A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America

There was not just one American war for independence, and there are whole nations inside the United States that do not conform to state boundaries. Linguists in accents, anthropologists on material culture and political scientists on voting patterns recognize this.

That’s from American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America, the influential 2011 book by writer-researcher Colin Woodward. It sparked much follow-on research, and the Nationhood Lab, which continues developing the book’s premise today.

Below my notes for future reference.

My notes:

• Carlos Fuentes of the U.S. Mexico border : “I have always said it is a scar, not a border”
• Kevin Phillips’s 1969 book The Emerging Republican Majority book also built on the idea of distinct regions that ignored state borders
• The Nine Nations of North America (1981) by Joel Garreau is an influential work of regional geography that argues North America is divided into nine distinct, culturally and economically driven “nations” rather than national borders.
• David Hackett Fischer’s Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America (1989) identifies four major waves of British migration that established regional cultures in the United States (New England Puritans, Chesapeake Bay, Delaware Valley Quakers and the backcountry Scots-Irish). Then in his 2008 book Champlain’s Dream, he added the New France Quebecois
• Other books with regional identities typically tap into these groups without always naming the full context
• Author argues that immigrants influence but ultimately adapt to the culture where they live
• Wilbur Zelinsky’s 1973 “Doctrine of First Effective Settlement” argues that the first group to establish a self-perpetuating society in a new territory sets the cultural, social, and political tone for that region”: ” “Whenever an empty territory, undergoes settlement, or an earlier population is dislodged by invaders, the specific characteristics of the first group able to affect a viable, self perpetuating society, or a crucial significance for the later, social and cultural geography of the area, no matter how tiny the initial band of settlers may have been… Thus, in terms of lasting impact, the activities of a few hundred, or even a few score, initial colonizers can mean much more for the cultural geography of a place than the contributions of tens of thousands of new immigrants a few generations later”

• Author argues The Big Sort (2008) arguing Americans move to places with similar politics, misses that mostly these landslide counties were in existing ‘nations’ that had cultural reinforcement: likely people moved and accelerated these beliefs
• Author uses a geographic framework of “Core, Domain and Sphere” to map the influence of each regional culture. He acknowledges significant overlap, suggesting that while a nation has a distinct, intensely cultural heartland, its values dilute and mix with neighboring regions as they spread
• El Norte was the oldest of European settlements. Expanding from the north, the pope granted Spanish all territory if it converted all the people, hence its system of missionaries (San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco, St Augustine): they introduced many American icons like the “open range,” herding and cowboys (originally Indians in missions)
• After the”brutal” 1604-1605 winter on Saint Croix Island, now located in Maine on the Canada border, shifted “New France mainland. In 1685, correspondence about how many fled the colony to live with the indigenous and trap
• Why did the “Tidewater” create so many influential founding fathers? Because Jefferson, Washington and Madison had an old Greco-Roman ideal of classical republicanism (Latin “libertas” sense of liberty, not Germanic sense of “Freiheit” or freedom which informed yankeedom and midlands)
• In 1685, King James II wanted American colonies to be more homogenous , sparked early rebellion 1689. Yankeedom led (Philadelphia and Charleston had only a few hundred residents so didn’t ) April 18 1689, Boston rebellion
• South Carolina’s Charleston was founded by Barbados slave owners, who also over ran Jamaica, and were known as cruel by even 17th century standards
• Tidewater needed no slave imports by 1740, but Deep South kept importing because they killed off those enslaved people, treating them historically depraved cruelty
• Deep South blacks had “a parallel culture” and a caste system from 1670-1970
• Philadelphia formed “the most prototypically American of the nations”, which spread into middle America
• Early Quakers (17th century) practiced radical civil disobedience, refusing to remove their hats to authorities as a testament to spiritual equality. Occasionally, to protest persecution, some Quakers “went naked as a sign,” walking through streets to symbolize spiritual strippedness, a prophetic act meant to awaken a deemed decadent society.
• The Midlands, started in Philadelphia , were “tolerant, multicultural, multilingual, civilization, populated by families of modest means – many of them religious – who desired mostly that their government and leaders leave them in peace”
• Quaker pacifism doomed their leadership, author argues
• “Like a lot of strange experiments, the founding of Pennsylvania came about because a rich, respectable man had accumulated favors that were later cashed in to the benefit of a rebellious, unorthodox young man”
• Penn attracted families, and quickly included Germans, mostly middle class. Both Quakers and Germans criticized slavery
• 5k German speakers from 1683-1726, then 57k more 1727-1755
• In areas where Pennsylvania Dutch and German (family farms) moved to elsewhere (New Bern NC and New Braunfels. Texas), there was less slavery
• “The first formal protest against slavery in North America was articulated by German Quakers in Germantown, Pennsylvania. ‘We shall do to all men like we will be done ourselves,’ the protesters declared in 1712, “making no difference of what generation, descent or color they are.’ Many wealthy Quakers, Penn included, had come to Pennsylvania with slaves, but within a decade, friends were advising one another that slaveholding violated the golden rule. In 1712, the Quaker run legislature even imposed a prohibitive duty on the import of slaves, but it was overturned by a royal court. With German support, they tried again to suppress slavery in 1773, but were vetoed by the crown.”
• But Quakers were bad at governance, assuming the best in self rule led to bad outcomes. This resulted in Delaware breaking away. Penn finally appointed outsiders to run: Yankee puritan John Blackwell, Anglican Boston merchant Edward Shippen and English aristocrat David Lloyd
• But by 1775, 100k Scot’s and Ulster immigrant Calvinists that rejected Quakerism and believed in inherent wickedness of people came into Philadelphia and to central PA and Appalachian mountains
• First Quaker colony was first non English majority English colony (Germans), then these Scots-Irish followed

• Ben Franklin wrote in 1747 of this Quaker complacency: “To refuse defending one’s self or one’s country is so unusual a thing among mankind… [Our enemies] may not believe it… Till by experience, they can come higher and higher up our river, seize our vessels and plunder, our plantations and villages and retire with their booty unmolested”
• After the 1755 war with Lenapes, Quaker leadership never again led. Benjamin Franklin and allies took hold
• The last of the ‘American nations’ to develop was “the most immediately disruptive”: Appalachia was founded as a clan-based warrior culture from the borderlands of British Empire, from Philadelpia they extended down the Great Wagon Road 800-mile Indian trail
• In February 1764, armed frontiersmen known as the Paxton Boys (Appalachian) marched on Philadelphia, threatening the state house and seeking to kill Native Americans taking refuge there. Benjamin Franklin led a delegation to Germantown, negotiating a peaceful end and averting violence, though the crisis exposed deep political, religious, and westward expansion tensions
• Author argues Yankeedom, New Negland, Appalachia and the Deep South rebelled — but Midlands, New Netherland and New France didn’t. Collectively they just viewed Britain as a shared enemy
• In 1600, England was led by aristocracy, with regional accents and manners. By 1763, there was a centralized elite trained and sounding the same
• Philadelphia elite remained roughly Loyalist, while transplants (Franklin, Thomas Paine) and Appalachian borderlands went patriot — New Netherland also was very loyalist (lest their business get toppled)
• September 1774, first Continental Congress with 56 delegates was first gathering of all colonies. Joseph Galloway (1731-1803) of Philadelphia was classic Midlands middle ground: wanted to stay in empire but push for an American legislature; Thomas Mckean from Philadelphia was the closest thing to representation of Appalachia
• In his 1989 book Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America, David Hackett Fischer argues that the American Revolution was not a single unified conflict, but rather four distinct wars of independence waged by four different regional cultures: a popular insurrection in New England, a professional gentlemen’s war in the South; a savage civil war in the backcountry and a “nonviolent economic and diplomatic struggle” led by those around Philadelphian — this author says it was six
• In effect, New England had won its independence by March 1776, when they pushed British out of Boston (in contrast NYC was the heart of loyalist )
• In 1777, Quakers were imprisoned in Virginia for not being sufficiently patriotic, as a loyalist Pa government was ousted
• With so much indecision and loyalist sympathy, how did the American cause win? Author says two reasons: Tiderwater elite who wanted their personal freedom (Washington, Madison) and the Appalachian that showed up in several states (Carolina’s, PA, Virginia) and would fight any authority
• Popular post war support for “democracy” further aligned otherwise distinct colonies
• Quebec (New french) had some revolutionary regiments and Ontario some yankee influence but Canada on the whole sat out the revolution
• The 1789 constitution beat back more open democracy, borderlanders didn’t want it ratified — threatened PA legislators
• Madison: “defense against the inconveniences of democracy”, the unelected senate was a “check the impudence of democracy”
• “Notoriously unethical banker Robert Morris” wouldn’t honor IOUs to soldiers and farmers but then after most were bought back at reduced rate he honored them with gold and silver. This led in part to the Whiskey Rebellion
• Author says James Logan was arrested for sedition under John Adams’ notorious Sedition Act, inspired by French refugees following the revolution: But rather Philadelphia Quaker and Republican Dr. George Logan was not arrested for sedition; rather, his 1798 private peace mission to France prompted Congress to pass the Logan Act of 1799. Aimed at prohibiting private citizens from negotiating with foreign governments, this law was a Federalist response to his successful efforts to ease tensions during the “Quasi-War”.
• National Road: Before 1830, the south looked down on slavery as Anachronistic but after 1830 Southerners celebrated it — author says this is because of a changing balance between fading Tidewater and growing Deep South (Appalachia only joined this coalition after civil war)
• El Norte was born in the tumult of post independence Mexico (1821), accepted illegal trade and immigrants because they were all poor
• “ I cannot help seeing advantages, which… Would result if we admitted, honest, hard-working people, regardless of what country they come from… Even hell itself,“ said San Antonio politician Francisco Ruiz
• Santa Anna in 1833 found el Norte difficult to manage, full of rebellion. And individualism; Texas independence
• Mexican War: they won handily but took only the sparsely populated north but not Mexico City and territory more dense because, as John Calhoun‘s infamous words put it: “I protest against such a union is that! Our, sir, is the government of a white race”
• The left coast has New England temperament because it was founded by Yankees by sea who wanted similar vibe; the chinook Indians referred to all Americans as “Bostons” – but more socially liberal especially as gold rush changed
• “The civil war was ultimately a conflict between two coalitions” Deep South and its satellite Tidewater; Yankeedom its opposition. South, Yankees, Midlands and Appalachia wanted to own westward expansion to own federal givernment. After war of 1812, Deep South economy grew but Popularions grew much faster in New England, midlands and so they gained political power
• James Henry Hammond, a South Carolina Senator and planter, infamously argued in 1858 that Southern slavery was more “just and stable” than Northern industrial labor. He labeled Jefferson’s “all men are born equal” dogma “ridiculously absurd,” calling for a social order based on a “mudsill” labor class to maintain stability. (Poor whites should be slaves too)
• Jefferson Davis thought New England was alone and other regions would support their cause — NYC had blackbirders slave culture and only the Yankee-dominated New York State house ended slavery (NYC voted against Lincoln; it considered seceding too to become independent city state)
• But the attack (April 12-13, 1861) on Fort Sumter swelled patriotism
• The Anaconda Copper Mining Company (commonly known as “The Company”) exercised nearly total control over Montana during the first seven decades of the 20th century, serving as a primary example of how massive corporate interests dominated the American West at the expense of small families and local autonomy. By consolidating mining, logging, rail, and utilities under one entity, Anaconda functioned as a monopolistic power that shaped local politics, labor conditions, and the daily lives of residents
• Between 1830 and 1924, the United States experienced three massive, distinct waves of immigration (1830-1860; 1860-1890; largest was 1890-1924) that transformed its demographic landscape, yet these influxes did not fully overwhelm the existing, dominant culture. While the foreign-born population reached significant peaks—notably roughly 14.8% by 1890—immigrants remained concentrated in specific gateway cities, allowing for a gradual, rather than an instant, assimilation process.
• When we say the United States was always multicultural, we mean New Netherland and the Midlands; when they say American society is free market that’s true in left coast and far west; the “melting pot” Calvinist work ethic priority was Yankeedom: We are made of multiple cultures that claim American identity
• John Dewey in 1915: “ it is fatal for a democracy to permit the formation of fixed classes”
• In his 2004 book Who Are We? The Challenges to America’s National Identity, Samuel Huntington argued that American identity is rooted in the “continuing centrality” of an Anglo-Protestant culture established by the country’s founding settlers. He contended that this cultural core, rather than merely the political ideology of the “American Creed,” is what has historically defined American identity and attracted immigrants.

• American identity is an amalgamation of all these cultures: South and Tidewater preferred pace of life as virtuous; Englishness was not Midland and New Netherland from the start; individualism was Appalachian and Far West but not otherwise; Yankees weren’t multicultural
• The South wasn’t unified until after the Civil War. In battle against reconstruction ((like the north didn’t exist until fort Sumter)); Dixie and the lost cause
• Public Protestants of New England wanted to remake society (intervention); Private Protestants of the Southern tradition wanted individual salvation (private)
• KKK was Appalachian; whereas the Deep Southern elites more wary of poor whites taking action
• The 1960s cultural revolution was led by a mix of Yankeedom (intellectual freedom), Midlands (tolerant pacifism) and New Netherland and lefty coast
• Civil war pensions only went to Union soldiers, and so money flooded to the north and west
• This represented 37% of the federal budget in the 1890s (NYC had few Union soldiers so opposed it, and global commerce meant it was anti-tariff like Deep South )
• Thomas Frank’s 2004 book What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America: focused on a state straddling the Midlands and Far West but familiar tactics to Appalachia (anti elite), who fought against the Deep South (pro elite) in civil war but was courted as a coalition member
• In response to the 1999 Columbine school shooting, then Texas congressman Tom DeLay said: “The causes of youth violence are working parents who put their kids into daycare, the teaching of evolution in the schools and working mothers who take birth control pills.”
• “The Midlands is the most philosophically autonomous of the nations, for centuries leery of both mettlesome, messianic Yankees, and authoritarian Dixie zealots. Midlands share the Yankees identification with middle class society; the borderlanders distrust of government intrusion, the new Netherlanders commitment to cultural pluralism and the deep south of version to Trinh to activism. It’s truly a middle of the road American Society, and as such as rarely sided unambiguously with one coalition, candidate or movement.”
• Canada is the United States without the authoritarian Dixie bloc
• “If Americans seriously want the United States to continue to exist in something like its current form, they had best respect the fundamental tenets of our unlikely union”
• In the acknowledgments, the author cites many books that offer various interpretations of this theory of localized mini-cultures, including Digby Baltzell’s 1979 Quaker Philadelphia, Puritan Boston book