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On August 8, 2022, activists protest the lack of monkeypox vaccine and treatment access outside the San Francisco Federal Building.

What the AIDS Crisis Can Teach Us About Monkeypox

Harm reduction strategies, like those pioneered by queer men of color, have the best chance of stopping this disease.
by Joshua Gutterman Tranen via Boston Review on October 3, 2022

From Progress to Poverty: America’s Long Gilded Age

The America that emerged out of the Civil War was meant to be a radically more equal place. What went wrong?
by Steven Hahn via The Nation on April 18, 2018
National Archives building.
partner

Scratching the Record

On the long history of governments attempting to restrict access to documents about their inner workings.
by Asheesh Kapur Siddique via HNN on July 8, 2025
African American workers march past a line of National Guards troops with bayonets fixed.

The National Guard’s History of Violent Labor Repression

Donald Trump recently deployed California’s National Guard to repress protests in LA. The National Guard has a long history of breaking up protests and strikes.
by Dana Frank via Jacobin on June 30, 2025
A drawing of John Adams.

John Adams Is Bald and Toothless

A brief history of the Alien and Sedition Acts.
by Michael Liss via 3 Quarks Daily on May 19, 2025
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.
by Adam Hochschild via Washington Post on April 3, 2025
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”.
by Phil Tinline via New Statesman on April 2, 2025
A statue of Andrew Jackson riding a horse outside of the White House.

Before Trump, This President ‘Paralyzed’ Washington with Cuts

Andrew Jackson set the standard for the most tumultuous presidential term ever — at least until now.
by Ronald G. Shafer via Retropolis on February 28, 2025
President Franklin Roosevelt, seated with the CCC.

A Constitutional Rule on Federal Spending

USAID grants may have cracked constitutional spending limits.
by Robert Natelson via Law & Liberty on February 20, 2025
Print depicting a teacher and students at a freedmen's school in Vicksburg.

Why America’s First Department of Education Didn’t Last

Created in 1867, the short-lived office was mired in the ongoing American strife after the Civil War.
by Petula Dvorak via Retropolis on February 4, 2025
A flour sack with a girl feeding ducks with "Nassogne, 1915" and "Merci, L'Amerique" or "Thank you, America" embroidered on it.

The Beginnings of USAID Can Be Traced to a Famine in Belgium

Trump is freezing the United States’ foreign aid agency, which grew from our relief efforts over the world’s wars and crises.
by Petula Dvorak via Retropolis on February 4, 2025

Edward C. Banfield and What Conservatism Used to Mean

Hard thinking on difficult and uncomfortable questions about how to keep everything from falling apart.
by Joshua Tait via The Bulwark on February 1, 2025
Donald Trump wearing a MAGA hat.

The Panama Question

Trump’s canal comments resurrect a forgotten American interest.
by Joseph Addington via The American Conservative on December 29, 2024
Nancy Pelosi standing next to a sign that says "Protecting America's Health Care."

UnitedHealthcare’s Decades-Long Fight to Block Reform

UnitedHealthcare, the health insurer whose CEO was murdered, has spent decades fighting and winning political battles to maintain the for-profit health system.
by Branko Marcetic via Jacobin on December 21, 2024
President Roosevelt signs the proclamation naming December 15 as Bill of Rights Day.

The Reinvention of the Bill of Rights

The New Deal-era creation of “Bill of Rights Day” obscures the real nature and guardrails of American liberty.
by Jerome C. Foss via Law & Liberty on December 13, 2024
A USPS postal worker pulling a cart of mail through a snow storm.

How Mailmen Saved Rural America

Amazon will never be neighbourly.
by Jeff Bloodworth via UnHerd on November 25, 2024
A painting of Congress Hall and the New Theater in colonial Philadelphia.

The Mutiny of 1783

America’s only successful insurrection.
by Andrew A. Zellers-Frederick via Journal of the American Revolution on November 19, 2024
President Woodrow Wilson riding as a passenger in a two seater car with his chauffeur, George Howard.

States’ Rights or Inalienable Rights?

Some early progressives may have been advocates of states’ rights, but they misunderstood the philosophy of the American Founding.
by Samuel Postell via Law & Liberty on November 13, 2024
A drawing of protestors wrestling a tax collector to the ground.

A Prudent First Amendment

Often, the proper scope of the First Amendment can be determined only by considering both text and context.
by David Lewis Schaefer via Law & Liberty on November 7, 2024
A graphic of a megaphone with a group of people inside the horn holding smaller megaphones.

Gags and Grievance: The Labor Origins of Whistleblowing

The forgotten history of the Lloyd-La Follette Act and of whistleblowing in the federal workforce.
by Sarah Milov via Knight First Amendment Institute on October 28, 2024
A computer, business documents, envelope, and a broadcast tower.

How Tech Giants Make History

AT&T’s early leaders used PR to sway public opinion, casting their monopoly as a public service and obscuring its political roots.
by Richard R. John via Pro-Market on October 10, 2024
Protestors and counter-protestors face off holding flags and posters.

Two Americas?

Heather Cox Richardson argues that there are two Americas: one interested in equality, the other in hierarchy. But it's not that simple.
by Nicholas Misukanis via Commonweal on August 6, 2024
A judge's gavel and the Capitol building, edited to look like the top of the Capitol is the other side of the gavel.

America Has Too Many Laws

An excess of restrictions has taken a very real toll on the lives of everyday Americans. Their stories must be told.
by Neil Gorsuch, Janie Nitze via The Atlantic on August 5, 2024
Indiana Dunes National Park.

Inside the Fight to Save the Indiana Dunes, One of America’s Most Vulnerable National Parks

Caught between steel mills, suburbs and a hard place, the 15,000-acre site is a fantasia of biodiversity—and a case study for hard-fought conservation.
by Eli Wizevich via Smithsonian on July 25, 2024
U.S. Capitol building ca. 1800.

Creating a Federal Government, 1789-1829

Digital archive and interactive map that tells the story of U.S. government institutions through the lives and work of federal employees.
by Peter J. Kastor via Washington University in St. Louis on July 1, 2024
A rally and march in New York City demanding that every vote be counted in the general election, despite Trump’s premature claim of victory, on November 4, 2020.

Defend Liberalism? Let’s Fight for Democracy First

America never really was liberal, and that’s not the right fight anyway. The fight now is for democracy.
by Jefferson Cowie via The New Republic on June 21, 2024
Star-Herb Medicines and Teas for all Diseases, 1923.

How Government Helped Birth the Advertising Industry

Advertising went from being an embarrassing activity to a legitimate part of every company’s business plans—despite scant evidence that it worked.
by Livia Gershon, Daniel Navon via JSTOR Daily on May 17, 2024
Deb Haaland.

Deb Haaland Confronts the History of the Federal Agency She Leads

As the first Native American Cabinet member, the Secretary of the Interior has made it part of her job to address the travesties of the past.
by Casey N. Cep via The New Yorker on April 29, 2024
Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gormé.

Slouching Towards Tax Day

How did taxes become something we "do"?
by Brian Domitrovic via Law & Liberty on April 15, 2024
Book cover of "Cold War Country" by Joseph M. Thompson.

Big Government Country

Connie B. Gay and the roots of country music militarization.
by Brock Schnoke via UNC Press Blog on April 11, 2024
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