The City-State of Boston: The Rise and Fall of an Atlantic Power, 1630-1865

A groundbreaking history of early America that shows how Boston built and sustained an independent city-state in New England before being folded into the United States_x000D_

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In the vaunted annals of America’s founding, Boston has long been held up as an exemplary “city upon a hill” and the “cradle of liberty” for an independent United States. Wresting this iconic urban center from these misleading, tired clichés, The City-State of Boston highlights Boston’s overlooked past as an autonomous city-state, and in doing so, offers a pathbreaking and brilliant new history of early America. Following Boston’s development over three centuries, Mark Peterson discusses how this self-governing Atlantic trading center began as a refuge from Britain’s Stuart monarchs and how―through its bargain with slavery and ratification of the Constitution―it would tragically lose integrity and autonomy as it became incorporated into the greater United States._x000D_

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Drawing from vast archives, and featuring unfamiliar