority" voting districts. One of these snaked along Interstate 85 for nearly two hundred miles—not much wider than the road itself in some places—and was ridiculed by many as one of the least compact legislative districts ever proposed.From 1993 to 2001, three intertwined cases went before the Supreme Court that decided how far a state could go in establishing voting districts along racial lines. Noted Supreme Court biographer Tinsley Yarbrough examines these closely linked landmark cases to show how the Court addressed the constitutionality of redistricting within the volatile contexts of civil rights and partisan politics.A suit was first filed by Duke University law professor Robinson Everett, a liberal who loathed discrimination but considered racially motivated redistricting a clear violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause. Yarbrough tells how Everett enlisted associates as plaintiffs and went on to win two Supreme Court victories in Shaw v. Reno (1993) and Shaw v. Hunt (1996)—both by 5-4 decisions. Following the creation of another "flawed" redistricting plan, he rounded up a new set of plaintiffs to take the battle back to the Supreme Court. But this time, in Easley v. Cromartie—on the swing vote of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor—the 5-4 vote went against him.Yarbrough shows the significant impact these cases have had on election law and the fascinating interplay of law, politics, and human conflict that the dispute generated. Drawing heavily on court records and on interviews with attorneys on both sides of the litigation, he relates a complex and intriguing tale about these protracted struggles. His cogent and balanced analysis considers whether the state legislature was wrong in using race as a measure for establishing the new district, or whether it was simply engaging in the time-honored practice of gerrymandering to ensure political balance.Race and Redistricting spotlights efforts to "racially engineer" voting districts in an effort to achieve fair representation. By examining one state's efforts to confront such dilemmas, it helps readers better understand future disputes over race and politics, as well as the ongoing debates over our "color-blind" constitution.

On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, authorizing the U.S. military to ban anyone from certain areas of the country, with primary focus on the West Coast. Eventually the order was used to imprison 120,000 people of Japanese descent in incarceration camps such as the Rohwer Relocation Center in remote Desha County, Arkansas. This time of fear and prejudice (the U.S. government formally apologized for the relocations in 1982) and the Arkansas Delta are the setting for Camp Nine. The novel's narrator, Chess Morton, lives in tiny Rook Arkansas. Her days are quiet and secluded until the appearance of a "relocation" center built for what was, in effect, the imprisonment of thousands of Japanese Americans. Chess's life becomes intertwined with those of two young internees and an American soldier mysteriously connected to her mother's past. As Chess watches the struggles and triumphs of these strangers and sees her mother seek justice for the people who briefly and involuntarily came to call the Arkansas Delta their home, she discovers surprising and disturbing truths about her family's painful past.

From the ancient Appalachians to the high Sierra, mountains have always symbolized wilderness for Americans. Susan Schrepfer unfolds the history of our fascination with high peaks and rugged terrain to tell how mountains have played a dramatic role in shaping American ideas about wilderness and its regulation.Delving into memoirs and histories, letters and diaries, early photos and old maps, Schrepfer especially compares male and female mountaineering narratives to show the ways in which gender affected what men and women found to value in rocky heights, and how their different perceptions together defined the wilderness preservation movement for the nation. The Sierra Club in particular popularized the mystique of America's mountains, and Schrepfer uses its history to develop a sweeping interpretation of twentieth-century wilderness perceptions and national conservation politics.Schrepfer follows men like John Muir, Wilderness Society cofounder Robert Marshall, and the Sierra Club's own David Brower into the mountains—and finds them frequently in the company of women. She tells how mountaineering women shaped their lives through high adventure well before the twentieth century, participating in Appalachian mountain clubs and joining men as "Mazamas"—mountain goats—scaling Oregon's Mount Hood.From these expeditions, Schrepfer examines how women's ideas, language, and activism helped shape American environmentalism just as much as men's, parsing the "Romantic sublime" into its respective masculine and feminine components. Tracing this history to the 1964 Wilderness Act, she also shows how the feminine sublimes continue to flourish in the form of ecofeminism and in exploits like the all-woman climb of Annapurna in 1978.By explaining why both women and men risked their lives in these landscapes, how they perceived them, and why they wanted to save them, Schrepfer also reveals the ways in which religion, social class, ethnicity, and nationality shaped the experience of the natural world. Full of engaging stories that shed new light on a history many believe they already know, her book adds subtlety and nuance to the oft-told annals of the wild and gives readers a new perspective on the wilderness movement and mountaineering.

Long before Judy Garland sang "Over the Rainbow," the denizens of Oz had already captivated the American reading public. The quintessential American fairy tale, L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz has had a singular influence on our culture since it first appeared in 1900. Yet, as Michael Riley shows, Baum's achievement went far beyond this one book, or even the thirteen others he wrote about that magic kingdom.The Land of Oz was just one in a whole continent of fantasy countries whose histories, geographies, and citizens Baum developed in detail over the course of his writing career. In this Other-world, Baum created a full-scale mythology that foreshadowed Tolkien's Middle Earth in its imaginative detail.Taking us on an entertaining tour of this endearing and unforgettable Other-world, Riley illuminates Baum's richly creative imagination in the Oz books and other works of fantasy, like the much neglected Life and Adventures of Santa Claus. He restores for millions of readers Baum's original conception of Oz as it existed long before other writers were hired to continue the immensely popular series following Baum's death in 1919. Equally important, he shows us how Oz and its companion countries evolved over time, as Baum repeatedly responded to a loyal readership clamoring for an endless supply of Oz stories.While there have been other studies of Baum, this is the first to examine his Other-world in its entirety. Oz and Beyond provides the first comprehensive analysis of all of Baum's fantasy creations and his evolution as a fantasy writer, demonstrating that Baum had a more consistent and disciplined imagination than is generally recognized. It also explains the influence of Baum's childhood and adult experiences on his writing and illuminates his philosophy concerning nature, civilization, and industrialization.Oz's enduring influence on American culture is indisputable--witness its endless replication in books, films, musicals, and theme parks. In returning to the original source of that influence, Riley serves as our guide to that land over the rainbow and inspires renewed appreciation for a great writer's magical vision."An excellent introduction to the work of America's greatest writer of children's fantasy, Oz and Beyond is also a remarkable achievement in the criticism of Baum and American popular culture. It breaks new ground and opens up, really for the first time, all sorts of entrancing possibilities for critical dialogue."--Douglass Parker, professor of classics, University of Texas."This is not, I hope, the last work that places Baum's Oz books into an account of his entire career, but it is a most welcome first one. Queen Xixi of Ix and The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus, marvelous books almost lost to us, are here given the attention they deserve."--Roger Sale, author of Fairy Tales and After: From Snow White to E. B. White."The best critical analysis of Baum and his contributions to American children's literature since the publication in 1929 of Edward Wagenknecht's Utopia Americana. Given that Baum still has a huge readership, the book should also have a large commercial market."--Douglas G. Greene, director, Institute of Humanities, Old Dominion University.

John Marin was a major figure among the cutting-edge circle of American modernist artists who showed his work in Alfred Stieglitz’s New York galleries from 1909 until 1950. A new collection of the artist’s work at the Arkansas Arts Center, given by Marin’s daughter-in-law, forms the basis of this first book of essays and images to concentrate on Marin’s drawings in the context of Marin’s life, his watercolors, and his etchings.We follow Marin to his most famous subject matter: New York City and the coast of Maine. Foundational drawings and an unfinished watercolor of the towering Woolworth Building, still under construction when they were made in 1912, begin the story of a renowned group of watercolors first exhibited in 1913 at Alfred Stieglitz’s 291 Gallery and then at the ground-breaking 1913 Armory Show. Other images take us to lesser-known locales, such as the Ramapo Mountains in New York and New Jersey where Marin often painted when he couldn’t get to Maine. More obscure aspects of the artist’s career explored in this collection include portraits of friends and family, charming drawings of animals, and circus scenes.Becoming John Marin invites readers to look over this important artist’s shoulder as he created and honed the sketches he would interpret into completed watercolors and etchings, illustrating the evolution of his style and methods as he transformed from intuitive draftsman to innovative modernist watercolorist and etcher.

Female American Eels spend years traversing the 3,000 miles from the site of their Atlantic Ocean inception to the freshwaters of Kansas. Upon reaching the coast, they leave their male counterparts behind and make the last leg of the journey alone. Eventually swimming back, they rendezvous with the males, head out to sea, spawn, and die. Although most fishes found in Kansas aren't as well traveled as the Eel-some probably never venture more than a few thousand feet in their lives-they each have their own characteristics that make them a unique and important influence on their environment. Featuring full-color drawings and photographs for the first time, this revised guide describes and illustrates the 135 common and not-so-common, native and introduced fishes found in Kansas. It provides a wealth of information on appearance, size, habitat, reproduction, food, and unusual or interesting traits and behaviors. Standardized common and scientific names, black-and-white drawings for each species, identification keys, and maps showing species location by county are included. Fishes in Kansas spotlights the petite and the stout, the brightly colored and the transparent, the toothed and the toothless, the survivor and the vanquished. The Least Dart, we find, is only 1-3/4 inches at its maximum length while the largest known Kansas flathead catfish measured in at 5-foot-3 and 90 pounds. The channel catfish is found in all large Kansas streams and many lakes and ponds while only four Pugnose Minnow have been recorded in the state, back in 1931. The Rudd females produce as many as 232,000 eggs in their lifetimes. The Neosho Madtom is classified as federally threatened. This guide also helps clear up common misconceptions-The Walleye is commonly called "Walleyed Pike" but is really a perch while the Sunfish, commonly called a perch, isn't-and notes the affect of human activities on the population and distribution of fishes. Providing the most complete and up-to-date information available, Fishes in Kansas is essential for anyone interested in the state's aquatic environment.

“Throughout this anthology, more than 60 other well-known Brooks poems can be read the same way, with lines from ‘The Mother’ and ‘The Bean Eaters’ tripping down the right-hand side of the page. The anthology ends with ‘Non-Brooks Golden Shovels’ and ‘Variations and Expansions on the Form.’ The cross-section of poets with varying poetics and styles gathered here is only one of the many admirable achievements of this volume.” —Claudia Rankine, The New York Times, August 2017“The editors, including tireless poetry advocate Kahn, of this unique, new addition to the Gwendolyn Brooks legacy put together a richly diverse set of poets working with the most unusual and fertile new poetic form created in recent years. National Book Award winner Terrance Hayes invented the Golden Shovel, which he illuminates in his stirring foreword, writing, “Because where do poems come from if not other poems?” In a Golden Shovel poem, the last words in each line are taken from a Brooks poem. A veritable who’s who of contemporary poets tried their hands at this encoded homage, including Billy Collins, Mark Doty, Rita Dove, Nikki Giovanni, Joy Harjo, Billy Lombardo, Sharon Olds, Alberto Ríos, Tracy K. Smith, and Timothy Yu. Beautifully introduced by Patricia Smith, this is a beguiling and mind-expanding anthology shaped by formal expertise and deep appreciation for the complexity and resonance of Brooks’ work and profoundly nurturing influence. In all, a substantial and dynamic contribution to American literature.”—Booklist, May 2017"Gwendolyn Brooks was the first black writer to receive the Pulitzer Prize for poetry back in 1950. A new book honors her work in using a form called the golden shovel, developed by poet Terrance Hayes. In The Golden Shovel Anthology, poets select a line from a poem of Brooks’s and use it as the closing line or lines in a poem of their own. The result is an expansive and extraordinary assemblage edited by poets Peter Kahn, Ravi Shankar, and Patricia Smith.”—Nina MacLaughlin, Boston Globe, March 2017The Golden Shovel Anthology celebrates the life and work of poet and civil rights icon Gwendolyn Brooks through a dynamic new poetic form, the Golden Shovel, created by National Book Award–winner Terrance Hayes.The last words of each line in a Golden Shovel poem are, in order, words from a line or lines taken from a Brooks poem. The poems are, in a way, secretly encoded to enable both a horizontal reading of the new poem and vertical reading down the right-hand margin of Brooks’s original. An array of writers—including Pulitzer Prize winners, T. S. Eliot Prize winners, National Book Award winners, and National Poet Laureates—have written poems for this exciting new anthology: Rita Dove, Billy Collins, Nikki Giovani, Sharon Olds, Tracy K. Smith, Mark Doty, Sharon Draper, and Julia Glass are just a few of the contributing poets.The poems found here will inspire a diversity of readers, teachers, and writers of poetry while at the same time providing remarkable access for newcomers, making it ideal for classrooms. The Golden Shovel Anthology will also honor Brooks with publication in 2017, the centenary of her birth.

Federalism—including its meanings and limits—remains one of the most contested principles in constitutional law. To fully understand its importance, we must turn to a landmark decision nearly two centuries old. M'Culloch v. Maryland (1819) is widely regarded as the Supreme Court's most important and influential decision-one that essentially defined the nature and scope of federal authority and its relationship to the states. Mark Killenbeck's sharply insightful study helps us understand why.Killenbeck recounts how the cashier of the Baltimore branch of the Second Bank of the United States refused to pay Maryland's tax on the bank and how that act precipitated a showdown in the Supreme Court, which addressed two questions: whether the U.S. Congress had the authority to establish a national bank and whether Maryland's tax on the bank was barred by the Constitution. In one of Chief Justice John Marshall's most famous opinions, the Court unanimously answered yes to both, authorizing the federal government to exercise powers not expressly articulated in the Constitution—and setting an alarming precedent for states—rights advocates.The issues at the heart of M'Culloch are as important today as they were then: the nature and scope of federal constitutional authority, the division of authority between federal and state governments, and the role of the Supreme Court in interpreting and applying the Constitution. Situating the case within the protracted debate about the bank and about federal-state relations, the Panic of 1819, the fate of the Second Bank following the Court's momentous decision, and the ever-expanding and increasingly contentious debate over slavery, Killenbeck's book provides a virtual constitutional history of the first fifty years of the nation. As such, it shows that the development of the Constitution as a viable governing document took place over time and that M'Culloch, with its very broad reading of federal power, marked a turning point for the Constitution, the Court, and the nation.As the Court continues to reshape the boundaries of federal power, M'Culloch looms large as a precedent in a debate that has never been fully settled. And as states today grapple with such questions as abortion, gay rights, medical marijuana, or assisted suicide, this book puts that precedent in perspective and offers a firm grasp of its implications for the future.

In 1950, Main Street America—restored by victories in a global war and hopeful for a prosperous and peaceful future—was abruptly traumatized. The sudden prospect of thermonuclear war with the Soviet Union, Senator Joseph McCarthy's vicious anticommunist crusade, and the beginning of the Korean War all combined to dampen the public mood. In the wake of these events, the Cold War invaded every home and convinced millions of Americans that the liberal establishment created by Franklin Roosevelt and sustained by Harry Truman had betrayed the public trust and placed the nation in mortal peril.Revealing the intense interplay between foreign policy, domestic politics, and public opinion, Lisle Rose argues that 1950 was a pivotal year for the nation. Thermonuclear terror brought "a clutching fear of mass death" to the forefront of public awareness, even as McCarthy's zealous campaign to root out "subversives" destroyed a sense of national community forged in the Great Depression and World War II. The Korean War, with its dramatic oscillations between victory and defeat, put the finishing touches on the national mood of crisis and hysteria. Drawing upon recently available Russian and Chinese sources, Rose sheds much new light on the aggressive designs of Stalin, Mao, and North Korea's Kim Il Sung in East Asia and places the American reaction to the North Korean invasion in a new and more realistic context.Rose argues that the convergence of Korea, McCarthy, and the Bomb wounded the nation in ways from which we've never fully recovered. He suggests, in fact, that the convergence may have paved the way for our involvement in Vietnam and, by eroding public trust in and support for government, launched the ultra-Right's campaign to dismantle the foundations of modern American liberalism.Engagingly written, The Cold War Comes to Main Street is a sophisticated synthesis that cuts to the core of a half-century of postwar national paranoia. It calls into question the assumptions of several generations of scholars about foreign affairs and domestic policies and will force readers to reconsider their assumptions about just when—and how—the nation lost its sense of community, confidence, and civility.