The Latest 
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H.W. Brands on Ben Barnes's "Revelation" about the Iran Hostage Crisis
"In effect, Connally and Casey were telling the Iranians not to do something the Iranians had no intention of doing."
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Keri Leigh Merritt on the Politics of Grief and the Power of Historians' Witness to COVID
Three years since the public became aware of the seriousness of the COVID pandemic, a recent collection of essays turns the skills of historians toward reflection on grief, survival, and connecting understanding of the past to a better collective future.
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When World War II Pacifists "Conquered the Future"
Eric Laursen
Daniel Akst profiles the pacifists who opposed American involvement in the Second World War and their influence on the civil rights and peace movements that followed.
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Censoring History Education Goes Hand in Hand with Democratic Backsliding
Julia Boechat Machado and Ruben Zeeman
Regimes in the Philippines, India and Brazil have recently tried to censor the teaching of history in service of their poltical goals and claims to power. The pushback by scholars in these countries should inspire historians in Florida and elsewhere to resist the political censorship of research and teaching.
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The Nixon Library's Vietnam Exhibition Obscures the Truth about the War's End
Brian Robertson
The exhibition commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Paris Peace Accords chooses its sources selectively to present the negotiations as the product of Nixon's grand strategy, ignoring the role of domestic political machination.
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The "Critical Race Theory" Controversy Continues
Florida's legislature is working to implement the agenda laid out by Governor Ron DeSantis, including eliminating Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives and putting control of faculty hiring in the hands of university presidents, not faculty.
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The Roundup Top Ten for March 17, 2023
The top opinion writing by historians and about history from around the web this week.
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The Defiant Woman at the Center of New York's First Abortion Battle
Alan J. Singer
Carolyn Ann Trow Lohman, better known as Madame Restell, defied the authority of the medical establishment and moral crusaders to help women obtain abortions. Justice Alito's misuse of history to justify the Dobbs decision shows the need to remember her.
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Blog
"You Don't Belong Here": Elizabeth Becker Tells the Story of the Women Journalists of Vietnam
Robin Lindley
Elizabeth Becker discusses her triple biography of Frances FitzGerald, Catherine Leroy and Kate Webb, three women journalists who broke barriers to cover the war in Vietnam, and Becker's own ex...
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How The Irish Saved Wellington at Waterloo
Brendan Farrell
For centuries, the Irish provided manpower to the British military, never more notably than on June 18, 1815.
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What Makes a Rebel Into a Hero?
Stephen Dando-Collins
The same political process that made a hero out of the rebel Julius Caesar made villains out of his assassins, and burnished the reputations of some other rebels against the Roman Empire.
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Irish Legend Should Inspire the Fight Against Famine Today
William Lambers
The Irish show Riverdance has incorporated elements of legend derived from the Irish experience of famine, and raised funds to help victims of hunger around the world, an example to follow at St. Patrick's Day.
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The Roundup Top Ten for March 10, 2023
The top opinion writing by historians and about history from around the web this week.
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Blog
Kermit Roosevelt III on the Founding and Re-Founding of America
Robin Lindley
"I started thinking that it’s actually very important—and very harmful—that we locate our fundamental values in the Founding and the...
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Another Casualty of the Academic Job Market? The Relatable Professor
Elizabeth Stice
As the academic job market demands a degree of excellence and achievement in young scholars that was unknown for earlier generations of faculty, are the shrinking ranks of the faculty being filled with professors who struggle to relate to their students?
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Whose "Red Lines"?
Lawrence Wittner
Far from promoting clarity and stability, when powerful nations declare "red lines" in their dealings with the world they declare their intentions to impose their will on others. Peace-promoting red lines must be drawn by more robust international cooperation.
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Why We Don't Remember Edith Galt Wilson as the "First Woman President"
Richard Bluttal
While the First Lady ran the executive branch while concealing the extent of Woodrow Wilson's ill health after a stroke, her unofficial stewardship raises too many questions about secrecy and its consequences to be celebrated today.
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Youth Failed by Their Leaders: How the Palestinians Lost Their Way
Alon Ben-Meir
Four generations of Palestinian leadership have failed their youth through intransigence and a failure to distinguish between Israel and the occupation.
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Don't Forget the Private Sorrows of Ukraine
Walter G. Moss
In Ukraine, as with all wars, statistical accounts of death and destruction risk depersonalizing the killing and obscuring the humanity of the victims.
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Blog
The "Singular and Emblematic" History of Tuskegee with Dr. Brian Jones
Skipped History with Ben Tumin
A conversation about student protest culture at the Tuskegee Institute and beyond
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The Roundup Top Ten for March 3, 2023
The top opinion writing by historians and about history from around the web this week.
News
- Chair of Florida Charter School Board on Firing of Principal: About Policy, Not David Statue
- Graduate Student Strikes Fight Back Against Decades of Austerity, Seek to Revive Opportunity
- When Right Wingers Struggle with Defining "Woke" it Shows they Oppose Pursuing Equality
- Strangelove on the Square: Secret USAF Films Showed Airmen What to Expect if Nuclear War Broke Out
- The Women of the Montgomery Bus Boycott
- New Books Force Consideration of Reconstruction's End from Black Perspective
- Excerpt: How Apartheid South Africa Tried to Create a Libertarian Utopia
- Historian's Book on 1970s NBA Shows Racial Politics around Basketball Have Always Been Ugly
- Kendi: "Anti-woke" Part of Backlash Against Antiracist Protest Movements
- Monica Muñoz Martinez Honored for Truth-Telling in Texas History