Internal Improvements and the Union, 1790–1860
@article{Minicucci2004InternalIA, title={Internal Improvements and the Union, 1790–1860}, author={Stephen Minicucci}, journal={Studies in American Political Development}, year={2004}, volume={18}, pages={160 - 185} }
A federal role in funding and constructing internal improvements – building roads, canals, and railroads, river and harbor projects, and erecting lighthouses and other aids to navigation – was one of the most persistent and contentious issues of antebellum American politics. Elites based in the various regional economies of the American coastal plain shared an interest in developing the transportation infrastructure of the country: They were isolated from one another by poor inland…
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