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History News Network

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Roundup Top 10!


A House Still Divided

by Ibram X. Kendi

In 1858, Abraham Lincoln warned that America could not remain “half slave and half free.” Today, the country remains divided by racism—and the threat is as existential as it was before the Civil War.


The Hacking of America

by Jill Lepore

Political and technological disruption have fed off each other since the nation’s founding. Now they are dangerously out of whack.


America Is Living James Madison’s Nightmare

by Jeffrey Rosen

The Founders designed a government that would resist mob rule. They didn’t anticipate how strong the mob could become.


How Midwestern Suffragists Used Anti-Immigrant Fervor to Help Gain the Vote

by Sara Egge

Women Fighting for the Ballot Saw German Men as Backward, Ignorant, and Less Worthy of Citizenship Than Themselves


The myth of freedom

by Yuval Noah Harari

Governments and corporations will soon know you better than you know yourself. Belief in the idea of ‘free will’ has become dangerous.


Edwin Stanton Was Part of the ‘Resistance’—in 1860

by Adam Rowe

If President Buchanan’s experience is a precedent, Trump’s internal critic may privately flatter him.


Teddy vs. Trump: The Art of the Square Deal

by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Roosevelt’s evolution as a dealmaker defined his presidency—and offers profound lessons to the current occupant of the Oval Office.


Learning the Power of Lies

by Arnold R. Isaacs

Facts vs. Falsehoods in the Age of Trump


Lessons from White House disinformation a century ago: ‘It’s dangerous to believe your own propaganda’

by John Maxwell Hamilton andMeghan Menard McCune

One hundred years ago, the U.S. government published documents that fueled the mounting Red Scare, helped justify the American military invasion of Russia and poisoned American-Russian relations for years to come.


Battles over patriotism, Pledge of Allegiance in schools span a century

by Randall Curren and Charles Dorn

Seventy-five years ago, at the height of America’s involvement in World War II, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a decision in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette that guaranteed public school students’ right to refuse to stand in patriotic salute.