Jonathan Earle
Dean of Roger Hadfield Ogden Honors College | Professor of History Louisiana State University
- Baton Rouge LA
Dr. Earle is a historian of American politics and culture with focuses on the early republic and antebellum periods.
Media
Biography
A native of suburban Washington DC, Dr. Earle is a specialist in the history of the antebellum United States. Educated at Columbia (BA) and Princeton (MA, Ph.D) Universities, he is the author of numerous books and articles including Jacksonian Antislavery and the Politics of Free Soil (UNC Press, 2004), winner of the Society of Historians of the Early American Republic's 2005 Broussard prize and co-winner of the Byron Caldwell Smith Book Prize; John Brown's Raid: A Brief History With Documents (Bedford/St. Martin's Press, 2008); The Routledge Atlas of African American History (Routledge, 2000) and co-author of Major Problems in the Early American Republic (Cengage, 2007). In 2013 the University Press of Kansas published his edited collection Bleeding Kansas, Bleeding Missouri: The Long Civil War on the Border, which was named a Notable Book by the Kansas State Library. Dr. Earle is currently working on a book on the election of 1860 for the Pivotal Moments in U.S. History Series published by Oxford University Press.
Before coming to LSU, Dr. Earle was a longtime faculty member in the History Department at the University of Kansas, where he also served as Director of the University Honors Program and Associate Director of the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics.
In support of his research, Dr. Earle has received major fellowships from the NEH and the American Council of Learned Societies. He spent the 2006-7 academic year as the Ray Allen Billington Chair in U.S. History at Occidental College and the Huntington Library and the 1999-2000 academic year as an NEH Fellow at the Huntington. Earle has appeared on numerous programs and documentaries on the History Channel, C-SPAN, and PBS. The History News Network named him a Top Young Historian in 2007.
Areas of Expertise
Research Focus
Early-Republic & Antebellum U.S. Political History
Dr. Earle’s research centers on early-republic and antebellum U.S. politics, with emphasis on the antislavery movement and sectional crisis preceding the Civil War. He analyzes how past struggles against systemic injustice and deep national division illuminate today’s debates over race, democracy, and civic responsibility.
Accomplishments
Hall Center for the Humanities Fellowship
2012-2013
J. Michael Young Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Advising, University of Kansas
2011
Best First Book Prize, Society for Historians of the Early American Republic
2005
Education
Princeton University
Ph.D.
1996
Princeton University
M.A.
1992
Columbia University
B.A.
1990
Media Appearances
LSU Ogden Honors College: Keeping the best and brightest in Louisiana
225 Magazine online
2025-05-05
It’s the Honors TRACTS (Traditions in Critical Thought and Scholarship) bachelor’s degree, which promises to enhance the knowledge, expertise and career opportunities for its students. “Our focus is on leadership development — not just at a state level, but nationally and even globally,” says Dean Jonathan Earle. “We believe that companies like Exxon, DXC and IBM … even LSU’s Law Center … will be lining up to sign on our graduates.”
Local expert weighs in on JFK files
WAFB 9 tv
2025-03-21
President John F. Kennedy’s assassination has sparked decades of theories, but the official narrative has remained the same: that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone when he took out the 35th president of the United States. This recent drop of CIA case documents did not point to the contrary. Dr. Jonathan Earle is dean of the honors college at LSU.
“I think most of these documents we’ve seen before they just had some redactions on them which could be as minor as one of the CIA’s operatives or a member of the church committee’s reports from the 1970s Congress investigations,” Earle said.
The Speakership Fight in 1860
C-SPAN tv
2010-05-10
Jonathan Earle talked about the contest for the position of speaker of the House in 1860. While Congress was grappling with the issues of secession and slavery, the House of Representatives debated for two months over who should be the speaker of the House. He showed slides during his presentation, after which he responded to questions from members of the audience. "A Martyr, A Speaker, and Impending Crisis: The Fight over the Speakership in 1860" was the first session of the U.S. Capitol Historical Society (USCHS) Spring Symposium, "Secession and War Come to Washington," which was part of the series "The National Capital in a Nation Divided: Congress and the District of Columbia Confront Sectionalism and Slavery."
Congress Confronting Slavery, Part 1
C-SPAN
2006-04-28
The U.S. Capitol Historical Society 2006 Spring Conference "Congress and Slavery in the 1840s and 1850s" is the third in the series, "The National Capitol in a Nation Divided: Congress and the District of Columbia Confront Sectionalism and Slavery." Professor Finkelman served as moderator. Jonathan Earle discussed the building of an anti-slavery movement in Congress from 1838 to 1854, describing its beginnings in the home of Dr. and Mrs. Bailey in Washington, DC during weekly salons. Bailey also wrote an abolitionist newspaper. Kathleen Sullivan talked about police authority in the 1840s to seize free blacks, about the Black Seaman's Act, and about the different laws and practices in different states. After their presentations the speakers answered audience members' questions. Professor Earle is the author of, The Undaunted Democracy: Jacksonian Antislavery and the Politics of Free Soil, published by UNC Press.
Teaching Tocqueville
C-SPAN tv
1997-11-14
Professor Jonathan Earle talked about how he uses Tocqueville to teach U.S. history during the early 19th century.
Articles
Abraham Lincoln goes to the archives: Slavery, the cooper union address, and the election of 1860
Historian in Chief: How Presidents Interpret the past to Shape the Future2019
Research Grants
National Endowment for the Humanities Research Fellowship
The Huntington Library
1999-2000
Grant
American Council of Learned Societies
1999-2000
