The purpose of the The American Archive is to provide a comprehensive collection (arranged by date) of electronic reprints of the documents US history using the latest technology to hyperlink, annotate and deliver them with a unified view.

The series of documents relative to the formation of the American Federal States is called the March to Freedom, which was initially inspired by Documents illustrative of the Formation of the union of the American states (whose preface is shamelessly poached here).

March to Freedom emphasises the evolution of the Constitution as developed at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and its amendments. Even today with the availability of the web the documents necessary for a complete study of the development of the Federal Constitution are scattered so widely in different publications and web sites, many of them still inaccessible or unfindable by the ordinary reader, that it is a real service to collect all relevant materials and to organize them not as isolated documents but as a related whole.

As to the The American Archive as a whole, no argument is necessary to point out the value of having these historical papers made available and linked together using modern technology. Making the documents dealing with the details of our history and the subsequent constitutional development will foster a better understanding of the principles upon which our government is founded.

The contents page shows a partial list of the documents in chronological order. The analytical subject index and index of names adds materially to the usefulness of the series as a reference tool.

Whether you are an interested citizen, a student or a scholar it would be hard to overestimate the value of this series of publications for understanding the development of our constitution and our system of Government.

The original documents in the The American Archive form the core of all other publications of Speculum Mundi Press on the history of the United States as today's electronic technology allows us to link these together in ways that reflect their natural interconnections.

The history of the United States is not isolated from that of other countries. Many documents from other places are important to US History (eg the Magna Charta). With this in mind Speculum Mundi Press offers several other series of original documents from both other countries and US states (including colonial documents). These are part of the Speculum Mundi Press history offerings fo the individual places. In addition, inspired by United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation; Analysis of Cases Decided by the Supreme Court of the United States, originally published by the CRS and sometimes called The Annotated Constitution, there is a series of transcripts of the decisions of some of the better known Supreme Court cases.

Richard Weyhrauch
Editor

Summary of Contents

• The March to Freedom
  The First Constitutional Convention to passing the Bill of Rights
• The Charters of Freedom
  7 The Declaration of Independence, US Constitution, Bill of Rights plus later amendments
• The American Archive
  From the earliest discoveries to the present

Other SPECULUM MUNDI PRESS History Series

• The Portable Constitution
  Versions of the US Constitutions with different annotations.
• Understanding US History
  A collection of documents and study guides related to the history of the United States.
• Caselaw - Suprxseme Court Cases
  Including some associated state court decisions
• The Age of Exploration
  A collection of documents related to exploring our planet and the universe.
• State and Local History
  A collection of documents related to exploring our planet and the universe.

Other SPECULUM MUNDI PRESS books and articles about American History:

• 1775 The Arrival of the Pilgrims
• 1775 Mecklenburg Declaration
• 1888 Amerriques, Amerigo Vespucci, and America by Jules Marcou