A fascinating study of America’s first national burial ground, with photos: “It’s stunning to realize what a who’s who exists in that space.” —Howard Gillette, Professor Emeritus, Rutgers University at Camden This study explores the multiple ways in which Congressional Cemetery has been positioned for some two hundred years in “the shadow” of the U.S. Capitol. The narrative proceeds chronologically, discussing the burial ground during three periods: the antebellum years; the years from the end of the Civil War to approximately 1970, when the site progressively deteriorated; and the period from the early 1970s to 2007, when both public and private organizations worked to preserve the physical site and the memory of what it has been and continues to represent. This monograph focuses on the dominant narrative associated with the site: its legacy as the first national burial ground in the nation. Given this emphasis, the text presents a political and cultural analysis of the cemetery, with particular focus on the participation of the U.S. Congress. “This book makes historians and many others aware of a fascinating and complicated history. Moreover, it not only details the long history of the cemetery, but it uses it to explore the nature of historic memorials generally in the creation of national memory.” —Steven Diner, Chancellor of Rutgers University at Newark “The history of Congressional Cemetery is intimately tied up in the changing demographics of its locale, and its corresponding decline as the neighborhood around Christ Church changed led to its emergence as a cause célèbre for historic preservationists.” —Donald Kennon, Chief Historian for the United States Capitol Historical Society and editor of The Capitol Dome “The Johnsons have done an excellent job of mining a wide range of sources and conveying the complex history of an institution that merits documentation.” —Howard Gillette, Professor Emeritus, Rutgers University at Camden

The history of the modern U.S. Capitol, the iconic seat of American government, is also the chronicle of America's most tumultuous years. An award-winning journalist has captured with impeccable detail the clash of personalities behind the building of the Capitol and its extraordinary design and engineering.

Global in scope, but refusing a familiar totalizing theoretical framework, the essays in The Politics of Culture in the Shadow of Capital demonstrate how localized and resistant social practices—including anticolonial and feminist struggles, peasant revolts, labor organizing, and various cultural movements—challenge contemporary capitalism as a highly differentiated mode of production. Reworking Marxist critique, these essays on Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, North America, and Europe advance a new understanding of "cultural politics" within the context of transnational neocolonial capitalism. This perspective contributes to an overall critique of traditional approaches to modernity, development, and linear liberal narratives of culture, history, and democratic institutions. It also frames a set of alternative social practices that allows for connections to be made between feminist politics among immigrant women in Britain, women of color in the United States, and Muslim women in Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, and Canada; the work of subaltern studies in India, the Philippines, and Mexico; and antiracist social movements in North and South America, the Caribbean, and Europe. These connections displace modes of opposition traditionally defined in relation to the modern state and enable a rethinking of political practice in the era of global capitalism. Contributors. Tani E. Barlow, Nandi Bhatia, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Chungmoo Choi, Clara Connolly, Angela Davis, Arturo Escobar, Grant Farred, Homa Hoodfar, Reynaldo C. Ileto, George Lipsitz, David Lloyd, Lisa Lowe, Martin F. Manalansan IV, Aihwa Ong, Pragna Patel, José Rabasa, Maria Josefina Saldaña-Portillo, Jaqueline Urla

On 1 March 2002, The Washington Post reported that a parallel shadow government' had been activated in the wake of September 11. The first in-depth exploration of this frightening topic, this book reveals the secret actions of this 'shadow government' in full detail, including the complete text of several formerly classified government and military documents outlining plans, secret facilities and more, making a powerful case that the 'shadow government' is more concerned with restricting American civil liberties than with fighting international terrorism.'

Few images of early America were more striking, and jarring, than that of slaves in the capital city of the world’s most important free republic. Black slaves served and sustained the legislators, bureaucrats, jurists, cabinet officials, military leaders, and even the presidents who lived and worked there. While slaves quietly kept the nation’s capital running smoothly, lawmakers debated the place of slavery in the nation, the status of slavery in the territories newly acquired from Mexico, and even the legality of the slave trade in itself. This volume, with essays by some of the most distinguished historians in the nation, explores the twin issues of how slavery made life possible in the District of Columbia and how lawmakers in the district regulated slavery in the nation. Contributors: David Brion Davis, Mary Beth Corrigan, A. Glenn Crothers, Jonathan Earle, Stanley Harrold, Mitch Kachun, Mary K. Ricks, James B. Stewart, Susan Zaeske, David Zarefsky