Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power

by Jefferson R. Cowie

A prize-winning historian chronicles a sinister idea of freedom: white Americans’ freedom to oppress others and their fight against the government that got in their way.

American freedom is typically associated with the fight of the oppressed for a better world. But for centuries, whenever the federal government intervened on behalf of nonwhite people, many white Americans fought back in the name of freedom—their freedom to dominate others.

In Freedom’s Dominion, historian Jefferson Cowie traces this complex saga by focusing on a quintessentially American place: Barbour County, Alabama, the ancestral home of political firebrand George Wallace. In a land shaped by settler colonialism and chattel slavery, white people weaponized freedom to seize Native lands, champion secession, overthrow Reconstruction, question the New Deal, and fight against the civil rights movement.

A riveting history of the long-running clash between white people and federal authority, this book radically shifts our understanding of what freedom means in America.  

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, Race, American History, Audiobook, Social Justice

512 pages, Hardcover

First published November 22, 2022

About the author

A social and political historian whose research and teaching focus on how class, race, inequality, and work shape American capitalism, politics, and culture, Jefferson Cowie is James G. Stahlman Professor of History at Vanderbilt University.

Reviews

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really thought this was incredible, and really perfect for a US History class. It is basically a microhistory of this one county in Alabama, and all the times white residents of that county resisted federal power in the name of "freedom." It is kind of amazing how this county is able to illustrate so many different periods - Cowie starts with the feds trying to enforce a treaty with the Creek and realizing they can't do it, and then trying to enforce Reconstruction and realizing they can't do it, and then trying to enforce desegregation and realizing they can't do it. You have this ongoing American saga of everyone coming to terms with the fact that only the federal government can protect citizenship, and then the federal government failing to do so. Because it always runs up against states' rights and local control. As Cowie puts it, it runs up against the "freedom to dominate others." Basically white people realize that local control allows them to maintain white supremacy, and so they decry any federal interference with local control as tyranny.
I also feel like I finally understand the New Deal era better, and it is definitely going to improve my lecture there. Roosevelt's whole deal is set up on this flimsy scaffold of white southern Democratic voters, who are GREAT with federal programs as long as they don't touch segregation at all. And then Truman does the Committee on Civil Rights, and here come the Dixiecrats, and then the Brown decision, and the whole scaffold just crumbles. There's this crazy story in here of how people in this county tried to get around the school desegregation decision by using ANOTHER New Deal program to seize property from Black families and segregate the whole town, so they wouldn't have to desegregate the school. Wow.
I wonder if I could assign this whole book to undergrads? It is kind of long. But such an eyeopener.

[Henry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Professor Cowie’s clean, potent, and precise prose hooks you from the very first page. Speaking to a shivering crowd on a cold Alabama winter afternoon, the “man who would become the firebrand of the modern conservative movement seemed to breath history and exhale ghosts.” Sustaining a smooth and rhythmic beat throughout the book, Cowie traces the battle between the “freedom” to dominate others and the federal government’s uneven but crucial commitment to enabling all Americans to secure something resembling the “full blessing of American life.” Get this guy a Pulitzer.

[Brandon Westlake · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cowie's latest work could best be described as a microhistory, looking at one particular county in Alabama. The narrative does a great job zooming in on how events can be framed around the idea of resistance to the federal government, and how that argument has been used to push a white supremacist agenda. One early example is that of Jackson and the Creek natives, how they were pushed out even though the federal government ruled it unconstitutional. It set Jackson in the vein of white resistance to federal authority, which is often overlooked. I found the background of Francis Scott Key to be really interesting, showing the complexity of his American complexity. The pushback and redemption against the civil war during Reconstruction was also cast in resistance to federal authority, although underneath a racial impetus was at work.

Cowie also connects some ideas that have garnered more attention in history writing. Convict leasing and lynching were both keys to understanding post Civil War southern culture, and seeing how Cowie explains these institutions in terms of states rights adds to the depth of the argument.

Cowie comments in his conclusion that since the 1960s, a second "redemption" has been occuring. An interesting way to frame a time period, and I think there is some more work that could be done with this premise. He really makes the case for history's importance in today's matters.

[Colleen Browne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the few non-fiction books that makes you feel that you have done more than learn important information about the past; its reading gives you the knowledge that you have learned the lessons of history in a deeper sense. The reader learns the history of Barbour County in Alabama but the author also instills the lessons to be learned from it. One can see how the struggles from that corner of Alabama reflect the struggles of the history of the U.S. It has been, in a very large sense, the struggle of white people against federal power, as the subtitle says.

It is easy and perhaps more comfortable to read about how European settlers forced Native Americans off the land in that area against the federal rule of law but it is less comforting to realize that American history is filled with the same struggle of the local pushing up against the national. Jeffersonian ideals of resisting national government have survived to this day from those people stealing indigenous land to plantation owners stealing the labor and the lives of black people to those same people fighting the federal government to prevent freedmen practicing their rights during the Reconstruction Era and Jim Crow to George Wallace, a son of Barbour County, standing in the school house door to prevent African American students from entering, to his racist and divisive runs for the presidency.

It is easy to believe that that struggle is behind us but we see in SCOTUS cases how the same ideas persist when the Court strips the soul from the Voting Rights Act. Cowie unpacks the history of this struggle through the prism of a single county in Alabama where great wealth was accrued through theft of the land, to theft of human beings and during Reconstruction through the convict lease system which, in some ways was worse than slavery- at least plantation owners had some incentive to keep enslaved people alive whereas in the mines when the state sold convicts, there was no such interest because their replacement was so easy and so cheap.

Throughout the modern era, although the American government has strived to make the democratic experiment work (with the exception of the current and immediate past on SCOTUS) localism has all too often been an attempt to impart local desires over federal dictates. For Cowie:

"Conflating the local with the democratic, the U.S. continued to fail to do what was necessary to
make democracy work: protecting -equally, aggressively, unflinchingly, and martially, when
necessary- the rights of all the people."

The national government has not been consistent in enforcing laws to protect and engender democratic ideals.

[Tyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to think about which American state was the worst. Its hands down Alabama

[Jason Watkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Urgent read for the times. Fills a critical gap in American History education. It's an exhaustive, matter-of-fact, and in-depth unpacking of the Southern (and now contemporary conservative) notions of "freedom," burgeoning from America's post-revolution westward expansion coupled with overt, rapacious fantasies of a white utopian society. Cowie's examination focuses on the microhistory of Eufaula, AL in Barbour County, which serves as an archetype for the Southern white supremacist movement and arguably remains today a key virtue of the Republican party. While this work provides rich, detailed information about the historical struggle for human rights in America we discover along the way that in many aspects America wasn't truly a democracy until perhaps the '60s/70s due to the effective voter suppression that occurred, specifically in the South.

Cowie makes the case, with detailed research, that the idea of anti-statism under the espoused theory of a Jeffersonian Democracy in the Southern psyche, originates from the Southern white class to maintain control...or "freedom" and that is the freedom to dominate in a zero-sum game. This anti-statist movement, reveals itself in the expulsion of the Creek Indians in Barbor County, in the Fed's attempt to protect Creek land rights...and failure; in Eufalan's / Alabama's overt secession from the Union, expressively to maintain the "liberty" to own and dominate humans; in the Fed's attempt to guarantee human rights following the Post Reconstruction 13, 14, & 15th Amendments, and the effectiveness and efficiency of Eufalans, and then Alabamanians, and then other Southern states, to systemically subvert these rights in absolutely every aspect of society henceforward up to the 1990s.

Cowie bookends the struggle by highlighting the influential success Governor, (and Eufalan) Geroge Wallace imprinted on Alabamanians, and then eventually, national society. While this story focuses heavily and the legal aspect of state-vs. federal rights, Cowie provides an ancillary understanding of how the Republicans walked away from the Party of Lincoln, to the Party of an anti-statism, rooted in white supremacy. This book adds to the body of knowledge of how key factions and influences, essentially switched party lines and did so, ostensibly for the espoused notion of "freedom under attack" from the Fed. That freedom was the white man's freedom. Conversely, at many key intervals throughout history, the Fed attempted...and failed...to serve as the savior for black minorities.

We can see this same polemic play out as I type. Choose your favorite topic: reproductive rights, weaponization, education, etc. Often, as a general theme, it takes overwhelming federal intervention to provide protections for various demographics, or else local control "states rights" wins the day for the controlling party which, paradoxically restricts the rights of the the disenfranchised minority.

Highly recommend!

[Vic Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Freedom's Dominion : A Saga of White Resistance To Federal Power" by Jefferson Cowie is a tough read. Cowie focuses on a single county in Alabama. From the theft of Creek Indian territory by white land developers and white farmers who had little respect for the law or much else. It was a theft so egregious that Pres. Andrew Jackson (yes, THAT Andrew Jackson) took a personal interest in the matter on behalf of the Creeks. To no avail.

From there through the civil war, reconstruction, WWI, right on through the Civil Rights movement this single county was front and center in the worst behavior this country has had the misfortune to witness. But it also is very telling in terms of the political turmoil we face now. Groups of white men constantly proclaimed their rights were being violated. What rights are those? The right to dominate others. "Equality is (liberal) tyranny." "My rights are being violated if anyone else has the same rights." It duplicates the mind set of antebellum cotton barons.

Cowie demonstrates the repeated pattern these episodes take. Whenever the Federal Government does anything to enforce legally legislated laws that in any way brush up against what this or that group of white men consider "their" interests, it is immediately labeled "Federal overreach" (a phrase that's been used since the early 19th century), or a violation states' rights. These groups insist enforcing Federal law in this or that case is a direct threat to or has caused actual damage to their rights. What they really mean is that enforcing Federal law curtails, not their rights, but their power. And if you have the mind set of a 19th cotton baron that is intolerable. It is a violation of a cotton baron's god-given (in his mind) right to dominate economically, socially, politically, and especially physically, any and all around him. It is an attitude that persists to this day.

As a personal aside and not part of this book:
It was truly stunning how strongly today's Trump movement is repeating these exact same ideas whether in regards to either women's or civil rights. Others not being submissive, never mind "equal," is a cause for anger and resentment focused on what they see as the cause. Not their own arrogance and intransigence but the Federal Government overreaching its bounds.

Highly recommend to anyone interested in US political history or the history of US western expansion.

[Rome Doherty · Rating 5 out of 5]

I rated this book so highly because I was surprised by what I learned from it. The extent and depth of the oppression in the American South surprised me. The persistence of the concepts and beliefs connected with this oppression through the centuries is daunting. The other reference was the incredible similarity of George Wallace with Trump is mind-boggling. The same ability to turn a legal or political defeat into an asset, the same language of grievance, and the same disregard of morality, fairness or truth in the naked pursuit of power. Really worth reading.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best, and most sweeping, non-fiction books I’ve read in a long time, maybe ever. This is a must read for anyone who thinks that Trumpism is an anomaly or blip in US history. Cowie shows that Trump is, in fact, just the latest figure in the long saga of the anti-federal, freedom-as-white-power movement. I feel more equipped to understand and resist our current political crisis after reading this book. I also feel even more appreciative of those who have stood up and fought long and hard to make this country more fair and fully democratic.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

In his book, Freedom’s Dominion, Cowie tells a riveting saga of pervasive and unrelenting racism disguised as a fight for state and local rights. From the late 18th century to current times, Cowie makes a strong case for the American brand of “Freedom” being defined as the right to freely oppress and marginalize others. Whether it be Native Americans, African Americans, or immigrants, local governments have systematically defied and undermined movements to advance civil rights. Unfortunately, due to often lack luster and inconsistent federal commitment, their efforts achieved many successes and continue to entrench with a new brand of “slow redemption”.

The first example Cowie highlights are the Muskogee Indian “Creek” people who settled in the AL/GA region. During the late 18th and early 19th century, whites violently encroached upon the Creek people’s land despite a federal treaty by Jackson to defend them. A very contentious conflict between the local government and Federal forces ensued, ultimately resulting in Jackson’s capitulation and subsequent “Indian Removal Act” which forced the Native Americas to give up and move westward. White Southerns had won their first victory for “Freedom”

The next section of the book focusses on the Reconstruction period after emancipation. Despite losing the Civil War, White southerners refused to relinquish their right to dominate African Americans. The mob violence, Election Day massacres, lynchings, Jim Crow, etc.. were really horrific examples of the extremes to which Southern Whites felt justified in defending their “freedom”. Much of the resistance was directed at how to stop voting rights and maintain segregation. As an example of the overt racial rhetoric routinely delivered by southern politicians, the President of the AL State Democratic convention had this to say: “ We hear the roar of the black wave that had its formation in the overflowing bounty of the federal government, but the glorious white cliffs of Caucasian supremacy illuminated by eternal sunshine, will roll back this Black Sea and sink it forever from the face of this lovely land it threatens to desolate and destroy. “

Finally, Cowie takes us to the second half of the 20th century which was a very exciting and productive time for civil rights ( Brown vs. BOE, Rosa Parks, Civil Rights and Voting Acts, Selma, MLK, etc..). However, with each major achievement, Southern anti-statists are ready with another new and innovative means of obstruction and self-preservation. Voter intimidation continued along with harassment and violence towards peaceful protestors. Election Day massacres were replaced with gerrymandering and blatant election fraud. Then the “fighting judge”, George Wallace,came on to the scene to dominate politics in the south and champion white local “freedom” with his famous inauguration speech where he declared “segregation now and forever”. A crafty and power hungry Wallace was able to sell his brand of freedom to the North and Midwest as a form of populism against the powers of the Federal government and in favor of strict constitutionalism. Surprisingly, his message was well received despite the not too disguised undertones of racism and his legacy in the South. Although eventually losing the presidential nomination, his campaign went on to influence American politics and help shape the now decades long small government conservative movement with its increasingly racist sentiments.

This was an enlightening but also depressing book which by shining a spotlight on the past has illuminated what is still present and driving our current state of national politics. The sharp divisions between right and left are just a continuation of our historic past. The rhetoric around “deep state”, illegal aliens, and DEI sound like the same old protests for local and white freedom from federal government oversight and freedom to oppress minorities. Even the Jan 6 insurrection bears striking resemblance to violent riots for freedom dating all the way back to the Creek peoples. The message for me was we are still in a very young democracy and a fragile one at that. It is imperative for the federal government to remain steadfast in its fight for individual civil rights and protections on the local level in order for all American citizens to enjoy the true meaning of Freedom.

[Dennis McCrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is another recent Pulitzer Prize winning book I’ve read in the last month and it did not disappoint. Probably the most poignant White Privilege, African American historical book (of at least 30 plus) I’ve read in the last 20 years.

I’ve grown up (as we all have since at least the 1950’s) in the Dog Whistle, coded language civil rights era, where politicians such as Joseph McCarthy (Red Scare/Baiting/Communists and Socialist everywhere, Barry Goldwater/Ezra Taft Bensen (individual liberty), Richard Nixon (Southern Strategy) and Ronald Reagan (limited federal government) all utilised what can only be described as coded language to communicate their aquiesence to Southern political thought. What many from the South (best epitomised by George Wallace and his rhetoric) would describe as Individual Freedom. But it is what a Southerner would define as their right to have the freedom to treat that others of a different morality would describe as mistreatment.

The book takes the limited historical reference of Barbour County, Alabama (the birthplace of George Wallace) and its historical reference of freedom. And juxtaposes it with what the rest of the country’s reference of what comprises freedom and the book takes on its mind altering depth and reference alteration.

Well worth one’s investment in time and meditation as the book is read. As for my shelf of books that have truly altered my life and its perceptions, this book is right up there along with Dr. Lopez’ ‘Dog Whistle Politics’, Edward Bernay’s ‘Propaganda’, and JFK’s ‘Profiles In Courage’.

[Angela · Rating 5 out of 5]

I learned SO MUCH from this book. I thought I had a decent grip on US history, but this detailed, and still interesting, writing really filled in a lot of gaps of both knowledge and understanding for me.

This would be great as required reading/listening for both students and the general public to understand the basis (though I still don't and probably will never understand these kinds of people's logic) for our white supremacist culture and the communities that continue to uphold it to this day.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is good, but falls into the (familiar to me) type of what I call "inverted Whig histories" that are all about the failures and injustices of some place or period. Totally valid rhetorical mode, but I often find I already know the general sweep of these histories and the tone/content make them too much of a familiar bummer in 20-goddamn-25.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Civil rights history staying with Reconstruction through the insurrection with a heavy focus on George Wallace and Alabama. Loss of facts with little bias. A should read for everyone of any political party.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Spectacular. It's Pulitzer is well deserved.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Freedom’s Dominion by Jefferson Cowie shows how many white people have historically used calls for freedom from federal government interference to mean the freedom to infringe on the freedom of others. To make his argument, the author reviews the history of Barbour County, the home of infamous segregationist George Wallace in southeastern Alabama. The history of Barbour County is the history of whites insisting on their freedom to dispossess Native Americans of their land, engage in mob political violence, enforce racial hierarchy through lynching, maintain an unjust convict labor system that replaced slavery, continue Jim Crow segregation, resist school integration, and fight against equal voting rights.

After decades of conflict, Creek Indians signed a treaty in 1832 with the federal government in which the government promised to remove white settlers from Creek lands in eastern Alabama for five years while the land was privatized into individual Creek Indian ownership. Immediately after the treaty was signed, however, white settlers invaded the territory. President Andrew Jackson sent Federal Marshall Robert Crawford to the evict the settlers, but they fought back and were supported by the state of Alabama. The state and the settlers argued that the federal government was oppressing them and their freedoms. U.S. troops killed an aggressive settler named Hardeman Owens in self-defense, but he became a symbolic martyr representing federal overreach as it was falsely said that he was murdered in cold blood.

Faced with a war against the white settlers and the state of Alabama that could grow to a national civil war, President Jackson sent Francis Scott key (author of the Star Spangled Banner) to work out a settlement, which ultimately allowed the white settlers to keep the land they stole from the Creeks. This settlement; resulting in widespread starvation, suicide and alcoholism among the Creeks; caused the Creeks to rise up in violence against the white settlers in 1836. Faced with Creek violence, the settlers begged for help from federal troops, which now had no problem mustering federal power to enforce its will. The Creeks were slaughtered and the survivors were forced to migrate Oklahoma. Thus, the Creeks were forced out and slaves were brought in to build the new cotton-based economy of the south.

Barbour County was enthusiastically in support of succession at the start of the Civil War, its white residents insisting that they must protect their freedom to a slave economy from the federal government. Ultimately, however, it was the poor whites who suffered and died during the war to protect the slave-based wealth of the white elite.

After the war, whites resented and resisted Reconstruction through which they were forced, via military occupation, to accept the new rights granted to freed slaves. Southern whites felt they were being oppressed by the federal government and forced to accept black domination of society. They saw it as a zero-sum game in which any advancement of blacks was at the expense of whites. Southern whites mobilized the KKK, but President Grant had federal troops enforce the rights protected under Reconstruction. Southern whites also tried, but failed, to prevent black candidates from taking elected office in 1872 by claiming voter fraud and refusing to certify some votes from Barbour County (sound familiar?). With this failure, however, they turned instead to voter suppression.

With the economic crisis of 1873 and political tensions around the 1874 election, southern whites were intent on taking back control of the political system in the south. On election day in Eufaula, the largest town in Barbour County, whites massacred black voters and thereby prevented the reelection of black congressman James Rapier and instead elected white supremacist Jeremiah Williams. In a nearby town, they tried to murder a white Republican judge who stood up for black civil rights, but instead murdered his son and then burned the ballot boxes consisting of mostly black Republican votes. By 1876, anyone trying to vote Republican was likely to be imprisoned or killed.

With white supremacists back in power and the federal government out-of-the-way, white southerners implemented the neo slavery of convict leasing, lynching, debt-based share cropping, and the disenfranchisement of blacks.

Convict leasing effectively reinstated slavery in the south, whereby blacks were imprisoned on often trumped-up charges and then the state leased them out to mining companies where they were routinely beaten and worked to death. Companies got very cheap labor that served as a bullwork against any union organizing by free men and state government leasing revenue allowed southern states to keep taxes low.

A populous movement by the Farmers Alliance led by Reuben Kolb in 1890 challenged the wealthy elite of Alabama by promoting agricultural regulation benefiting poor farmers. Kolb indicated support for protecting the right to vote of blacks, but when Kolb ran for Governor in back-to-back elections, the wealthy elite fixed the outcome of the elections to ensure his defeat.

In 1903, Alabama followed other southern states in adopting a new Constitution ensuring the disenfranchisement of both blacks and poor whites to guarantee rule only by wealthy white men.

Southern whites considered it their right and freedom to lynch black men and boys to enforce the racial hierarchy and only the federal government could put a stop to it, but anti-lynching bills were twice defeated by the filibuster in the Senate in the 1920s and 1930s.

White southern leaders largely supported Franklin Roosevelt‘s (FDR) New Deal, but opposed minimum wage and union protections, so they carved out minimum wage exceptions for agricultural and domestic workers when the minimum wage law passed. Southern paternalism of business leaders kept union organizing out of the south, greatly curtailing labor movements gains.

Alabama‘s Governor, Chauncey Sparks, led the fight against FDR‘s Executive Order to integrate the war production industry and circumvented a Supreme Court decision prohibiting all white primary elections, both seen as infringements on local freedom to conduct business and elections how they saw fit, which was to preserve white supremacy.

George Wallace was a relatively moderate southerner on the race issue early in his political career, but then the Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education decision marked the start of the firestorm backlash to the civil rights movement. Wallace lost the Alabama Governor’s race in 1958 to an overtly racist opponent and Wallace vowed never to lose on the issue of race ever again. He turned into a political warrior against federal intervention pushing integration and, as a result, he won the 1962 Governor’s race in a landslide.

Eufaula’s white leaders responded to the Supreme Court’s Board of Education decision to integrate schools by using the new federal Housing Act to its advantage. The Housing Act allowed the clearing of slums as part of “urban renewal,” and Eufaula used that authority to condemn the one black neighborhood in the white part of town, redevelop it, and sell the new houses only to whites. When school integration was finally forced on Alabama by the courts, communities used “school choice” as a means to preserve segregation. The feds finally declared Eufaula schools fully integrated only in 2003 and the first integrated prom only occurred after protest from students demanding it in 1991.

Wallace wrapped racism into questions of federal power and made race and federal intervention into an assault on American freedom. As the Civil Rights Act passed, Wallace challenged Lyndon Johnson for the 1964 Democratic presidential nomination and won a surprising number of northern blue-collar votes, but he ultimately failed. Wallace’s anti-federal government rhetoric was taken up by Republican Barry Goldwater, who faced Johnson in the general election, and for the first time many southern whites upset about the Civil Rights Act found themselves voting for a Republican.

In 1965, Freedom Riders arrived in the south to register black voters before and after the passage of the Voting Rights Act and they were arrested and beaten. The difference in their level of success in registering voters was determined by whether there was a federal official in the county overseeing the enforcement of the Voting Rights Act.

Southern whites used a variety of tactics to suppress the black vote after the Voting Rights Act and it took decades of legal wins to beat them back. It wasn’t until 1989 that blacks achieved proportional representation in the Alabama legislature.

George Wallace ran for president again in 1968 as an independent and if you substitute anti-desegregation with anti-immigrant, it sounded incredibly similar to Trump‘s presidential campaigns, but with an emphasis on getting federal government out of people’s lives and restoring “freedom.” Wallace showed Republicans that by appealing to whites’ racial fears and emphasizing the idea of the federal government infringing on people’s freedoms and lives, a candidate can build a winning coalition, something that Richard Nixon fully took advantage of with his Southern strategy

Federal intervention to protect the rights of a minority have been enough to ignite local resistance in the name of white freedom, but have not been strong enough to actually protect those rights. History has shown the potential power of federal action to protect rights, but repeated examples of the federal government choosing not to fully exercise that power.

This was an interesting book that offered a new perspective on our nation’s too often dark history. Worth a read if you want to decode the frequent cries for state’s rights and liberation from the “oppressive” federal government.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is not an easy read, but definitely worthwhile for the unusual approach Cowie took of focusing on a specific history of Eufaula and Barbour County, Alabama. The detailed narrative begins back in the settler days and Indian conflicts, on forward through the Civil War, Reconstruction, and finally to the life and lasting influence of George Wallace, Barbour's native son and an incredible natural politician.

I have 3 main takeaways:
1) How deep the roots of white supremacy are in this country, even back to the Indian days in the southland- it wasn't just because of cotton. (As fyi, 3/4 of my family tree is rooted in the deep south, so this is not pointing fingers of judgment at others.)

2) A clearer picture of how "freedom" has been (and continues to be) defined differently by various groups of Americans. For some, it is freedom of speech, assembly, worship, labor, association, self-defense. For others, freedom has historically been considered incomplete without the ability to control others that they consider innately inferior to themselves. For yet others, it still is an unachieved goal to live, travel or work in the safety which I, for example, would take for granted fully 80% of the time.

3) A new impression of George Wallace as an incredibly shrewd politician of his times- one far more committed to segregation (not that is admirable, it's not) than fullblown racism, especially early in his career and years as a state judge. The story is told that black attorneys, defendants and constituents found him very fair, and indications are he was more capable as a politician and even administrator than as a husband and father (poor Lurline). Once Wallace expanded his political ambitions, he chose to couch his bias toward segregation in vehement antifederalism and states' rights rhetoric. All this remains incredibly relevant to the present day in America, decades after Wallace passed off the scene.

Probably no matter who you are, at least if you are American, you will find parts of this history hard to stomach and even harder to accept. That's probably what makes it worth the time to read.

(Also, I split my time between reading and listening to the book, my focus is improving when listening to nonfiction if I can either follow along in the moment or go back and reread something I missed initially with just audio. The audiobook is good but not great, I speed most of them up anyway since I have so many things in the pile at any one time.)

[Johnny Gale · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book that will turn you against states' rights and small federal government, because some of your fellow Americans believe freedom is the right to lie, intimidate, steal and kill.

[Dan Downing · Rating 5 out of 5]

Prof. Cowie combs through American history. In the process, he reminds one of forgotten tidbits concerning the idiocy we Americans have embraced. Several of the slogans used by Sen. Goldwater's campaign, for instance, and one of the rebuttals: "In your gut, you know he's nuts". I remember being gob-smacked on a daily basis by the stupid things said by Barry Goldwater and his campaign, as well as the fervor a number of my classmates held him in. But Mr. Cowie goes further, traveling back to the very roots of segregation when he gives us the quotation, "Segregation ended when whites took blacks from Africa". Certainly, a thought avoided by the millions of racists in this country.

The history of racism, which here is seen largely as the freedom of white people to have power over non-whites, cuts into the American Indian experience, the Civil War, reconstruction, Jim Crow and every other ploy used by crooked, morally repugnant whites to bolster their supremacy over someone. Someone, anyone.

Using a small county in Alabama as his case, we follow Mr. Cowie as he investigates the process, starting in 1832, of the United States War Department breaking its word to the Creek nation. Land was promised. And while an effort was made, ultimately the U.S. Government was too chicken-hearted, too enthralled by the hordes of greedy white land thieves, to keep our word to the Creeks. Hundreds, probably thousands, died. But most were red-skinned, so...who cares?

Following were slaves and then war and Reconstruction and Constitutional Amendments and civil rights laws and voting laws, all of which were worth little more than a laugh as greedy, morally bankrupt whites subverted, bypassed, ignored or bullied their way past the laws. As we have today, the Supreme Court made horrific decisions, Presidents lied, and treaties were trampled. The story enrages anyone with a shared of decency.

George Wallace was a man attached to Eufaula, Alabama, the geographic base this story runs through. Unlike today's bigots, Mr. Wallace spoke openly and frankly about race: he hated Negroes, and would gladly have reinstated slavery. Today we have millions of voters who buy into the old bogus straw men about state's rights, about Federal overreach, and so forth, when what they really, in their hearts, believe, is that freedom means the power to enslave, disenfranchise, starve, deny medicine, dignity, jobs, housing---any human good to any non-white.

Freedom's dominion is a false construct. The government's role is to protect, defend, engineer prosperity for all its citizens on every level, in every neighborhood. Prof. Cowie has given us a moral guide wrapped in honest, documented history.

Only the honest and brave tread here.

Highly Recommended

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wowza! Just the book to read in our current times with the extremist Republicans shouting about “freedom” at every chance, whether a parents right to freedom in schools and libraries or freedom from the “tyrannical, deep state” federal government. Using Barbour County, Alabama as a case study, Cowie follows this warped use of the idea of freedom from the beginning of its usage to overrun, and murder, the Creeks for their land to the Reconstruction years (particularly the passage and enforcement of the 14th Amendment) where Black citizens were murdered for voting and elections were nullified and overturned to favor racist candidates (sound familiar?) along with lynching, sharecropping, and convict leasing and into the Jim Crow Era. He ends with George Wallace who understood the power he could gain (and as with many politicians, it was all about power for Wallace) by playing to white mens’ (ignorant) fears of losing their “freedom” as Black citizens’ rights were finally and rightfully acknowledged. In all these situations over a century and a half the federal government failed to have much effect. Cowie argues that when a substantial federal presence was used, good things happened, but follow through and permanence did not occur. Cries and screams from White Alabamans that the federal government was impeding their freedom were heard in every situation, and were sadly effective. I had not realized the states’ and local rights’ ideology had started before the Civil War and was used to displace and assault Creeks.

Cowie notes in his acknowledgment that his thesis for this book began decades ago. It’s scary to realize that this white mans freedom from the federal government continues to this day, as he points out in discussing the January 6th insurrection.

Easily readable, not in the least an “academic” book.

[Steven Meyers · Rating 5 out of 5]

“WHITES YEARNING THE FREEDOM TO OPPRESS OTHERS”

Many people with oversized egos are predisposed to think that they alone have shaped themselves into the person they are. They are delusional. We are all products of not only inherited traits and individual experiences but also the culture we are raised. That culture is shaped by a myriad of historical precedence. Understanding our region’s past is important to understanding ourselves. You would not be the same person if you were raised in New England compared to, oh, the Deep South. Mr. Bowie focuses on a specific region in Alabama as representative of Southern resistance to the federal government’s expansion of civil rights in their state. Speaking as a lifelong Mainer, this 64-year-old fossil has read a plethora of books about the South’s mindsets. ‘Freedom’s Dominion’ is consistent with other respectable investigations. Mr. Cowie analyzes the South’s views of personal freedoms. The book helped me understand why today’s ultraconservative temper-tantrum-prone Congressional “Freedom Caucus” labeled themselves such, what I thought, an odd usage of the word ‘freedom.’ The people who use freedom in such a manner are, at their core, fearful, prejudiced, and resentful about losing their freedom to maintain white political and economic power as well as dominate others. Those others, for the most part, are non-white people. They view it as their Constitutional right. We see it today in such things as voter suppression tactics towards minorities and odious gerrymandering. Like back in the early 1800s, we still also hear the occasional demagogue vomit out nullification as an argument. Nullification is the right to ignore federal laws if it goes against their state’s laws, especially when it comes to minorities’ civil rights.

The book focuses on events in Alabama and begins in 1832 with the theft of Native American lands by a wave of lawless white men and elite speculators who ignored federal laws that gave the Muscogee Creek Nation sole ownership of the new land after they had been driven off their original homeland. Widespread fraud, theft, and violence were heaped upon the Creek people. Many of these unsavory A-holes are still viewed as heroes by Southern folks. The white thieves and their supporters kept beating the drum of the federal government encroaching on their personal freedoms by not allowing them to steal Creek territory. What happened in Alabama certainly was not a one-off when it came to screwing over Native Americans.

Mr. Cowie next addresses push back by Southern whites against Reconstruction and Southerners successful efforts to remove blacks’ newly gains rights (the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.) It was also the birth of the argument that minorities were being granted “special rights.” It is the same tactic used by today’s folks against granting LBGTQ people their civil rights. Southern whites rationalized violence towards law-abiding blacks as self-defense of their personal freedom to oppress others. Mr. Cowie does a good job explaining whites’ racist pretzel logic and their redemption mythology built upon poppycock tales of white victimization and federal corruption. The redemption mythology is also still very much used today in political circles to gin up support in white communities against people who are not white.

The third section of the book talks about the barbaric practice of convict leasing and the huge incarceration of blacks that is still part of our justice system today. I highly recommend Michelle Alexander’s 2010 masterpiece ‘The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.’ Lynching, the redemption mythology, the Lost Cause claptrap, oppressive tenant farming and sharecropping, union busting, and antidemocratic industrial paternalism are also addressed. Federal oversight of horrific Southern practices threatened the area’s racial and economic hierarchy.

The last part of ‘Freedom’s Dominion’ focuses on George Wallace and his impact on the Republican Party. While Trump is nowhere near as intelligent or crafty as Wallace, his and many Republican’s playbook, starting with Richard Nixon, is copied from the late Alabama governor’s racist tactics. Wallace showed that white resentment towards blacks attaining or surpassing them economically is not restricted to the South. Trump just leans in much more into the racist innuendoes with such dog whistles as “Make America Great Again” than most Republicans with national aspirations. You may view the Democratic Convention with its multi-racial crowd as a good thing. Many white people fear it.

The Pulitzer-Prize-winning ‘Freedom’s Dominion’ is one of those books that Southern states likely would love to keep out of the hands of high school and college students as well as their local libraries. There was a lot of material in ‘Freedom’s Dominion’ that made my blood boil. White people have not cornered the market on inflicting injustices upon other people, but we sure have an overabundance of U.S. history that shows racial animus towards Native Americans, Blacks, Latinos, Jews, Irish, Chinese, Japanese, Italians, French-Acadians etc. ‘Freedom’s Dominion’ is a brilliant analysis of why our country is the bipolar mess it is. We’ve been like this since our nation’s formation. The book deserves all its accolades.

[Mikey B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Page 338 (my book) Governor Ross Barnett of Mississippi at an American Patriot Day demonstration in Atlanta, Georgia (two days after the passage of the Civil Rights Act on July 2,1964)

“Are you with us in the fight for freedom?”

Page 231 Orlando Patterson

“One is most free when one can do as one wants with others.”

This book raises some philosophical controversies as it probes what can occur when one espouses “freedom”? The author argues persuasively that freedom has led to the ability to dominate others, and hence to crush their freedom. My freedom over your freedom.

He examines a small territory of Alabama called Barbour County so see how freedom has evolved over the centuries. He starts in the 1830s with the Creek Indian tribe who inhabited this land. It was purportedly “protected” by a treaty with the federal government in Washington, DC. The settlers in Alabama thought otherwise. They saw it as their prerogative, their freedom, to move in and settle on this land – and to remove and kill the Creek Indians who lived there. For a short time, the federal government responded and tried to protect the Creek people from this violent encroachment. It was to no avail. The federal forces were overwhelmed by the number of settlers who saw no reason to obey Washington. They proclaimed states’ rights. The conflict became intertwined between localism, the federal government, and the Creek Indians. The Creek Indians lost out. This freedom to pursue your own agenda and localism would soon escalate into a Civil War in 1861.

This struggle for freedom repeated itself. With Reconstruction after the Civil War, there was an attempt by northerners to aid the now freed Black slaves. Schools were opened. Black men were given the vote, and some Black Congressman were elected. White southerners felt threatened. Long imbued race hatreds flared up – with shootings on election day, lynchings… White southerners did not want equality, seeing it as a menace to their way of life.

Page 166

The violent retaking of white freedom in the fall of 1874 has a name: redemption… an inescapable suspicion endured that federal intervention served the interest of an untamable and unruly Black society, while simultaneously threatening to crush the freedom of white people.

Page 171

Equal rights… meant incursions into, even the destruction of, the liberty of white people.

The author makes the following statement (page 230): White democracy was rooted in Thomas Jefferson’s framework of “constitutional government and individual liberty.” Yet that freedom did not include… that “men of all races have been found to be equally capable in every respect … and should be merged without distinction.” Disenfranchisement and segregation were not antithetical to Jeffersonian egalitarianism. They were essential.

The individualism that permeates the American zeitgeist can negate the quest for freedom of others.

The author examines the rise of George Wallace in the 1960s from Alabama (he was born in Barbour County). He appealed to white working-class northerners when he ran as a presidential candidate. He knew that they felt under siege by the new Civil Rights Act. He found a commonality between white southerners and white northerners – the race issue. Like Republicans, he wanted less government, which translates to more white freedom. George Wallace was a predecessor to Donald Trump.

Page 323 for school integration

The idea of freedom of choice and freedom of association preserved a fundamental right to discriminate.

The author emphasizes the quest for freedom and how it can corrupt it. He exposes the vagueness of the U.S. constitution which can be open to interpretation. I feel that “freedom” is not the only source to the problems that have persisted over the decades in the United States. Is in not more the perennial dilemma of “states’ rights”? This led to the Civil War because southern states felt they had a “right” to keep slavery.

How was it possible that southern states were able to impose segregation laws via Jim Crow? Why does each state have the right to make its own election laws? Shouldn’t this be controlled federally? Currently several states in the South are whittling away at Lyndon Johnson’s Voting Rights Act.

With each state permitted to make its own laws – or overrule federal laws – this leads to a fragmented nation. There is the constant tug-of-war between states seeking their “rights” versus federal power. How long can this go on for? Will these united states continue to be united?

Nevertheless, the constant pervasiveness of freedom and liberty has been detrimental. As exemplified during the recent covid pandemic, many saw it as an infringing on their liberty to wear a mask and to have a vaccination provided for free. This is an abandonment of social responsibility where you are exposing yourself to being infected and then infecting others. Freedom must go hand-in-hand with treating the community in a just and fair way – a communal responsibility.

[Ryan A. Fleming · Rating 5 out of 5]

With Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power, Jefferson Cowie charts the history of freedom in America being interpreted as a freedom to dominate others.

In the opening chapters and throughout, Cowie dissects what freedom actually means in the US context and how individual liberties became not only intertwined with a freedom from government authority but simultaneously a freedom to have authority over others. Those others change with the progression of history that Cowie charts. There are many primary sources drawn upon during the four historical periods which form the main focus of the book. It helps to ground the argument when framed in the words of those concerned or in contemporaneous reporting. You can see a real evolution as certain elements echo throughout different periods. That is helped by the focus placed on Barbour County, Alabama throughout: from the displacement of the Creek peoples in the early 1800s, throughout opposition to Reconstruction, the New Deal, and civil rights grounded in white supremacism. The county was the site of several flashpoints and home to some who would go on to prominence in sate and national politics like George Wallace.

The focus on a single location also allows exploration for how this freedom to dominate others has evolved since the early 1800s. The exact targets of the oppression may change, or the lines may be blurred to include more of the poor and working class of any demographic, but the intention always remains the same. That said, Cowie could have put more detail on grassroots efforts from those marginalised and oppressed communities instead of focusing on the events almost entirely from a federal government versus local oppressors narrative. It ignores much oppression done by the federal government itself and the attempts to counter it on the ground. The book is left open-ended however, perhaps unintentionally, that there is a further chapter yet to be written in this long, sad story based on current events. Those current events do hang heavy over the historic ones portrayed within the book, and a sense is created that even when that chapter is written it won’t be the last.

Cowie creates an engaging narrative history in which historical personages are fully fleshed out characters. We get a sense of their lives as much as their position in society, which places their actions and fates later in the correct context. The focus on the one county again helps this since the same family can appear driving events across generations. The imagery used in describing events also helps the narrative, in particular the Election Massacre of 1874 and later accounts of lynchings in Barbour County. Vivid, visceral, often depressing, it places the abstract ideas of freedom, the specific freedom practiced during these events, into a tale that shows the effect of that notion on the lives of the people who practice it and have it practiced upon them. The final chapters, focused on the segregationist efforts against the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 60s, ends up feeling not a culmination but a continuation of the conflict in the area that began before the foundation of the county. The narrative doesn’t draw to a close exactly, but it provides a context for events since the 1960s.

Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power conveys the history of Barbour County, Alabama, through a series of conflicts between white supremacists and the US federal government in an engaging, visceral narrative.

[Mark Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title lays bare the real issue: Parse the expression, and then consider the paradox of whether Freedom and Dominion can truly co-exist. In this book Jefferson Cowie illustrates—across centuries of historical fact—that use of the word freedom as meaning the right to dominate others was (and is) applied without irony by those who would influence society for their sole profit. Although centered on the local history of Eufaula, AL, Cowie demonstrates the relevance of this community to the US nation as a whole. In many ways this book exposes the sordid soul of white supremacy throughout America.

Cowie traces the history through the initially illegal white settlements in Native American territory, through the introduction of slaves once the Indians were removed, through the suppression of the non-slave holder class (both black and white) before and after the Civil War. The inconsistent federal efforts to expel the white settlers, through faltering Union control during Reconstruction, through hamstrung federal attempts in the New Deal era, were all inadequate to dampen the ultimate control of the elite class whose status and wealth (before and after the war) were based on white dominance and the associated attitudes necessary to maintain their position. Those attitudes incorporated a religious justification of white supremacy conveniently crafted two centuries before Europeans settled in the region around what became Eufaula—since then, African Americans have turned that erroneous impetus on its head, and expressed a Christianity more aligned with the Gospels. A key thread throughout this entire historical narrative is the notion that concerns of white persons—in this case, people of European extraction—supersede any concerns of anyone not of that racial stock. It was (and remains) a effective method to artificially maintain wealth and status.

Another key thread is the manipulative ethos of white supremacy culture—the efforts of whites who are not on board with white supremacy are by themselves insufficient to alter the course of that culture. This is rarely the fault of the individual white people who attempt to be on the right side of history. A major factor is those with wealth often have acquired their wealth through white supremacy—they prefer the status quo and they take extreme measures to keep their ill-gotten profits. These measures include provoking poor and less educated whites to hate their neighbors (and would-be allies) of color. A close cousin to white supremacy culture is the laissez-faire mantra that gained mainstream traction in the late 20th Century. There are significant similarities between neoliberal economics and the white supremacist culture that lives on today—this book illustrates the natural relationship between the two. It's been a proven strategy spanning centuries, and shows no signs of slacking off as it continues to work so well.

As Cowie demonstrates throughout this book, the only effective solution to white supremacy and its associated false freedom to dominate others is conclusive federal intervention. The removal of freedom to dominate is not the removal of essential Constitutional freedoms—it's the only way to ensure these essential freedoms are truly there, as long as the impulse (by anyone) to dominate remains active. Fortunately there are signs that the public is becoming more aware of the need for federal intervention in several areas—and these increasingly aware people are voting accordingly.

[John Pepper · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't overstate my admiration for this outstanding history. It illuminates the tension, indeed the fight for the true meaning of "freedom" between the poles of ensuring and supporting the freedom of every person and the freedom claimed and asserted by individuals to essentially do what they choose even as and if it deprives the rights of others. As Cowie writes, "By. recognizing discrimination, white supremacy, economic power, and the capacity for violence as dimensions pf what 'freedom' has always meant, we gain a fresh perspective on central problems of American ideology and practice. A core dimension of freedom is an expression of power".

Cowie develops this timeless history while never failing to engage the reader with fluent and often inspiring prose and individual stories capturing broadly applicable themes thorough the lens one area of the country--southeastern Alabaman, Barbour County over the course of two centuries. He frames the history in the context of America's being born at "a unique confluence of two streams of global history: settler colonialism and chattel slavery". He describes our experience as being even more unique because our nation was founded "on a premise so deeply wedded to the combined ancient republican values of freedom and democratic governance".

Cowie shows how the oppression of individual rights, beginning with the Creek Indians, to African Americans has been waged at the local level and contested and thwarted only by Federal Action which has all too often proved insufficient and temporary and indeed used by its opponents as a further reason to demand a locally imposed definition of "freedom" which entitles the denial of "freedom" to others. Again, Cowie writes: "we learn that federal power has proven itself, quite consistently, by design and practice, to be inadequate to the basic claims of citizenship by the people" Cowie goes on to lament that "one of the great ironies of American history is that federal power has a far better record of breeding anti-statists than it does disciplining them.

This commitment to "anti-statism" has too often been a cover for discrimination against blacks, immigrants and other minorities. It has been turned into "anti-elites" as well by politicians from Governor George Wallace to Nixon to Trump.

It is striking to read how Wallace's platform and very words mirror those followed by Trump. It fed off "victimization" at the hands of the Federal government and intellectual elites and indulged in outlandish untruths and the aura employed by "strongmen" through all time.

As Cowie cogently writes, "Freedom has always been a contested, messy, and ill defined concept..but it is crucial to recognize that the anti-statist, white power version of it is not an aberration but a virulent part of the American idiom".

He concludes, "To confront this saga of freedom is to confront the fundamentals of the American narrative. We ought not embrace the cruelty of the past, but neither should we continue the malignant idea that this story of oppression was never the 'real' American story. The solution is to commit to a bright, sharp, militant defense of the one single, unambiguous thing that the federal government should do defend. the civil and political rights on the local level for all people--cries of freedom to the contrary be damned".

[Charles Stephen · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a native son who fled Alabama 50 years ago, during the interminable governorships of George C. Wallace, and only returned in 2019, I found Cowie’s history to be informative, satisfying, and inspiring. The wonder is that it has not been touted in Alabama to a greater extent, since it was announced on May 7 that Cowie had won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for History. The prize was $15,000, and Cowie’s agent currently charges $15,000 for each speaking engagement he books for Cowie. Travels expenses are extra.

Studies of whiteness were the vogue in the social sciences 25 years ago—except for history. With Freedom’s Dominion, an examination over centuries of white resistance to federal authority in Barbour County, Alabama, Cowie has blown every whiteness study out of the water. Cowie has demonstrated in the most powerful way possible that when history uncovers the past it can also address perplexing problems of the present day. It is likely that many white Alabamans do not want the mirror of history to be turned on them to reveal their connection to such a shocking, reprehensible past.

When George Wallace won his governorship the first time in 1962—in a landslide—he was the fifth man from Barbour County to occupy that chair. Wallace dominated only the last quarter of Cowie’s book, so this study allowed readers to see how all five governors were cut from the same cloth, representing the interests of whites in a county and state with a majority nonwhite population, all decrying federal overreach into the affairs of the state. This rhetoric, this dynamic, holds sway in 2023 far beyond the borders of Alabama and not just in The Deep South.

To appreciate the work of historians and the particular magic of Cowie, examine his description on pp. 344-346 of a meeting in the Oval Office in 1965 between Wallace and President Lyndon Baines Johnson. By this point in his career Wallace had proven that he could win in presidential primaries outside the South. He was used to dominating the soapbox with every speech and press conference he gave. Wallace had requested the meeting, but he met his match with the wily LBJ, who told Wallace to “stop looking back to 1865 and start planning for 2065.” In contemporary parlance, Cowie stated that LBJ “owned” Wallace during their three-hour meeting. I chuckled and was curious to see the sources Cowie used for his fresh and memorable description of that meeting. I recognized Dan Carter’s The Politics of Rage, one of a dozen sources, and marveled at Cowie’s skill at synthesis and interpretation. Two days after the Wallace meeting, LBJ went on national television, introduced The Voting Rights Bill, and gave a speech etched in memory for the millions who watched him, ending: “‘and . . . we . . . shall . . . overcome.’”

Freedom’s Dominion is a remarkable book, an unforgettable read, one that I would pay to get into the hands of my Congressional representatives in Washington, DC. Do you think Tommy Tuberville would read it?

This review is not an endorsement of amazon.com or any business owned by Jeff Bezos. Books for my reviews were checked out from a public library, purchased from a local brick-and-mortar book shop, or ordered from my favorite website for rare and out-of-print books.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow!

This book has so much to say about American Democracy. It would be too much to ask everyone to read this, but I wish its theme were more widely understood.

Cowie tells the story of Democracy in America as one of tension between the enviable ideals authored by the Founding Fathers and the local impulse of some citizens to impose their will on vulnerable populations. The Federal government was called upon to enforce the Constitution many times and its track record of efficacious action or even willingness to act is woefully inadequate.

The word “Freedom” winds its way through the book almost always in opposition to the concept of Equality under the Law.

The action takes place in Barbour county Alabama, but Cowie insists that the concepts are applicable to events across our nation.

The 1830’s saw a treaty between the Muscogee (Creek) nation and the federal government in which the Creek were granted land in eastern Alabama along the Chatahoochee river. When White settlers swindled or just seized these lands, Andrew Jackson (incredibly) sent federal marshals to enforce the treaty by restoring the lands to the Muscogee. A combination of federal weakness and local determination doomed the effort. This is Cowie’s first tale of the federal government in opposition to the White settlers’ “Freedom.”

The next section deals with Reconstruction. This is probably the clearest episode of the federal government imposing itself in opposition to White Freedom (to dominate the newly emancipated Black population). The Civil War both strengthened the federal government and provided resolve to enforce the 13-15th amendments. Voting rights were a brief reality in Barbour county and the Freedmen (no women) used them to elect Black representatives. But again a combination of lack of federal commitment and a very determined and unscrupulous local White population meant that federal power, and the civil rights of black people, withered and died. After mass violence at the 1874 elections, the Black population was effectively disenfranchised for nearly a century.

Book 3 “Federal Power in Repose” deals with the long period between Reconstruction and the Civil Rights movement. Cowie deftly outlines how voter disenfranchisement (including poor whites when the elites had to defuse William Jennings Bryant era agrarian populism), celebration of local “customs,” and barbaric acts of racial violence defied American ideals by maintaining a throughly undemocratic racial hierarchy. New state constitutions across the South at the turn of the century simply legalized the disenfranchisement of African Americans as a class as well as many landless Whites. The national Democratic Party turned a blind eye in return for Southern collaboration in Congress as Alabama used state prisoners as forced laborers in mining operations in flagrant disregard of civil and labor rights.

The last section deals with the Civil Rights movement and its resistors. Barbour County native son George Wallace was emblematic of White resistance, but hardly unusual. Extraordinary in his political skills, not his views on race. The take home message from this section is that process was and, importantly, is the result of the concerted and relentless efforts of legal and social activists. Its easy to think that societal attitudes on race became more enlightened, but the truth is that progress in extending the civil rights promised by the Constitution to all Americans has been fought every step of the way.

[Chris Jaffe · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars.

This is a very good book that looks at the relationship between race, anti-federal feelings, and how people define history. To look at this relationship, Cowie focuses on one county: Barbour County, Alabama. This was part of Creek County back in the day, and the first part of the book focuses on that. Some local settlers were so aggressive in wanted to take Creek land that even Andrew Jackson sent federal marshals down there to restrain them. When those federal authorities killed the most radical member of the movement (largely in self-defense) he just became a martyr to the cause, and the cause picked up more steam. EVentually, the Creek were forced out, with huge local approval.

Barbour County had no sooner left the frontier phase than the road to session got underway. The whites strongly supported session and for them freedom was tied to the fredom to enslave others. The SOuth lost the war but southern Democrats continued to oppose federal "despotism" - in which the despotism was attempting to give blacks rights. Reconstruction effectively ended in Barbour in 1874 with an election day massacre that killed 15-40 black citizens. Troops were still there but ordered not to get involved.

The days of segregation saw white oligarchy as Jeffersonian democracy (which, to be fair, is in keeping with Jefferson himself). The CSA was noble and the Lost Cause myth was perpetuated. The black vote was silenced. There were 181,315 blacks registered to vote in 1900 but just 2,980 in 1903. Convict leasing began, with people jailed on bogus grounds and often worked to detah in Alabama's mines. FDR needed southern votes to pass his New Deal, so the bills didn't touch southern race relations. Whites see blacks having equal jobs as "negro domination."

Enter the civil rights movement. George Wallace was from this county. He distilled its values and more than anyone made the rhetorical connection to freedom and opposing federal power. Race didn't even have to be mentioned directly - and he realized he had a following up north. Post-Selma civil rights saw disappointment in Barbour County as the white vote was enough to win. By 1968, Wallace took his case North and Cowie contends he was doing a good job peeling away white ethnic northern working class voters from the Democrats until his choice of VP scared away many voters, especially white working class women.

The book essentially ends in 1968, with a brief 10 page postscript talking about how a fetish for localism is called democracy. He has a page or two on Jan. 6, 2021 - and a main problem with this book is how its narrative feels like it ends too soon. He notes there was a double murder by cops of two black men before the #BlackLivesMatter movement emerged. A lot of themes mentioned in this book can be very visibily seen on Jan. 6. Leaving it in 1968 freels frankly chickenshit.

The latter chapters on Wallace also feel a little strangely off, as we've been so focused on one PLACE so far that shfiting the focus to one MAN felt off.

Still, this is an excellent book overall.

[Paul Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

A TERRIFYINGLY ILLUMINATING book, and a winner of the Pulitzer for history to boot. By looking at just one county, Barbour County in southeastern Alabama, from about the time of statehood (1819) to late 1960s, Cowie explores how "freedom" in our political discourse has often amounted to "the freedom of white men to do whatever they want with the lives and property of non-whites"

The four principal sections of the book take close looks at moments when the federal government tried to circumscribe the actions of the white men who ran Barbour County and, basically, failed.

In the 1820s and 1830s, during the Andrew Jackson administration, a treaty put together by the federal government ceded the Creeks a large piece of territory in southeastern Alabama in return for their withdrawal from Georgia. White settlers had discovered, though, that the land in question was excellent for growing cotton, so they just moved in and started plantations, completely ignoring the treaty. Federal officials (including, bizarrely, Francis Scott Key) were sent to enforce federal law. No dice. The white settlers got the land.

Reconstruction: in a scene enacted all over the South in 1872, white men secretly brought firearms to the polling place and shot at the formerly enslaved, now newly enfranchised Black citizens who were trying to vote. Federal officials were sent, again, and protests made in Congress. Were the voting rights of the formerly enslaved restored? Umm, no.

End of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century: the state of Alabama discovers that a lot of revenue can be generated by using convict labor. The prisons fill up with convicts, enriching both the state and local manufacturers. Federal officials try to stop this practice. Do they succeed? Nope.

Mid-1950s to mid-1960s: the civil rights movement galvanizes the country, leading to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Alabama governor George Wallace, native son of Barbour County, becomes notorious for leading the resistance to integration. Federal officials make some headway this time, and the federal legislation is enforced. Local officials, however, begin a decades-long project of whittling away at it. They have made a lot of progress.

The real looming shadow at the end of Cowie's book, though, is that George Wallace discovers that the political trick of marketing white supremacy as "freedom," as in "the freedom the founding fathers bequeathed us and that our patriots died for," is a hit all over the country. The Republican Party takes due note.

And that is why this important book is not just illuminating, but terrifyingly so.

Brilliant book--not only energetically researched, but written with verve, some scenes (Election Day 1872, Wallace's one-on-one with LBJ) having a novelistic intensity.

[David Valentino · Rating 5 out of 5]

American Freedom Means Dominating the Other

Can you tell the history of this nation’s striving for freedom looking at a single county? Jefferson Cowie’s history that focuses on Barbour County, AL, and springs its bounds to cover the U. S. demonstrates that you can, especially when the subject is about what freedom means; that is, what freedom means to white Americans. The title sums up the tale: domination over the others, they being the Creeks and other Native American tribes, and most especially African Americans. Thoughtful readers not seduced by mythology will find this mostly a dispiriting saga, particularly as while once the unspoken beyond the boundaries of Barbour and Dixie is now nearly shouted and inescapable. Freedom’s Dominion stands as a timely history that all will benefit from reading.

Cowie if anything is not subtle, thank goodness. In several places and in various straightforward language he states the thesis of the book and the basic problem that has faced the United States throughout its history. Randomly selected, then, is one such statement that appears toward the end in Chapter 19, The SCOPE of Freedom (the registration push following the passage of the Voting Rights Act): “The fight against the white version of freedom—one that said if you cannot be a master then you are not free, that if federal authority is not on your side it should not exist—neither started nor ended with those heroic [civil rights] stories.”

Cowie provides ample support for his theme, beginning in the early 1800s with whites driving the Creek nation off its land, through the reconstruction era that saw white Southerners defeat the Federal effort to enforce the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, the battle for civil rights that still left Blacks mostly disenfranchised, and George Wallace’s governorship and run as a third party candidate, a candidacy that revealed that white Southern attitudes prevailed among whites north of the Mason-Dixon line.

Cowie, besides drawing a clear-eyed bead on American history, also adds clarity to the predicament we find ourselves in today, that is our highly racialized and anti-government politics that has all but paralyzed our Federal government. Freedom’s Dominion is more than just a timely history, it is an essential read for concerned Americans not afraid to confront their history forthrightly.