Homeland Security Was Born in Philadelphia, Says Rutgers–Camden Historian in New Book

For Immediate Release

CAMDEN --  In the ongoing quest to prevent future terrorist attacks on American soil, many experts contend that homeland security is a concept born of 9/11, and we cannot look to history to understand security and defense today.  

Not so, according to a new book by Dr. Jeffery Dorwart, a professor of history at Rutgers–Camden. Invasion and Insurrection: Security, Defense, and War in the Delaware Valley, 1621-1815 (University of Delaware Press, 2008) suggests that the origins of modern day security and defense are rooted in the history of the metro Philadelphia area. 

The book traces the birth of national homeland security in the Delaware Valley from the area’s earliest settlers up through the War of 1812.

“What we call homeland security and homeland defense were concepts and organizations that developed and merged gradually over time in the Delaware Valley,” said Dorwart, who has taught military, naval, and local history at Rutgers–Camden for nearly 40 years. “9/11 did not invent the idea of security and defense. It’s been there all along.”

At Rutgers–Camden, Dorwart’s senior seminar students inspired Invasion and Insurrection when they inquired about the meaning of homeland security following 9/11. Looking for answers, he found that most experts agreed this “new” concept defied definition. Others placed its study not within a historical framework, but beginning on Sept. 11, 2001.

Dissatisfied, he searched for its true origins, armed with a tenet he teaches his Rutgers–Camden students: all of today’s institutions are deeply rooted in our history. Since the Delaware Valley was instrumental in the founding of the United States, could it also be the birthplace of security and defense? After all, Philadelphia did host the Second Continental Congress, whose members issued the Declaration of Independence.

First settled by the Dutch, British, and Swedish in the early 1600s, Pennsylvania and western New Jersey were established by William Penn and other Quaker leaders in the late 17th century as havens from the religious persecutions and wars in Europe. Uniquely diverse, the Delaware Valley became a center for emerging politics, ideas, and institutions, with Philadelphia rising as the largest and most prosperous city in the colonies.

Isolated 100 miles up the Delaware Bay at a crossroads between the Chesapeake Bay and New England colonies, the Delaware Valley escaped the invasion and warfare experienced by colonies to the north and south. Nonetheless, the threat of bloodshed and brutality was ever present in the region. “Organized violence was less prominent but the local citizens always feared violence,” says Dorwart. “They were always aware that their homes were under threat.”

Shopkeepers and craftsmen of the riverfront towns, poor folk of the Delaware Bay, New Jersey farmers: concern for the security and defense of their homes, land, and families crossed class lines. “These people were scared. All the time. They had threats everywhere and had to figure out ways to defend themselves,” explains the Rutgers–Camden historian.

Although the Delaware Valley people debated who should pay, direct, and organize their security, they did agree that a terrorist was anyone who threatened their existence, including their own people. “Anyone who upset their way of life or community was seen as an external enemy,” notes Dorwart.

As the line between insurgents and invaders blurred in the 18th century, communities constructed laws and institutions to guard against these real or imagined threats. Eventually these fears contributed to Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. The “Militia Clause” gives Congress the power to use military force to both “suppress insurrections and repel invasion.”

More than 200 year later, the Patriot Act, signed into law seven years ago this October, extends the breadth of U.S. law enforcement agencies to protect against foreign and domestic terrorism. But it took the devastating acts of violence and terror on Sept. 11, 2001 to shake our false sense of national security.

“For a long period of time before 9/11, we forgot about the threat of attack on our land and farms. 9/11 resurrected these fears,” said Dorwart, who has authored 10 works on the topics of local, military, and naval history, including books on Camden and Cape May counties and Philadelphia’s Fort Mifflin, and publications on the Naval Air Station Wildwood and the Office of Naval Intelligence.

“When writing books, I try to think in terms of the people who lived during that time. People today just want to feel secure, have their property, and live. These people in the Delaware Valley were no different than us. They just wanted to be safe.”

Dorwart, a native New Englander, received his Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 1971. Now residing in the Salem County borough of Elmer, he calls southern New Jersey his “adopted home” of nearly 40 years, and has used local interest in the Delaware Valley to teach his students how to think historically. “I want them to think about the space around us and what it means,” he said. “That’s how I use local history to teach my students.”

At the end of the semester, Dorwart, who also founded the campus’ sports history program, will retire. Reflecting on four decades of teaching at Rutgers–Camden, Dorwart’s dedication as both an educator and historian is evident: “I’ve had a mission to teach these kids for 39 years. Their legacy is in this book.”

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