The presidential election of 1884, in which Grover Cleveland ended the Democrats' twenty-four-year presidential drought by defeating Republican challenger James G. Blaine, was one of the gaudiest in American history, remembered today less for its political significance than for the mudslinging and slander that characterized the campaign. But a closer look at the infamous election reveals far more complexity than previous stereotypes allowed, argues Mark Summers. Behind all the mud and mala...

Reconstruction policy after the Civil War, observes Mark Wahlgren Summers, was shaped not simply by politics, principles, and prejudices. Also at work were fears — often unreasonable fears of renewed civil war and a widespread sense that four years of war had thrown the normal constitutional process so dangerously out of kilter that the republic itself remained in peril.To understand Reconstruction, Summers contends, one must understand that the purpose of the North’s war was — fir...

For a generation, scholarship on the Reconstruction era has rightly focused on the struggles of the recently emancipated for a meaningful freedom and defined its success or failure largely in those terms. In The Ordeal of the Reunion, Mark Wahlgren Summers goes beyond this vitally important question, focusing on Reconstruction’s need to form an enduring Union without sacrificing the framework of federalism and republican democracy. Assessing the era nationally, Summers emphasizes ...

Relations between the press and politicians in modern America have always been contentious. In The Press Gang, Mark Summers tells the story of the first skirmishes in this ongoing battle. Following the Civil War, independent newspapers began to separate themselves from partisan control and assert direct political influence. The first investigative journalists uncovered genuine scandals such as those involving the Tweed Ring, but their standard practices were often sensational, as ...

Much of late-nineteenth-century American politics was parade and pageant. Voters crowded the polls, and their votes made a real difference on policy. In Party Games, Mark Wahlgren Summers tells the full story and admires much of the political carnival, but he adds a cautionary note about the dark recesses: vote-buying, election-rigging, blackguarding, news suppression, and violence.Summers also points out that hardball politics and third-party challenges helped make the par...

A dramatic reappraisal and retelling of the destruction of the American UnionTo Save Us All from Slavery’s Power is a novel assessment of the culmination of the sectional crisis before the Civil War. It is a story of mutual misunderstanding, journalistic mendacity, and irreconcilable visions of the country’s future. With threats of disunion and rebellion rising in a thunderous chorus from the South in 1860, how could Republicans not have believed them unti...

Set sail for high-seas hijinks and nautical nonsense with those paragons of Pirattitude who invented the famous International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Whether readers are old hands at pirating or hopeless landlubbers, the Pirate Guys will have them pirate-savvy in no time with sure-fire pirate pickup lines for any occasion, tips on how to make their pirate party a buccaneer ball that even Martha Stewart would be proud of, and help determining their true pirate monicker.

Nicholls, Montgomery, and Knowles on The Law of Extradition and Mutual Assistance is the leading work in this complex and growing area of law. It provides a comprehensive and analytical treatment of the laws covering the extradition arrangements between the UK and other states, as well as international mutual assistance. This edition provides an expanded discussion of the case law on human rights and an examination of the of the UK's post-Brexit extradition arrangements with the E...

""I am going back through your two Caper books. I gotta tell ya, they are great!! " Robert "Cockroach" Blair --- The authors of "Pirattitude!" and "The Diego Garcia Caper" present another tale of the pirates aboard The Festering Boil. The crew has its sights set on glory and gold at the Pirate Olympics, but they run into more trouble than they bargained for when confronted by something more dangerous than Spanish steel - Cap'n Slappy's ex-wives!

Everyone knows Cap'n Slappy as a legendary pirate, pillaging and plundering and delivering savage beatings with his fists and forehead. But he also has a more artistic side, and in "Cap'n Slappy's Parade of Pirate Poetry," he offers his poetic output with the same finesse his blunderbuss offers its explosive output - sort of all over and with awesome effect.

"Cap'n Slappy and Ol' Chumbucket are funny, funny men ..." (The Greenman Review) The authors of "Pirattitude!" are at it again. The guys who invented International Talk Like a Pirate Day bring to life a pirate fantasy - a swashbuckling adventure with action, comedy, romance, feats of derring do, and colorful, larger-than-life characters. Join the crew of The Festering Boil as they careen across the Seven Seas in a madcap race for riches, romance and revenge! As one reader said - "Just want...

The third in the "Festering Boil" caper series, by the creators of International Talk Like a Pirate Day and authors of "Pirattitude!" and "A Pirate's Life for Me." When the crew of the Festering Boil return to the Caribbean, they are confronted by an old nemesis with an evil plan. But things take a strange and dangerous turn in the depths of the South American jungle. The crew meets old friends in new places, new friends in old places, there's danger, laughs, swashbuckling and even a littl...