“Russian celebrations” and American debates about Russia in 1813

Abstract

In the article, the author uses a sociocultural approach to analyze debates in the US press that accompanied “Russian celebrations” in 1813. During the War of 1812, the Federalist opposition to President Madison's administration organized several celebrations of Russia's victories over Napoleon, who was a de facto ally of the USA in its war against England. As a result, harsh debates arose about the relative merits of the Russian nation. Madison's supporters described Russia in extremely critical terms, while the critics of the administration mostly spoke positively of the distant country. For both sides, the Russian victories were just a pretext for formulating their own political views, but by using an image of “the Other,” they elaborated and affirmed two major characterizations of Russia: in one view, it was a barbaric and uncivilized country; in the other, a guarantor of liberty and a rapidly developing and freedom-loving nation. The main difference was summarized in a pamphlet publication of correspondence between Robert Harper and Robert Walsh. The article affirms that the level of civilization in Russia was not just used as an argument in domestic polemics, but was determined according to the demands of that polemic.

Keywords:

• US–Russian relations
• Russia's image
• role of media

Acknowledgements

The author expresses his deep gratitude to participants of the panel at the ASEEES convention in San Antonio in November 2014, where the initial draft of the paper was presented to Nina Tumarkin and Nicholas Cox and to the anonymous reviewers of Nationalities Papers, whose advice made the text better. Everything that remains doubtful, erroneous, or insufficiently analyzed is the author's sole responsibility.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

ORCID

Ivan Kurilla http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7144-2007

Notes

1 For the most detailed account of the festivals and polemics about Russian celebrations, see Shulim (1958); see also Bolkhovitinov 1966, 579–583.

2 Robert Walsh (1785–1859) – US journalist and diplomat. The founder (1811) and publisher of the first American quarterly magazine American Review of History and Politics.