An example for all the land

"An Example for all the Land, clearly argued and deeply researched, represents a significant breakthrough in the crowded field of Reconstruction scholarship. Showing how Washington, D.C. became a laboratory for political experimentation, Masur reveals important new facets of the process of emancipation, the fight for racial justice, and the reconstruction of democracy for all Americans."-Laura F. Edwards, author of The People and Their Peace: Legal Culture and the Transformation of Inequality in the Post-Revolutionary South. "Kate Masur takes us to a distinctive place where the local and national struggles of Reconstruction coincided, and where the promises and limits of change-and the new meanings of equality-foreshadowed political dynamics on the many stages of late nineteenth-century America. An Example for All the Land is, for us, an example of freshly conceived and very thoughtful historical writing."-Steven Han, University of Pennsylvania. "This is a model study, integrating social and political history, on an important but underexamined topic. Masur skillfully explores the implications of race and development politics in Washington, D.C., drawing a clear connection with the