Abraham Lincoln

During the 1860 presidential election, political parties dueled over the intent of the framers.

The oval office looks different now that President Biden is its occupant.

Disunion is hardly a new theme in American politics. In this moment of tumult, it would be unwise to rule out its return.

From "insurrection" to "rebellion" to "Civil War," finding a name for the conflict was always political.

An image from the Capitol captures the distance between who we purport to be and who we have actually been.

But the belief that America previously had a well-functioning democracy is an illusion.

While Wednesday's images shocked us, they fit into our history.

The story of John Wolcott Phelps and his push for Lincoln to emancipate all slaves.

Why did the man known as the “father of Black nationalism” defect to the Democratic Party during Reconstruction?

We must be cautious of the inclination to find a “usable history” that proves those points we want to prove, that reinforces the lessons we want reinforced.

Jefferson revised the Gospels to make Jesus more reasonable, and lost the power of his story.

A history of the United States shifting the financial burden of emancipation onto enslaved people.

James Shapiro’s recent book looks at why Shakespeare has been a mainstay of the cultural and political conflicts of the country since its founding.

History is asking only one question right now as Trump refuses to concede. Will the Republicans decide they are no longer an American political party?

Biden will take over a country facing myriad challenges. And Trump's lame-duck period could be one of the most treacherous in American history.

Enabling sustained minority rule at the national level is not a feature of our constitutional design, but a perversion of it.

In 1880, a new generation helped decide the closest popular vote in U.S. history.

In certain corners of the internet, you can actually buy money, but these bills are relics of the Free Banking Era that reigned from the 1830s to the 1860s.

This 1952 textbook serves as an example of the "patriotic history" that Donald Trump grew up with and calls for today.

In our current politics we must be attentive to how talk of American freedom has long been connected to the presumed right of whites to dominate everyone else.