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"The Valor and Spirit of Bygone Times": The Memory of the Battle of St. Louis and the Persistence of St. Louis's Creole Community, 1820-1847 In the context of the American Revolution, the Battle of St. Louis is a mere footnote, resulting in under 100 casualties. But to the St. Louisans who experienced it – mostly French civilians living in a Spanish territory, many of whom lost loved ones in the battle – it was the defining event of their lifetimes. This paper focuses on two antebellum tellings of the battle story - Thomas Hart Benton's speech in the United States Senate in 1822 and Creole Wilson Promm's speech at St. Louis's anniversary celebration of 1847 - to explore the ways in which Creoles and their allies altered the battle narrative to serve their own cultural or political ends. A close reading of these tales reveals that despite their declining numbers and waning cultural influence, French Creoles remained a distinctive and politically important community in St. Louis throughout the antebellum period. Furthermore, Primm's speech complicates traditional narratives of the nativist moment, showing that some Catholic non-immigrants - such as St. Louis Creoles - risked being targets of nativist prejudice and that they took steps to prevent this, such as invoking the Battle of St. Louis as proof of American bona fides. Crossing Jordan: Black St. Louisans and the Mississippi River, 1815-1860 In the antebellum United States, two rivers – the Ohio and the Mississippi – combined to form a thousand-mile border between slavery and freedom. Yet political boundaries between slavery and freedom do not always map neatly onto cultural or ideological landscapes. A close examination of Mississippi River crossings and trans-Mississippi connections of slaves and free blacks from St. Louis (by far the largest southern city located on the boundary) complicates any simple dichotomy of "Missouri-slave" and "Illinois-free." In addition to the (hopefully) one-time crossings of blacks fleeing slavery in Missouri, St. Louis free blacks established social networks that extended across the river, and used both temporary and permanent crossings as strategic solutions to problems they faced in St. Louis. at other times, however, they chose to stay in St. Louis, strategic decisions which suggest reveal much about their attitudes toward the river and suggest the limited nature of the freedom available in Illinois. An examination of these crossings reveals the ambiguous and permeable nature of the Mississippi as a boundary between slavery and freedom.

Der Beitrag fragt anhand ausgewählter Indikatoren nach Ursachen und Folgen der Krise der Volksparteien. Die Ursachen dieser Krise werden in einem Wandel des Parteiensystems gesehen. Für traditionelle Großparteien haben sich fundamentale Veränderungen ergeben. Ihre Milieu- und Mitgliederbasis erodiert, ihre Fähigkeit, große Anteile der Wählerstimmen zu mobilisieren, geht zunehmend verloren. Große Koalitionen werden ungeachtet des Ergebnisses von 2009 immer wahrscheinlicher, Dreierbündnisse scheinen selbst auf Bundesebene inzwischen möglich. Einen Ausweg aus dieser krisenhaften Entwicklung sieht der Verfasser in einer Stärkung der Parteiidentität. Die Krise der großen Parteien ist nicht mit einer Krise des politischen Systems insgesamt gleichzusetzen. Gelingt es den Volksparteien allerdings nicht, ihre Parteiidentität zu revitalisieren, könnte die Demokratie langfristig Schaden nehmen. (ICE2)

The speakership during the civil war and interregnum has received scant attention by historians. This article considers the occupants of the Speaker's chair as a group, making some observations about their age and background, including within its scope the short‐lived and irregular speakerships of men such as Sir Sampson Eure and Henry Pelham. The popularity of the Speaker within the Commons is found to have depended much on his perceived competence and goodwill, while his reputation in the country at large depended greatly on the unpredictable cut and thrust of political opinion. The speakership of William Lenthall in the Long Parliament is examined in some detail and judged to be exceptional in a number of respects, not least in his grappling with the explosion in the number and power of executive committees. Lenthall's dealings with the press suggest that he was well aware of the uses of print as well as its potential for damage to his reputation. The contemporary allegations of venality aimed at Speakers are examined with respect to individual occupants of the office and are also set in the context of fee‐taking by Commons' officials. While this period seems not to have been a particularly important one in terms of lasting procedural innovation in the chamber, it was significant in heralding the possibility of a separation between the person and office of Speaker. The article provides as an Appendix an authoritative list of Speakers in this period.