Excerpts

Curated stories from around the web.
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Jewish activists hold Passover Seder outside ICE headquarters in New York City to demand an end to Israel's war on Gaza.

The Past, Present, and Future of Left Jewish Identity

Jewish-led Palestine solidarity demonstrations are part of a long history of Jewish identity being bound up in leftist politics.
Collage of various black women mentioned within the article.

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Edda L. Fields-Black on the Combahee River Raid

Harriet Tubman’s revolutionary Civil War raid and the power of preserving Black history in the face of political pushback.
John Cassidy

John Cassidy on Capitalism and Its Critics

The author on capitalism’s critics, why everyone is so unhappy with the system, and what may come next.
William F. Buckley Jr. surrounded by piles of books in his office.

What Made William F. Buckley So Unusual

The author of a new biography talks about the conservative journalist’s life and legacy.
A group of Asian men standing with towels around their necks

“Endless Bad Infinity”

A conversation with the creators of a podcast series on the feedback loop of American empire.
F. D. R. looks intently across a table at Brazilian President Getulio Vargas during a meal.

Won’t You Be My Neighbor?

Christy Thornton and Greg Grandin discuss his new book, “America, América,” and the intertwined histories of the U.S. and Latin America.
AFL-CIO president Lane Kirkland stands behind a podium speaking into an array of microphones.

When US Labor Backed US Imperialism

After the successful purges of leftists from unions, US labor leaders were enlisted by government officials to join in their global imperialist operations.
Karl Marx gazing off into the distance while surrounded by books

Karl Marx’s Legacy in the United States

For two centuries, Karl Marx’s thoughts have significantly impacted US politics. In turn, his close study of the US informed the development of his ideas.
Political cartoon of men chopping down the tree of slavery.

The Root and The Branch: Working-Class Reform and Antislavery, 1790–1860

On the robust influence of labor reform and antislavery ideas and movements on each other from the early National period to the Civil War.
Joseph McCarthy and Roy Cohn.

Blacklists and Civil Liberties

On the Second Red Scare and the lessons that it can provide for us today.
Film still from "Three Seasons" of a flower seller in Vietnam.

Tony Bui on the Vietnam War’s Cinematic Legacy

Films from Vietnam and Hollywood testify to the range of stories told about the war on-screen and the different memories they embody.
Lindsey R. Peterson.

'Home Builders': Free Labor Households and Settler Colonialism in Western Civil War Commemorations

On the gendered dimensions of trans-Mississippi Civil War memory, the idea of the single-family household, and the politics of expansion and settlement.

How to Not Get Poisoned in America

"We should go back into history and ask: Why did we need the federal Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906?"
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.
The “Visscher Map of the New World” including North and South America, 1658.

The Impossibly Intertwined History of the Americas

A conversation with Greg Grandin about his groundbreaking new book "America, América: A New History of the New World."
Filmmaker Oliver Stone speaks to journalists following a hearing with the House Oversight Committee at the US Capitol on April 1, 2025, in Washington, DC.

Oliver Stone Goes to Washington

Legendary filmmaker Oliver Stone says we’re closer than ever to finally piecing together the mystery of November 22, 1963.
City workers get their lunch at the Horn & Hardart automat in New York City, ca 1940.

Choice and Its Discontents

Today no one on either side of the political spectrum would present themselves as an enemy of choice. Sophia Rosenfeld exposes the complex legacy of this idea.
Harvester on farmland.

America’s Pernicious Rural Myth

An interview with Steven Conn about his new book, “Lies of the Land: Seeing Rural America for What It Is—and Isn’t.”
Elon Musk holds a chain saw as he shakes hands with Argentine president Javier Milei at the Conservative Political Action Conference.

The Method in the Far Right’s Madness

How today’s far right manages to combine the call for economic freedom with pseudoscience about natural hierarchies of race and IQ.
Henry Fonda in The Best Man (1984).

President of the Nameless: Alexander Horwath on Henry Fonda for President

A documentary dissects Henry Fonda's character and his role in American cinema.
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.
Aerial view of Oakland.

The Future Happens in Oakland First. That’s a Cautionary Tale for Global Cities

International trade boomed with the city’s early adoption of technological and economic changes, but Black neighborhoods became ‘sacrifice zones.’
Lerone A. Martin

Christian Nationalists Don’t Want Us To Remember the Real MLK

The same Christian ideology that inspired J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI to surveil MLK is alive and well in the Trump administration.
David Levering Lewis and his book overlaid on a stained glass window.

No Nation Under Their Feet

A historian explores his own family's history to understand the African-American community’s internal pigmentocracy and the absurdity of racial binaries.
Eve Ewing, and the cover of her book "Original Sins."

How Do We Combat the Racist History of Public Education?

On the schoolhouse’s role in enforcing racial hierarchy.
W.E.B. DuBois, seated in garden reading book, while Shirley Graham DuBois waters plants.

How Black Marxists Have Understood Racial Oppression

Black Marxist thought emphasizes the centrality of capitalism to racial oppression and the destructiveness of that oppression for all workers.
Group of white people carrying a sign that thanks Donald Trump

Make South Africa Great Again?

How the country’s post-apartheid politics may inform the world view of Elon Musk and Donald Trump.

Slavery Is Not a Metaphor

In the aftermath of the American Revolution, southern slaveholders were thinking about what a prison should look like for a society that was economically and socially dependent on slavery.
A person carrying a table into a moving van.

Why American Mobility Ground to a Halt

Once a nation of movers, the US has lost its “culture of mobility,” a new book argues. That’s been a disaster for housing affordability and economic progress.
Supreme Court sign proclaims "equal justice under law."

What Happens If Trump Defies the Courts

Do judges have the power to enforce their rulings if the executive branch refuses to comply?
Carrie Baker and her book Abortion Pills: US History and Politics.

The Forgotten—and Incredibly Important—History of the Abortion Pill

Mifepristone took longer to get approved than most drugs—but not because it was unsafe.
American Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb, Hartford, Connecticut.

What Was Psychiatric Deinstitutionalization?

An interview with sociologist and historian of psychiatry Andrew Scull about the history and legacy of psychiatric deinstitutionalization.

The Historical Roots of Donald Trump’s Aggressive Nationalism

What the President’s confrontations with Panama, Greenland, Canada, and Colombia suggest about his expansionist vision.
Frances Perkins

How the First ‘Madam Secretary’ Fought to Save Jewish Refugees Fleeing From Nazi Germany

Frances Perkins’ challenged the United States’ restrictive immigration policies as FDR’s Secretary of Labor.

Opus Dei, Embezzlement, and Human Trafficking

The Catholic order has branches all over the world, and a deep history of unethical and illegal behavior.
Trump holding an American flag crowded with extra stars.

What the History of American Expansion Can Tell Us About Trump’s Threats

A historian of U.S. empire discusses nuclear Greenland, selling Puerto Rico, and the renaissance of William McKinley.
President Jimmy Carter seated in the Oval Office of the White House, 1980.

How Jimmy Carter Became a Cold War Hawk

Jimmy Carter is associated with an idealistic “human rights agenda.” In reality, he was paving the way for Ronald Reagan’s aggressive anti-communism.
Blair LM Kelley

Talking Black Joy and Black Freedom with Blair LM Kelley

“The world didn’t give It, but the world can’t take It away.”
Burgundy leather book cover with "Published By The Author" written in gold.

Self-Publishing and the Black American Narrative

"Published by the Author" explores the resourcefulness of Black writers of the nineteenth century.
Grover Cleveland.

How Grover Cleveland’s Grandson Feels About Donald Trump

Trump is often described as unprecedented, but in winning a non-consecutive second term, he has a significant antecedent: Grover Cleveland.

Globalism, Sovereignty, and Resistance

Quinn Slobodian and Jennifer Mittelstadt discuss their research on the meanings of “globalism” and “sovereignty” throughout history.
Illustration of Founders signing the Declaration of Independence.

How the Meaning of the Declaration of Independence Changed Over Time

When Thomas Jefferson penned ‘all men are created equal,’ he did not mean individual equality, says Stanford scholar.
Conservative College Campus Counterprotesters with signs saying "Peace Through Victory in Vietnam."

Modern Conservatism Was Born on College Campuses. So Why Does the GOP Hate Them?

Leaders of the political right learned lessons from the 1960s that still inform the movement today.
Photographs of historian Zachary Schrag and his father Philip Schrag in front of a Nuclear War plan background

Two Generations of Nuclear Hopes and Nuclear Fears

A conversation with historian Zachary Schrag and his father Philip Schrag about their multi-generational encounters with nuclear threats.
State Correctional Institution at Camp Hill Administration Building, with a restricted entrance sign in front of its doors.

The Porous Prison

How incarcerated people have become separated from American society.
Painting by Mary Cassatt titled "Mother and Child (Goodnight Hug)".

Beyond “Baby Blues”

“Postpartum depression” encompasses various debilitating changes in mood that can occur after giving birth. How did that language come to be?
Collage art of Supreme Court Justices.

Science Historian Naomi Oreskes Schools the Supreme Court on Climate Change

Scientists and lawmakers in the 70s knew more than we think they did about climate change and the impacts of fossil fuel regulations.
Police officer in front of a playground and school.

The Historical Precedents to Trump’s Attacks on Haitian Immigrants

An expert on white nationalism explains how such demonizing rhetoric incubates and spreads—and what sets this particular episode apart.
A drawing of two people speaking with a third person's head listening between them.

Diverging Majority

Demography has not managed to be destiny in the past half-century—but predictions of a millenarian shift have not lost their appeal.
Richard Nixon gestures toward George Meany during a speech at the 1971 AFL-CIO convention.

How the “AFL-CIA” Undermined Labor Movements Abroad

During the Cold War, the AFL-CIO actively participated in efforts to suppress left-wing labor movements abroad.
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