More than hustlers.(books, arts & manners)(Book review)

Throes of Democracy:

The American Civil War Era,

1829-1877, by Walter A. McDougall

(Harper, 816 pp., $34.95)

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ANUMBER of traits tend to characterize American historians: Some embrace narrative, while others are more interested in solving historical puzzles; some excel at biography or the great-man view of history, while others provide a bottom-up account--the story of women or working men, slaves or freedmen, or Native Americans; and some write with a veneer of objectivity, while others freely wear their opinions on their sleeves. Back in graduate school, I was taught about J. H. Hexter's maxim that some historians are splitters whereas others are lumpers, which is to say some delve into the particulars of history while others deal in large overarching themes. So what is Walter McDougall? He, like his new book, is actually quite difficult to characterize. In countless ways Throes of Democracy is a curious, almost eccentric work, but it's also a significant one, and more often than not a breath of fresh air.

For starters, it is a sprawling kaleidoscope of America stretching from the mercurial, irreverent rise of Andrew Jackson and the first mumblings of early-19thcentury secessionism to the tumultuous end of Reconstruction. In between we encounter two wars, the Mexican War and the Civil War; regional splits and frontier tensions; a splendid array of writers, thinkers, politicians, warriors, and millenarians; and the rise of railroads, robber barons, racial bigotry, reformers, black Baptist churches, and urban poverty.