Texting the Nation closely parses the Declaration of Independences text and logical argument in grammatical and rhetorical terms to highlight patterns of agency, from the passive voice construction and rearranged parallel arrangement of political principles to the composition history and meaning of the deleted slavery paragraph from the grievances, and then to the heavy Congressional editing of the conclusion, to both add God-language and restore the Lee Resolution for Independence. The book highlights the Virginia background of the Declaration (the Virginia Declaration of Rights, Jeffersons draft for the Virginia Constitution, and the Lee Resolution), including the Virginia antislavery myth and non-importation movement. Additionally, Texting the Nation includes Declaration criticism, including Timothy Pickering and Jacques Derrida.
Preface
List of Acronyms
Introduction: The Declaration of Independence and Criticism
Finding "the" Declaration of Independence: Notes on the Text(s)
1. Agent(s)/Agency, Slavery and Slavery in Eighteenth-Century British North
America
as Rhetoric (and Some Reality)
2. The Major Premise: Ambiguating The Human Condition, Government, and Divine
Passivity
3. The Minor Premise: The Omnipotent Potentate, the Grievances, and Slavery
(and the Virginia Constitution, 1776-1903)
4. Authorizing and Accomplishing Independence: Jefferson's Double-Columned
Conclusion, the Return (or Not) of God, and the Multiplying/Dividing
Declaration
Conclusion: Theres Something About the Declaration of Independence (But What
Is It?)
Index
Michael Ditmore is Professor of English specializing in early American literature and Great Books at Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA, where he has also served as Director of American Studies and Dean of the Humanities/Teacher Education Division. He has previously published on William Bradford, John Winthrop, Anne Hutchinson, Anne Bradstreet, Elizabeth Ashbridge, Jonathan Edwards, Crèvecoeur, and Benjamin Franklin.
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