Sailing to Rhode Island and the Storms of Politics — Nathaniel Philbrick — Washington sailed to Newport, Rhode Island in August 1790 to embrace the state after it finally ratified the Constitution, completing the original union of thirteen states. Philbrick recounts his own terrifying contemporary experience with a tornado while retracing this historical route by boat, using the meteorological storm as a metaphor for the political turbulence and factional conflicts Washington confronted. Philbrick highlights the complex historical paradox of Rhode Island: a place of genuine religious freedom that simultaneously served as the center of the American slave trade. Philbrick personifies this contradiction through the Brown brothers: John, a slave trader, and Moses, an abolitionist who profoundly influenced Washington to sign anti-slavery legislation and humanitarian reforms.
1889