Pre-Civil War race-thinking was vague and non-biological

Evidence

It is significant that the very concept of race had not yet attained its later fixity and definiteness. Racial nationalism, having arisen out of political and literary speculation, not out of scientific inquiry, displayed a characteristic vagueness. In the sense in which nationalists used the word, “race” often meant little more than national character. It usually suggested some sort of innate impulse, but, despite the growing biological interests of the nineteenth century, this was understood as an ongoing spirit more than a physiological actuality. At best a minor strain in American thought before the Civil War, Anglo-Saxon nationalism then lacked both the intellectual and emotional pungency essential to a serious, nativistic appeal. — John Higham, Strangers in the Land, 69

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies that early ‘race’ meant ‘national character’/‘ongoing spirit’ rather than physiological stock — key contrast against the later hardened racial nativism.
• XREF: Evidence that the race category is historically constructed and mutable, supporting the reader’s claim that racialization is a transitional form of the enemy category. — connects to: Early race science was naive speculation, not deliberate ideology — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 2243; Science followed race-thinking; it did not create it; Early race scholars were often not deliberate racists (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Early race science was naive speculation, not deliberate ideology #corroborates (0.85) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 2243
• Early race scholars were often not deliberate racists #corroborates (0.80)
• Science followed race-thinking; it did not create it #corroborates (0.78)
• Early racial theories based superiority on historical conquest, not physical traits. #expands (0.75) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 439