Richard Hofstadter

How a book of essays from 1964 explains what happened at the Capitol.

Why did the historian come to fear the very movements he once would have celebrated?

An interview with Sean Wilentz on Library of America's new collection of Richard Hofstadter's works.

The late historian and author of “The Paranoid Style in American Politics” misdiagnosed the fate of modern conservatism.

When it comes to intellectual partnerships, sometimes an acknowledgment is enough.

It's the transatlantic commentariat’s favorite political put-down. It’s also historically illiterate.

Revisiting Holfstadter's "paranoid style" in the era of Trump.

From Dow to now.

A new history argues that illiberalism is not a backlash but a central feature from the founding to today.

The US today has extraordinary levels of gun ownership. But to see this as a venerable tradition is to misread history.

What happens when radical historians write for the public.

A new history of American politics examines the past and future of political realignments.

What prospects are there today for assessing American politics and history from an early Hofstadterian remove?

The rise of tactical gun culture among civilians reveals a new front in the U.S. battle against nativist authoritarianism.

Conspiracy theories like QAnon are ultimately a social problem rather than a cognitive one. We should blame politics, not the faulty reasoning of individuals.

The peculiarities of how American Christianity took shape help explain believers’ vulnerability to conspiratorial thinking and misinformation.

Eric Foner has helped us better understand the ambiguous consequences of what were almost always only partial victories.

Today’s populist resurgence has us rethinking the role these movements play in U.S. politics.

Our difficulties today are far removed from what the Populist Party tried to tackle. But their movement can nourish our imaginations.

How a lurid 19th-century memoir of sexual abuse produced one of the ugliest features of American politics.