Exhibits

Exhibit

Federal Bureaucracy

The federal government is the nation’s biggest employer. To many, its size is a problem in itself. This exhibit asks: how big is too big, and what do we miss when we focus on size alone?

Exhibit

Social Safety Net

How Americans through the years have approached the thorny questions of identifying who the government is obliged to help and how such assistance should be funded and distributed.

Jimmy Carter speaking during his presidential campaign in 1976.
Exhibit

Legacies of Jimmy Carter

Historical reappraisals of Carter's legacies in foreign relations, the economy, the environment, and electoral politics.

Exhibit

Trumpism

A presidency often referred to as "unprecedented" has deep roots in American history.

Exhibit

Voting Rights: A Retrospective

Voting, a right not initially enshrined in the Constitution, has been secured, revoked, and contested since the nation's founding era.

Know-Nothing flag
Exhibit

The Many Faces of Nativism

As this exhibit shows, anti-immigrant sentiment has been a throughline of American history.

Exhibit

A Big Tent

Exploring the history of the Democratic Party, from its earliest days through the New Deal, the Long Sixties, and the post-Cold War era.

Declaration of Independence (1819), by John Trumbull
Exhibit

Declaring Independence

A collection of resources about the meanings of the 1776 document in its own time – and in ours.

Exhibit

President Precedents

How Americans understand the powers of the office and the legacies of past leaders.

Exhibit

“All Persons Born or Naturalized in the United States...”

A collection of resources exploring the evolving meanings of American citizenship and how they have been applied -- or denied -- to different groups of Americans.

Exhibit

American Corruption

The constant tug of war between those who try to bend government for their own gain and those who try to root out corruption and reform the system.

Voter with mask
Exhibit

Election of 2020

A look back at what historians have had to say about this epic contest over the nation's future.

John C. Calhoun

The Prelude to the Civil War

“Only two states wanted a civil war—Massachusetts and South Carolina.”
A playing card King superimposed over Trump's face.

The Dangerous Legal Theory Behind Trump’s Power Grabs

There was no “unitary executive” until some dudes made the idea up to save Nixon.
Chief Justices of the Supreme Court attend President Donald Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress at the US Capitol on March 4, 2025, in Washington, DC.

The Courts Won’t Save Us

Rather than resisting authoritarianism, the courts have enabled Trump’s rise.
Collage of the Battles of Lexington and Concord and patriotic imagery.

Revolution and Progress on Lexington Green

The American Revolution’s first battle is a reminder that liberty isn't the result of inevitable progress but a prize won by those willing to fight for it.
Alleged enemy aliens on way to detention camp, Gloucester, New Jersey, 1918.

The Alien Enemies Act: Annotated

Confused about the oft-mentioned Alien Enemies Act? This explainer, with links to free peer-reviewed scholarship, may help clear things up.
The words "the world you were born in no longer exists" covering Trump's eyes.

The Present Crisis and the End of the Long '90s

On the constitutional settlement that governed America from the end of the Volcker Shock in 1982 to the re-election of Donald Trump in 2024.
Workmen clearing cobwebs from exterior of the White House, c. 1920.
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How to Succeed in Government Without Really Trying

The long history of promising an “efficient” federal government. 
John Quincy Adams
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Are You Not Large and Unwieldy Enough Already?

John Quincy Adams challenges the idea of an expanding American frontier. 
Fiorello La Guardia.

How Mayor Fiorello La Guardia Transformed New York City

Zohran Mamdani’s campaign is questioning what a socialist might accomplish as mayor of NYC. To answer it, it’s worth looking back on Fiorello La Guardia.
William McKinley's  presidential inauguration.

A Warning for Democrats From the Gilded Age and the 1896 Election

Effective Republican organizing and intraparty divisions among Democrats solidified GOP political dominance until the 1930s.
Abraham Lincoln

Was the Civil War Inevitable?

Before Lincoln turned the idea of “the Union” into a cause worth dying for, he tried other means of ending slavery in America.
Revolutionary War reenactors near Lexington, Massachusetts.

The King We Overthrew — and the King Some Now Want

Americans need to reconnect with their innate dislike of arbitrary rule.
Sam Francis

He’s a Key Thinker of the Radical Right, But Is He All That?

Where the rediscovery of Sam Francis goes wrong.
Grave of John Quincy Adams.

From Son of the Revolution to Old Man Eloquent

A new Library of America edition of John Quincy Adams’s writings demonstrates the enduring appeal—and real shortcomings—of his revolutionary conservatism.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Free Trader

A little understood part of the New Deal.
Woodrow Wilson delivering his second innaugural address in front of a large crowd.

America Was at Its Trumpiest 100 Years Ago. Here’s How to Prevent the Worst.

During World War I, America lurched toward autocracy. Resistance was minimal.
An illustration of a government building holding up an American home with a stylized hand.

The Good Society Department

Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?
US Senator Cory Booker giving a speech.

US Senator Cory Booker Just Spoke for 25 Hours in Congress. What Was He Trying to Achieve?

He set a new record for the longest continuous speech in the Senate, surpassing Strom Thurmond’s 1957 attempt to prevent the passage of the Civil Rights Act.
Donald Trump and the presidential seal in an empty theater.

The Hoax that Spawned an Age of American Conspiracism

Donald Trump and Elon Musk are just the latest populists to weaponise fears of a sinister “deep state”.
A hand bound to a gavel.

The Question Progressives Refuse to Answer

As Democrats became the party of proceduralism, they sidestepped a crucial debate.
Painting of Troops, an American Flag and Eagle.

Echoes of Lexington and Concord

The 250th anniversary of "the shot heard round the world" is a reminder of the rights the Patriots fought for.
Silhouettes of John Tyler and John Quincy Adams
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The Constitution Does Not Speak for Itself

In 1841, John Tyler said he was the president. The Constitution said he wasn’t. What happened next?
Senator Joseph McCarthy speaking into microphones.

Newly Declassified Documents Reveal the Untold Stories of the Red Scare

In his latest book, journalist and historian Clay Risen explores how the House Un-American Activities Committee and Senator Joseph McCarthy upended the nation.
The ruins of Ft. Ticonderoga, and a note left in a knapsack a soldier carried in battle there.

A Knapsack’s Worth of Courage

Now, and for some years to come, we will need a lot less Paul Weiss, and a lot more Benjamin Warner.
Donald Trump at Lancaster Airport on November 3, 2024, in Lititz, Pennsylvania.

This Is America

Donald Trump’s authoritarian second term has led critics to describe him as a fascist in the mold of Adolf Hitler.
The Inspection Room at Ellis Island in New York circa 1910.
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The History of Categorizing Immigrants as Either Good or Bad

In the 19th century, debates about contract workers sorted immigrants into "natural" and "unnatural" categories.
Six hands holding a sword with an eagle on the hilt.

The Democratic Promise of Manifest Destiny

All Americans with some education are aware that Manifest Destiny was one of the Bad Things in our past and very few know any more about it than that.
Joseph McCarthy with a map.

Joseph McCarthy in Wheeling, West Virginia: Annotated

Senator Joseph McCarthy built his reputation on fear-mongering, smear campaigns, and falsehoods about government employees and their associates.
Thousands of shipping containers at the terminal at Port Elizabeth, New Jersey.

No Tariffs Without Representation

Executive trade power has gone too far.
Donald Trump at a formal event.

Trump’s Imperial Fantasy: To Be Polk, McKinley, and Putin—All at Once

Trampling rights, imposing tariffs, gobbling up others’ territories. Trump is imitating his role models to a T.