The crescent obscured: the United States and the Muslim world, 1776-1815

Abstract

The Crescent Obscured: The United States and the Muslim World, 1776-1815, by Robert J. Allison. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. xi + 225 pages. Notes to p. 255. Index to p. 266. $35. It has become something of an axiom in the field of Middle Eastern studies that the American public is generally ignorant of Islam and the Islamic world, in large part stemming from the almost always negative selective images it is fed through the media, film and literature. With the hostage crises in Iran and Lebanon in the 1980s, and the rise of militant Islamist movements, it also became clear that this negative image of Islam has affected American foreign policy and has raised important questions about the duties of our government. Robert J. Allison's fine work reveals that this is not the first time US involvement in the Islamic world has produced such reactions; that, in fact, this negative image dates back to the beginning of the republic with the actions the Founding Fathers took to address the pirating of US ships by the barbary states along the North African coast (Algiers, Morocco, Tripoli, and Tunis) that climaxed with the Tripolitan war during the Jefferson administration (1801-9). Bereft of British naval protection after the American revolution, the United States had to face the open seas on its own, becoming subject to interdiction of the commerce on which the prosperity of the republic depended and to the intricacies of European diplomacy, which, in many ways, intentionally made life difficult for the young nation. The Barbary states' preying on American shipping posed the first important foreign policy challenge to the incipient state, therefore exacerbating the debate over the role and duties of government, the size of the military, and the perceived exceptionalism of the new republic. Barbary activities also intensified the debate over the question of slavery, as some began to recognize the moral inconsistency of clamoring for the release of the Americans suffering under Barbary captivity while overlooking the infinitely more destitute position of African-Americans in this country. By examining thoroughly contemporary newspapers, literature, plays, poetry, music, memoirs, and diplomatic correspondence, the author deftly outlines how Americans in the late 18th and early 19th centuries tended to use the Islam they were encountering as a litmus test to reaffirm the worth of their own country and its unique place in the world. The values of Christianity and liberty, freedom, and democracy were contrasted against the perceived moral decadence and corruptness of Islam that typically produced tyrannical regimes. The world of Islam was consciously and unconsciously used as fodder to warn the American public of the moral depravity and questionable attitudes that could lead to the reinstitution of the tyranny Americans had so recently overthrown. In the formative years of the republic, the encounter with Islam allowed Americans, from a relatively safe distance, to forge a national purpose and provide the post-revolutionary generation of leaders, especially after a victorious Tripolitan war, a new-found confidence and pride that emboldened them to challenge even bigger foes, England and France. …