[act-ma] (Wed.) 1/21 Historian T. H. Breen on "Duel Over Dinner" at Cambridge Forum

[director at cambridgeforum.org]

CAMBRIDGE FORUM
3 Church Street ● Cambridge, MA 02138
617-495-2727
email: director at cambridgeforum.org
www.cambridgeforum.org

/RELEASE  /                                                                              
JANUARY 8, 2015

DUEL OVER DINNER:  PRESIDENT WASHINGTON’S CLASH WITH GOVERNOR HANCOCK
OVER STATE SOVEREIGNTY

On Wednesday, January 21, 2015  at 7:00 p.m. Cambridge Forum hosts
historian TIMOTHY H. BREEN as he explores one of the first disagreements
over the power relationship between federal and state governments. In 1789,
George Washington returned to Massachusetts for the first time since 1776,
touring all the states that had adopted the Constitution and elected him
President of the U.S. of A. Most places welcomed Washington with pomp and
ceremony, including a grand parade in Boston. Yet Washington found himself
at odds with his old colleague John Hancock, oft-elected governor of
Massachusetts. Who was the higher authority, the governor of a state or the
chief executive of this new federal union? What did the arrangement those
two statesmen worked out mean for the conflicts over states’ rights that
persist till today? J. L. BELL moderates the discussion.

T.H. BREEN is the William Smith Mason Professor of American History
Emeritus at Northwestern University and a James Marsh Professor at Large at
the University of Vermont. This talk is based on research for his
forthcoming book /George Washington’s Journey: The President Forges a New
Nation/, to be published by Simon & Schuster later in 2015.  He is the
author of /The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped
American Independence/ (Oxford University Press, 2004) and /American
Insurgents, American Patriots: The Revolution of the People/ (Hill & Wang,
2010), among other studies of American history.  Books will be available
for purchase and signing at the Forum, courtesy of Harvard Book Store.

J. L. BELL is a writer who specializes in the start of the American
Revolution in New England. He maintains the Boston1775.net website and is
particularly interested in the experiences of children in Revolutionary
America. Bell recently completed a major study for the National Park
Service on Gen. George Washington’s work in Cambridge during the siege of
Boston. He serves as administrator for the Friends of the Longfellow
House–Washington’s Headquarters.

The program is co-sponsored by the National Park Service, Longfellow
House-Washington’s Headquarters National Historic Site and the Friends of
the Longfellow House-Washington’s Headquarters with support from the
Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati.

The program is free and open to the public. The forum takes place at the
First Parish in Cambridge, 1446 Massachusetts Avenue in Harvard Square. 
Cambridge Forum is recorded and edited for public radio broadcast. Edited
podcasts are available, and select forums can also be viewed in their
entirety on YouTube.

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Cambridge Forum
3 Church Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
617-495-2727
www.cambridgeforum.org