Heather Cox Richardson is Professor of History at Boston College. Her previous works include West from Appomattox and To Make Men Free.
A timely and vivid account of America's enduring struggle between democratic ideals and oligarchical demands -- from a stellar historian. The themes are broad and the implications mighty, but this isn't history from on high. Richardson uses a human lens to tell her tale, revealing the passions and power-plays that have sustained this battle for dominance. The end result is something rare and invaluable: a skilled work of history, deeply grounded in the past, that speaks loudly, clearly, and crucially to the present. -- Joanne Freeman, Yale University, author of The Field Of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War A thought-provoking study of the centuries-spanning battle between oligarchy and equality in America. --Kirkus