Download or read book Clothed in Robes of Sovereignty written by Benjamin H. Irvin and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2014 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Clothed in Robes of Sovereignty examines the material artifacts, festivities, and rituals by which Congress endeavored not only to assert its political legitimacy and to bolster the war effort, but ultimately to glorify the United States and to win the allegiance of the American people. But fact, as Benjamin H. Irvin demonstrates, the "people out of doors"--including the working poor, women, loyalists, Native Americans and others not represented in Congress--vigorously contested the trappings of nationhood into which Congress had enfolded them.