The Birth of Empire: DeWitt Clinton and the American Experience, 1769-1828 (Paperback)

~ (Author) "BY THE TIME OF DeWitt Clinton's birth, on March 2, 1769, the Clinton family had been in New York for nearly four decades..." (more)
Key Phrases: canal commission, presidential electors, New York, Van Buren, George Clinton (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...Cornog offers unforgettable stories for general readers and a wealth of information and insight about New York politics and history."--Gazette, Schenectady, NY
"...Evan Cornog's biography of DeWitt Clinton is...welcome, filling a noticeable gap in the literature while portraying the individual who transformed New York into the Empire State....Cornog is to be congratulated for writing the definitive study of DeWitt Clinton. It should stand the test of time."--Journal of the Early Republic
"[Cornog] creates a forceful and colorful portrait of his vital and powerful subject....Rather like our Bill Clinton, his DeWitt Clinton recurrently finds in defeat the seeds of his next triumph, but he also invariably squanders victory by indulging in uncompromising fantasies of control and revenge. This biographical approach makes for a lucid and largely true story that lingers on the personal and contingent."--Alan Taylor, The New Republic
"In Cornog's telling, the life and times of DeWitt Clinton make a fascinating guide to the complex interaction of personality, popularity, and policy in our infant republic."--The New Yorker
"Evan Cornog served brilliantly as press secretary in my administration. Now as a writer and biographer, he is brilliant once again in telling the story of one of the great politicians of the state and city of New York. Cornog's wonderful Birth of Empire not only gives the history of DeWitt Clinton, for twelve years the City's mayor and twice the State's governor, but also paints a marvelous picture of early 19th-century Manhattan. Active sponsor of the Erie Canal, founder of the New-York Historical Society, and devoted supporter of the cultural and industrial growth of city and state, DeWitt Clinton comes alive in this story of the origins of the greatest city in the world."--Edward I. Koch, Mayor of New York City, 1978 to 1989

Product Description

DeWitt Clinton (1769-1828) dominated the politics of New York State during the first quarter of the nineteenth century, serving as mayor of New York City and then governor of the state. At the same time, he was influential on the national scene, running for president in 1812 and only narrowly losing to James Madison. Although patrician in his sentiments, Clinton nevertheless developed new forms of party politics, including the spoils system. He was an early champion of the nomination of candidates by convention rather than legislative caucus, and as a United States Senator contributed the draft language for the Twelfth Amendment, which embedded party politics in the fabric of the Constitution.

Clinton's greatest achievement was the Erie Canal, the establishment and implementation of which he championed as early as 1810. Construction of the canal began in 1817, and even before it was completed, eight years later, it had brought profound changes--economic, cultural, and social--to the state and the nation. As Evan Cornog illustrates in his detailed and compelling narrative, the Erie Canal hastened the economic expansion of the country, altered its political geography, set an example for activist government, and decisively secured New York City's position as America's foremost metropolis. It was a project unlike anything the Empire State--or the United States--had seen before, and was only the most successful of Clinton's many efforts to implement his view that government should play an active role in the economic and intellectual development of American society.

The Birth of Empire chronicles not only the life of an important political leader but the accomplishments that underlay his success. As mayor of New York City, for example, Clinton was instrumental in the founding of the public-school system. He sponsored countless measures to promote cultural enrichment as well as educational opportunities for New Yorkers, and helped to establish and lead such institutions as the New-York Historical Society, the American Academy of the Arts, and the Literary and Philosophical Society. An amateur scientist of some renown, Clinton also wrote essays on geology, botany, entomology, archaeology, anthropology, and ichthyology.

As shown here, Clinton's career was marked by frequent attempts to integrate his cultural and scientific interests into his identity as a politician, thus projecting the image of a man of wide learning and broad vision, a scholar-statesman of the new republic. Ironically, the political innovations which Clinton set in motion--the refinement of patronage and the spoils system, appeals to immigrant voters, and the professionalization of politics--were precisely what led to the extinction of the scholar-statesman's natural habitat. However visionary, the latter-day philosopher-king would eventually have no place in the modern world. DeWitt Clinton was born into the aristocratic culture of the eighteenth century, yet his achievements and ideas crucially influenced (in ways he did not always anticipate) the growth of the mass society of the nineteenth century.

With this book, Cornog engagingly guides readers through the colorful maze of early nineteenth-century New York politics and society, illustrating both the depth of achievement and breadth of influence of one of its most important leaders. Those who wish to understand the development of American politics, the flowering of a distinctly American cultural life, the progress of the market revolution, and the growth of America's largest city will find many valuable insights in The Birth of Empire.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (January 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195140516
• ISBN-13: 978-0195140514
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,429,818 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Complex New Yorker, Erie Canal and Historical Ironies, June 23, 2002

By	Peter Carrozzo (Flushing, New York) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Birth of Empire: DeWitt Clinton and the American Experience, 1769-1828 (Hardcover)

Evan Cornog has crafted an expert depiction and analysis of the life of DeWitt Clinton: the early nineteenth century mayor of New York City, governor of New York State and champion of the Erie Canal. Cornog puts this man in historical perspective; he ruled at the twilight of the age of elite, privileged politicians and the dawn of the age of popular democratic mass politics. Ironically, Clinton, the quintessential product of the former political age, helped usher in the latter by championing election reform, public education and the canal itself.

The historical ironies of the canal expressed by Cornog are insightful. Clinton was a proponent of federal funding for internal improvements yet the success of the canal as a state subsidized project discouraged massive federal public works projects for more than a century. Its success also led to a certain canal-building fever for other states. But later canal construction came when private railroads were gaining steam. This untimely investment, coupled with the Panic of 1837 actually frightened off and discouraged future state, federal and foreign investment in internal improvements.

A final unforseen result for Clinton was the social transformation which flowed quickly from the canal and led to the end of the elite age of New York politics.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The most important New Yorker, July 13, 2004

By	Rocco Dormarunno (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

DeWitt Clinton's accomplishments have long been trumpeted in New York City and State, and for too long his canal has been perceived as a local triumph. Thanks to Evan Cornog's study, "The Birth of Empire: DeWitt Clinton and the American Experience, 1769-1828" the many triumphs of Clinton's career are given the national and historic scope they deserve.

NOTE: This is a study of Clinton's contributions to New York's and America's emergence as a world power, especially in terms of an economic power. This is NOT a biography in the ordinary sense of the word. Unlike McCullough's "John Adams" or Chernow's "Alexander Hamiltion", we do not get a full-length portrait of the man. Partly because DeWitt Clinton was much more reserved and reluctant to show his feelings than others of his time and partly because his diary entries, as Cornog points out, are very mundane, we mostly see the public DeWitt Clinton: DeWitt Clinton the politician, DeWitt Clinton the scientist, DeWitt Clinton the philanthropist, etc. So intensely private in some ways (his mother wondered if he was dead or alive because he never wrote her while he attended Columbia), it is remarkable that he would seek such a public career.

But it was to New York's and America's benefit that he did.

Although he never achieved the Presidency, he often influenced (directly or indirectly) every President in office during his lifetime. He clashed with some of the mightiest men of his day: Aaron Burr, Daniel Tompkins, Ambrose Spencer, et al. As Cornog points out, not all his confrontations were rooted in ideology; DeWitt Clinton was a political animal, even though the political realm he operated in was rapidly changing, often leaving Clinton behind. Clinton also could often be extremely self-centered, snobbish and vindictive. And, yet, this contradictory man also had long-reaching visions and programs for the benefit of the poor as well as the merchant and upper classes. He supported free education for all New Yorkers. He supported artists, writers, and scientists. Most importantly, his dogged determination to get the Erie Canal built provided jobs for immigrants, provided a market for farmers, provided work for New Englanders, and helped build the great cities along the canal's path. And as the canal propelled New York State and New York City into economic powerhouses, it also propelled America's westward expansion and its status as a world-class nation.

Well-written and well-documented, Evan Cornog's "The Birth of Empire" captures the feel of the early decades of America, with all its growing pains. And it puts DeWitt Clinton in American history's spotlight where he belongs.

3.0 out of 5 stars PRINT TOO SMALL, August 13, 2008

By	Lawrence J. Moscato - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

THE PRINT IN THIS BOOK IS TOO SMALL. ONLY FOR PEOPLE WITH YOUNG EYES. I NEED A MAGNIFYING GLASS TO READ