| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 36.3

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| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 36.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

The Nation's Crucible: The Louisiana Purchase and the Creation of America. By Peter J. Kastor. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004. xiii + 310 pp. Map, notes, bibliography, index. $35.00.)

It is a tribute to the arrogance of our patriotic narrative that, two hundred years down the road, Americans (including professional historians) continue to think of Louisiana's incorporation into the new republic as unproblematic. Once the object of Spanish oppression and French intrigue, in 1803 Louisiana was "purchased" by the United States, and the dancing in the streets continues to this day. (That a "liberated" people may not appreciate American occupation is a concept that still eludes us, to our peril.) Peter Kastor's fine new study of Louisiana from before the purchase through early statehood thus offers a particularly timely contribution to our understanding of the process of constructing popular regimes two centuries ago, when there were no precedents to study with the care that marks this monograph.

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