NATION-BUILDING AND THE STATE IN THE USA 3.Defining « State » : State formation in the USA

On the eve of the war of Independence At the end of the 19th century At the end of the 20th century

1. On the eve of the war of independence British Bill of Rights of 1688 –limited powers of the crown, –The rights of Parliament –Regular elections to Parliament –The right to petition the monarch without fear of retribution

1. On the eve of the war of independence 18th century developments –A parliamentary system –Expansion of state revenue –Bank of England and national debt –Public sphere (Habermas) –Territorial formation –The army

1. On the eve of the war of independence 18th century developments –A parliamentary system –Expansion of state revenue –Bank of England and national debt –Public sphere (Habermas) –Territorial formation –The army A model / counter model for the USA ?

2. At the end of the 19th century The characteristics of modern states –A centralized bureaucracy –Concentration of powers –The advent of nation-states –Control of national territory How does this show in the USA ?

2. At the end of the 19th century Frederick Jackson Turner, « The significance of the Frontier in American History », 1893 “In a recent bulletin of the Superintendent of the Census for 1890 appear these significant words: "Up to and including 1880 the country had a frontier of settlement, but at present the unsettled area has been so broken into by isolated bodies of settlement that there can hardly be said to be a frontier line. In the discussion of its extent, its westward movement, etc., it can not, therefore, any longer have a place in the census reports." This brief official statement marks the closing of a great historic movement. Up to our own day American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of the Great West.”

A few paragraphs below : « As the frontier had leaped over the Alleghanies, so now it skipped the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains; and in the same way that the advance of the frontiersmen beyond the Alleghanies had caused the rise of important questions of transportation and internal improvement, so now the settlers beyond the Rocky Mountains needed means of communication with the East, and in the furnishing of these arose the settlement of the Great Plains and the development of still another kind of frontier life. Railroads, fostered by land grants, sent an increasing tide of immigrants into the Far West. The United States Army fought a series of Indian wars in Minnesota, Dakota, and the Indian Territory. »

2. At the end of the 19th century the 1890 census 1890 census form

2. At the end of the 19th century Transportation and internal improvement Mississippi River improvement, 1890 source : website of US army corps of engineers Federal and state involvement The Federalist’s American System

2. At the end of the 19th century Transportation and internal improvement 1830s railroad boom 1869 completion of first transcontinental railroad Federal involvement 1887 US transcontinental railroads map United States Pacific Railway Commission

2. At the end of the 19th century The military Wounded Knee, South Dakota,1890 U.S. Soldiers putting Indians in common grave US Library of Congress Prints and Photographs division

2. At the end of the 19th century Conclusion on Turner’s thesis

3. At the end of the 20th century Recess of states as major world players ? 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement 1995 World Trade Organization

3. At the end of the 20th century Conservative times, expanding domestic policies After the 1970s : Retrenchment difficult to achieve Social security grew despite budgetary austerity Education increasingly a federal field of action (1994)(2012)

George Bush, New Orleans, Sept I also want to know all the facts about the government response to Hurricane Katrina. The storm involved a massive flood, a major supply and security operation and an evacuation order affecting more than a million people. (…) Yet the system at every level of government, was not well coordinated and was overwhelmed in the first few days. It is now clear that a challenge on this scale requires greater federal authority and a broader role for the armed forces -- the institution of our government most capable of massive logistical operations on a moment's notice.

3. Today A continuing trend 2001 « war on terror » and Patriot Act 2008 Emergency Economic Stabilization Act 2010 Affordable Care Act

Conclusion Expanding role of the federal government Strong v. weak governement ?