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Was the Civil War, which ended slavery, the culmination of the American
Revolution's promise of liberty for all? Or was Abraham Lincoln's
suspension of habeas corpus, massive violation of other liberties and
squelching of the right of secession a repudiation of the American
Revolution and the real beginning of today's Big Government?

Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, an insightful libertarian scholar who will give a
speech Aug. 10 in Columbus, OH  argues that the paradoxical answer to both
questions is yes in "Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men: A History of
the American Civil War."

Hummel, a history and economics professor at San Francisco's Golden Gate
University, is a frequent speaker at Civil War roundtables and national
conferences. He wrote the scripts for audio tapes produced by Knowledge
Products on the Constitution (narrated by Walter Cronkite) and on American
Wars (narrated by George C. Scott). His articles have appeared in the Texas
Law Review, the International Philosophical Quarterly, Strategy and Tactics,
and many other publications. He has contributed to the Encyclopedia of
American Business History and Biography and to a collection edited by Robert
Higgs entitled "Arms and Politics."

Hummel's first book is a highly readable and eye-opening narrative history,
just been published by Chicago's Open Court, that views the Civil War as the
major turning point away from the libertarian promise of the American
Revolution and toward the authoritarian evils of 20th-century statism.
Widely praised but also bound to be controversial, this bold reinterpretation
of the causes and consequences of the war has the potential to be one of the
most significant and widely influential reinterpretations of American history
published in recent decades.

The book has received a rave early review and a Main Selection cover from
Laissez Faire Books Catalog, and will be reviewed soon in Publishers Weekly,
a good sign of a book's potential impact. Even more promisingly, Hummel has
received impressive advance "blurb" endorsements from some of the leading
historians and economists of our time-- a tribute to Hummel's vast
scholarship, reasonableness and discriminating generosity in acknowledging
the many Civil War scholars and studies that helped him build his new
synthesis.

* Kenneth Stampp ("The Peculiar Institution"), perhaps the leading Civil War
expert, praises the book as a "lucid, edifying account" with interpretations
that are "thoughtful, often provocative" but "always well worth considering."
* Douglass North, who won the 1993 Nobel Prize in Economics for his work in
U.S. economic history, hails the book as a "stimulating and original"
analysis of slavery and the Civil War, "stimulating because it incorporates
an exceptional blend of economic and political analysis; original because the
bibliographic essays at the end of each chapter alone are worth the price of
the book."

* Richard Vedder ("Out of Work"), a professor of economics at Ohio
University, admires Hummel for showing "how the coercive power of the state
strengthened the institution of slavery and deprived African-Americans of the
opportunities to share in the expanding American material bounty. He offers a
provocative new vision of the antebellum South that cries for attention from
scholars and laypersons alike."

And the book has a good chance of getting that attention, with endorsements
from many other scholars: Gary Gallagher, a prominent military historian;
Ronald Hamowy, a leading libertarian historian; Robert Middlekauff; Eric
Walther; Janet Sharp Herrmann ("Pursuit of a Dream"); and Stanford
University's Barry Weingast, who predicts that this "remarkable new
synthesis: will "take its place in the pantheon of Civil War books."
Hummel integrates two viewpoints that traditionally have been opposites:
radical abolitionism, or a strong anti-slavery view and radical antistatism,
which favors decentralization and resuscitates the right of secession.
Transcending the usual North vs. South dichotomies, Hummel argues that
slavery could have been abolished without the massive bloodshed, government
centralization and tyranny that resulted from the war. In fact, he reminds us
slavery faded away peacefully in Brazil and other nations of the era, and
that leading abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison had favored secession of the
North from the South!

Hummel brings the latest analysis in free-market economics and revisionist
history to bear on draft evasion and opposition to the war, the emergence of
the Republican Party, the politics of Reconstruction, changing perspectives
in the abolitionist movement, the transformation of American society wrought
by the war, slavery and slaves' rights in the early Republic and the thorny
issue of the economics of slavery. (Was it really profitable, or only
apparently because of government subsidies? If you guessed the latter,
bravo!).

Hummel, midway through a nationwide book tour that also has taken him to New
York, Texas, Illinois, Georgia, Arizona, Kentucky and Washington, D.C., will
visit Columbus Aug. 8-11 with journalist Michael Grossberg (one of Jeff's
college roommates at the University of Texas) as his host.
Hummel will sign autographs and give a speech on "The Civil War and the
Foundations of Big Government" at 8-10 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 10 in the party
room at Donatos Pizza, 1891 Tamarack Circle North. Admission is free. The
book is available in hardcover or trade paperback, and Hummel will have
copies for sale at a discount.

(Directions: Tamarack Circle is a large circle of stores in the middle of a
residential area East of the I-71 freeway, which can be reached via Tamarack
street from either 161 or Morse Rd.)

Hummel's speech is sponsored by the Free Press Association, a national media
network of journalists and First Amendment supporters that sponsors the
annual Mencken Awards for Best Book, Best Cartoon, Best Investigative Report,
etc., and sells "Bill of Rights: VOID Where Prohibited" T-shirts in many
colors (white, cream, gray, black, blue, purple, red, aqua and brown) and
sizes (S-M-L-XL-XXL-XXXL) as a fundraiser ($20 each, plus $2 postage.) Write
FPA, P.O. Box 8099, Columbus, OH 43201.)

For more information about Hummel's visit or the FPA, call (614) 291-1441.

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TANSTAAFL
Columbus, OH
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