What can the War of 1812 tell us about the various conflicts in which the United States finds itself today? How can American policymakers better understand contemporary wars and quasi-wars – and the political divisions they reflect and deepen – in light of what happened two centuries ago? Academic historians seldom frame their inquiries in such terms. Typically committed to denaturalizing categories like state and nation and generally excluded from inside-the-Beltway discussions, they seek to offer perspective to whoever will listen rather than “lessons” for whoever holds office. This is what makes What So Proudly We Hailed different. Produced by the center-liberal Brookings Institution, this collection of clear, well-conceived essays would seem equally at home in a Constitutional law seminar or a Congressman's office as in a class in early American, British, or Canadian history.

In their Introduction, editors Pietro S. Nivola and Peter J. Kastor evoke a controversial war of choice that spirals out of control, spawning intense discord along with horrifying bloodshed – “Iraq comes to mind” (1). They then propose the War of 1812 as an important case study in what to do next, not only because of certain parallels but also because the second war with Britain was so “momentous” (2), so central in re-creating the United States as it has come down to us. In this respect the volume joins an impressive list of conferences, monographs, and articles that place the War of 1812 nearly on par with the American Revolution and the Civil War in its overall significance. The essays that follow throw light on the war's military and sectional dimensions and legacies, as well as on the performance of James Madison and of the Constitution itself during this prolonged crisis.

Three major themes emerge: the limited ability of the central government to wage war against the British Empire, the unforeseen role of non-state and crypto-state actors in the conflict, and the misleading veneer of national “glory” and unity that emerged after 1815. Stephen Budiansky details the strategic blunders of the poorly funded, badly led US Army, while also explaining the much better record of the US Navy. Both emerged from the war as vital expressions of American nationhood rather than potential threats to American republicanism. Alan Taylor reminds us that the Revolutionary founders actually “agreed on very little” (67) besides the need to be rid of the empire and to build political institutions on some version of consent by some version of the people. The ensuing divisions between and among Jeffersonians and Federalists badly disrupted the war effort in 1812, 1813, and 1814. In many respects, the war's conclusion transformed these partisan divides into regional divisions hidden behind patriotic chest-thumping. New England limped out of the national spotlight for decades, while Virginia's rulers decided that they could not trust the Union to protect them from the “internal enemy” (79) that they so intimately exploited.

James Madison was both a Virginian and a slave-owner, but, as Benjamin Wittes and Ritika Singh show in their fine essay, he ran the war like the principled constitutionalist he also was. While regional strongmen like Andrew Jackson discarded the letter and spirit of common and Constitutional law in the name of emergency, Madison refused to overrule the various courts, governors, and Congressmen who stood in the war's way. Compared to the typical wartime President who pushes the envelope, Madison “sealed his envelope without even filling it completely – let alone overstuffing it” (116). Perhaps he had no choice in the matter. As Peter J. Kastor explains, the war was easiest to wage in the federal territories, where there were no state-level authorities to obstruct the various attacks launched against Native peoples and escaped slaves.

Almost everyone then and now agrees that the War of 1812 gave birth to a new, more emotional kind of nationalism that celebrated America's “glory” and “honor.” As Budiansky notes, these words meant something close to what we call deterrence – the power of the nation's reputation to protect its citizens and interests (60). To press the point a bit further, we might ask what a national state that saw “glory” as one of its goals actually did that a less emotional polity did not. In the case of Andrew Jackson, perhaps the single biggest winner of the war, a nation worthy of the name was obliged to avenge any injuries done to its citizens anywhere in the world. Irish-born sailors in the Pacific Ocean, fortune-seeking merchants in South America, desperate squatters in what remained of “Indian Country” – all of them were reflective of American honor and thus worthy of its vengeance. Pursuing that kind of glory partly explains why the United States has so often found itself waging quasi-wars of choice.