The revivalism connected with what we now call the Second Great Awakening was well established on the American landscape by the 1830s. Having observed the impact of camp meetings and itinerant preachers, particularly in the Far West, Alexis de Tocqueville noted that, “Here and there, in the midst of American Society, you meet with men, full of a fanatical and almost wild enthusiasm” (1847: 142). Yet Tocqueville's discomfort with frontier revivalism was hardly universal. By the late 1820s, many Americans recognized the recruiting success of western Baptists, Methodists, and Christians, and young men like Charles Finney modified their camp-meeting techniques for use in eastern churches. Although his methods shocked many hard-core Calvinists, Finney's New Measures soon overwhelmed the quiet, traditionalist revivalism of Nathaniel Taylor, Asahel Nettleton, and Lyman Beecher. As Finney and his associates gained wider acceptance throughout the nation, they also moved the Second Great Awakening from its formative stage, described by Nathan Hatch (1989), to a mainstream stage described by William McLoughlin (1978), Paul Johnson (1979), and numerous other historians (e.g., Ryan 1983, Roth 1987, C. Johnson 1989).

Recent major works on long-term racial inequality in the labor market revolve around competing hypotheses concerning the importance of human capital factors (Smith and Welch 1989) and government policy (Donohue and Heckman 1991) in promoting black advance. There is, however, another line of thinking which emphasizes the importance of experimentation and “demand-side learning”: employers’ gaining access to accurate information about the abilities of black workers and adjusting their beliefs in accordance with this information.

Virtually all previous empirical studies analyzing the characteristics of European immigrants to the United States during the nineteenth century examine a single country. These studies provide a vast array of information on some or all of the following: the immigrants’ ages, their occupations, whether they traveled singly or within a group, the size of the traveling groups, the number of their children, and the gender breakdown, along with other characteristics. As a result of this empirical work, our knowledge concerning who immigrated to the United States during the nineteenth century is much clearer than it was 30 years ago. Since this body of work is specific to individual countries and based on a variety of data sources, however, it is difficult to compare the characteristics of the immigrants from the various source countries.

The determination of anthropometric historians to unearth the broad patterns of human biological well-being is now too well known to need reiteration. From Richard Steckel's exploratory essays, which could be taken as the launching manifesto of the discipline, to the most recent publications, many hundreds of thousands of records from nearly all continents of the globe have been examined (Mascie-Taylor 1991; Steckel 1979). All of this effort notwithstanding, we are still in the initial phases of this research program, with many important features of the agenda remaining unsettled (Floud, Wachter, and Gregory 1990; Fogel 1993; Komlos 1989; Mokyr and O'Grada 1988). One such question is related to the most startling discovery to date, namely, that as part of its adaptability to its socioeconomic environment, human physical stature has undergone cyclical fluctuations during the course of the last quarter of a millennium (Fogel 1986; Komlos 1987,1994a, 1994b; Nicholas and Oxley 1993).

Until recently material factors had usually been regarded as the most important forces behind the great mortality decline in Western Europe during the last two centuries. Today, the discussion among historical demographers is much more diversified. Greater consideration is given to other factors than was previously. Predominant in several recent summaries is the argument that there was not one single cause of the mortality decline everywhere and in every age group (Brändstrom 1993; Health Transition Review 1991: 1-2; Mercer 1990; Schofield, et al., 1991; Sundin 1992a). One factor which has gained recognition especially in urban areas is the efforts by local and national agencies to improve hygienic conditions (Riley 1987). Cultural determinants of health have also received increased attention both in articles and monographs, especially in relation to mortality among infants and children (Johansson 1991; Preston and Haines 1991).

The premise here is that there existed a specific moment in the history of France —and, one might speculate, of other European societies—when a popular insurrection in the capital was capable of bringing down the national government, virtually overnight and irrespective of public sentiment in the provinces. In the face of such sudden outbursts, not even those regimes that appeared most firmly entrenched proved to be secure. The most striking instances, and the ones that will be the exclusive focus of attention here, occurred in Paris during the early years of the French Revolution of 1789 as in 1830 and 1848, when the urban crowd was able, if only for a time, to impose new institutions and policies upon the nation. In general, the rural population proved acquiescent, but the will of the capital initially held sway even when the numerical majority living in the countryside seemed resistant to the change.