The Organization of American Culture, 1700-1900: Private Institutions, Elites, and the Origins of American Nationality

Nationality, argues Peter Hall, did not follow directly from the colonists' declatation of independence from England, nor from the political union of the states under the Constitution of 1789. It was, rather, the product of organizations which socialized individuals to a national outlook. These institutions were the private corportions which Americans used after 1790 to carry on their central activities of production.
The book is in three parts. In the first part the social and economic deve...