Revolutionary Backlash

Spanning the first fifty years of the nation's history, "Revolutionary Backlash" uncovers women's forgotten role in early American politics and explores an alternative explanation for the emergence of the first women's rights movement.

Rosemarie Zagarri is Professor of History at George Mason University.

"'Pathbreaking' is an appellation reserved for few books; 'field-changing' is an even rarer designation. Nonetheless Rosemarie Zagarri's Revolutionary Backlash deserves both. She transforms the field of women's history and the standard political narrative that still dominates United States history."-William & Mary Quarterly "Widely researched, gracefully written, and nicely illustrated... A welcome corrective to both the usual women's history (without politics) and traditional political history (without women)."-North Carolina Historical Review "This book makes a significant contribution to the literature of American women's history by defining a period that has received too little attention. The writing is gorgeous. The research is first-rate."-Edith B. Gelles, author of Abigail Adams: A Writing Life "An engaging book that successfully marries political practice and political theory with gender ideology. It is also a persuasive book... What makes [Zagarri's] study compelling is the pervasive presence of women; we hear their voices as they communicate privately in letters and as they argue publicly for rights. Visual evidences let us see them at political gatherings."-American Historical Review