A Character and A Fame to Model Their Own: Statesmanship, Masculinity, and Honor in Northern Political Culture, 1852-1874

The advent of the 1850s ushered in a period great change in the United States. Finding themselves in a moment of transition punctuated with a political changing of the guard, Americans were prompted to consider what kinds of political leadership they valued in the midst of sectional conflict and crisis. By the 1870s, the ideals northerners held looked very different than those touted only two decades before. Using the eulogies of Daniel Webster, Stephen A. Douglas, and Charles Sumner, this thesis explores how changing ideals of masculinity drove the transformation of northern political culture and in particular its values regarding statesmanship. It argues that as shifting gender ideals and the politics of slavery prompted northerners to reconsider what kind of manhood they believed was capable of maintaining the nation’s character, voter preferences shifted from favoring restrained manhood to martial manhood.