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What to the Refugee Child is the Fourth of July?
Ed Simon
We should revisit Frederick Douglas' famous speech, "What to the Slave Is the 4th of July?" Analyze the rhetoric, the grammar, the syntax, the diction of Douglas’ address, and ask yourself if one iota should be changed in 2019?
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Independence Day and the Importance of Public Service in the Face of Regnant Tyranny
Gregory D. Foster
It isn’t hard to recognize something of the challenge before all public servants – certainly those who accept the proposition that we have enduring civic obligations, grounded in the Oath we have taken, that demand to be met – now, perhaps as never before.
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Colin Powell’s Recent “Lincoln Medal” Disregards A Checkered Past
Jeffrey J. Matthews
Powell’s outstanding service as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff notwithstanding, the perpetual lionizing of the general has had the effect of misbalancing the historical record. Despite of—or because of—his popularity and patriotic achievements, Powell has not been held to account for some of his major failings as a public servant.
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What We Can Learn About Tough Times and Problem-Solving from the 1970s
Tracy Dahlby
If 70s sage E.F. Schumachera has anything to teach us today, it may lie in his chronically appealing idea that optimism about the human spirit, and faith in our potential for problem-solving, can flourish even in the toughest of times.
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The Overlooked Story of “the Greater United States”: Historian Daniel Immerwahr Shares His Unique Perspective on American Empire
Robin Lindley
From the Guano Islands to America’s widespread empire now, Professor Immerwahr shares neglected stories from the past showing how inhabitants of America’s possessions have been relegated "to the shadows," and, at various times, have been "shot, shelled, starved, interned, dispossessed, tortured, and experimented on."
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The Declassified History of Hitler's British Traitors
Tim Tate
For all the genuine unity and determination of the vast majority of the British population to defeat Hitler, there was also a small – but dangerous – sub-stratum which yearned for the day when his troops could goose-step down Whitehall amid an orgy of swastika flags.
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How the Specter of Andrew Johnson Haunts Donald Trump
Mike Purdy
When the history books are written, impeachment may define Trump’s presidency in a similar way that “impeachment” and “Andrew Johnson” are solidly and forever linked together.
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Hawaii’s Cowboy Heroes
David Wolman and Julian Smith
At the turn of the 20th century, three Hawaiian cowboys arrived in Wyoming to compete in a rodeo extravaganza. What happened next overturned much of what people thought they knew, and still think they know, about Hawaii, the American West, and the relationship between the two.
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The Case for Religious Progressivism
Walter G. Moss
Those who argue, “We should keep religion out of politics,” are being simplistic. One can more properly cite individuals like Frederick Douglass, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King Jr., Barack Obama, and Pope Francis who counter that the spiritual and moral values commonly advocated by major religions should inspire our politics.
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Presidential War Powers and Bill Clinton's Battles
Paul W. Lovinger
Reviewing the 1999 attack on Yugoslavia and other belligerent acts: a study of arbitrary power and its supremacy over the Constitution in modern times.
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What Historians Are Saying: 2020 Election Democratic Primary Debates
Tweets, retweets, and likes by historians discussing the Democratic Primary Debates.
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Stonewall's Legacy and Kwame Anthony Appiah's Misuse of History
Alan Singer
What Appiah misses in his dismissal of the Stonewall Rebellion’s historical importance is that symbols like Rosa Parks sitting down and Stonewall are crucial to social movements as they mobilize and move from the political margins to the center of civic discourse.
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Roundup Top 10!
This week's broad sampling of opinion pieces found on the Internet, as selected by the editor of HNN.
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Blog
Racism, Reparations, and the Growing Political Divide
Steve Hochstadt
The clean partisan split over whether to consider reparations to African Americans demonstrates how Republicans and Democrats are moving away from each other.
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How the Debate Over the Use of the Term ‘Concentration Camp’ was Amicably Resolved in 1998
Ralph Seliger
How the Japanese-American organizers of a museum exhibit at Ellis Island entitled “America’s Concentration Camps: Remembering the Japanese American Experience” came to an amicable agreement with the American Jewish Committee (AJC).
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10 Things To Check Out At the Library of Congress’s New Exhibit on Women’s Suffrage
Andrew Fletcher
Highlights from the exhibit on women's suffrage at the Library of Congress.
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The Stonewall Exhibit in New York Needs Sturdier Walls
Bruce Chadwick
Stonewall was a momentous event and its 50th anniversary is being celebrated in many ways across the country, including the exhibit Stonewall 50 exhibit at the New York Historical Society.
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Tangled Lives, Tangled Culture, Tangled History
Bruce Chadwick
Today, Falsettos is more than a good play; it is an historic look backwards at the suddenly open lives of gay men and women and the troubles they were besieged by--legal, cultural and medical--in the early 1980s.
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The Moon Landings Have a Nazi Problem
Fraser MacDonald
As we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landings, the Nazi provenance of some technology and personnel is too often kept at bay.
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From "Ghettos" to "Concentration Camps," the Battle over Words
Daniel B. Schwartz
We can and should learn from the Holocaust to fight against racism and dehumanization, mindful of what they can lead to, but we should avoid comparisons that collapse the distance between the Holocaust and current events and result in the trivialization of the former.
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We Need A Long-Arc Historical Perspective to Understand White Supremacist Extremist Violence.
Eric V. Tait, Jr.
Much like today, in the early 1980s, people of color and the gains of the civil rights movement were increasingly under attack and many Americans wanted to “turn back the clock to an earlier era.”
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Wealth, Access, and Archival Fetishism in the New Cold War History
Benjamin R. Young
Cold War historians are only reinforcing elitist hierarchies if they continue to almost singularly hold up multinational research in previously unexplored archives as the gold standard of quality scholarship.
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On the 100th Anniversary of the Treaty of Versailles, It's Time to Reexamine Its Legacy.
David Carlin
Versailles did not destroy the German economy, make Germany into a permanent pariah, or inspire the German lust for revenge. Instead, the Nazis capitalized on a unique economic calamity (the Great Depression), German political instability, and deep seated radical nationalist currents.
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Why We Need Better Children's History Books
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
Assembling a coherent narrative that inspires students to image a different world is much more complicated than a Wikipedia search. Teachers can only carry out this task if they have access to narrative histories that are decolonized.
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How Estes and Ike Transformed the New Hampshire Primary – And How JFK Defined It
Patrick Lacroix
The New Hampshire primary isn't just important because it's the first presidential primary.
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Weaponizing Nicknames, From Earl Long to Donald Trump
Ron Faucheux
The tactic of nicknaming political opposition has survived the modern age of electronic media. Donald Trump is the new master of the game––delighting supporters, mortifying adversaries.
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Karin Wulf on Why History Hashtags on Twitter are Inherently Inclusive
Aleisha Smith
Dr. Wulf also discusses what she's working on now, the importance of Women Also Know History, and the success of the Black Perspectives blog.
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The Perfect Mentor: Alan Brinkley
Yanek Mieczkowski
Beyond his impeccable scholarship and insightful lectures, Alan Brinkley was a mentor to dozens of doctoral students. In that role, he was perfect, providing profound lessons that will last through many careers, and likely, many lifetimes.
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Blog
African Art Belongs Where It Was Created. Give It Back.
Steve Hochstadt
The fruits of genocide lie in glass cases in Western museums. Our institutions owe reparations for organized theft.
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All for One and One for All! The Three Musketeers Ride Again
Bruce Chadwick
Bruce Chadwick encourages you to see The Three Musketeers: It is a sizzling tale of derring-do, adventure and a solid piece of French history.
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Roundup Top 10!
This week's broad sampling of opinion pieces found on the Internet, as selected by the editor of HNN.
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Are Historians Doing Enough to Address Climate Change?
Walter G. Moss
For too long historians also paid too little attention to the most important topic of our day.
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The Lavender Scare and Beyond: Documenting LGBTQ History from the Great Depression to Today
Eric Gonzaba
An illumiting interview with Josh Howard, the director of the Lavender Scare documentary, and historian Eric Gonzaba.
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The Vatican's Latest Official Document Is An Insult to the LGBTQ Community and History
Ed Simon
Our understandings of romance, family, sexuality, and gender have been in flux in the past – within the Church no less – and no amount of thundering about “How the Vatican views it now is how it has always been” can change that.
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Why is Brazil so American?
Marcos Sorrilha Pinheiro
Given Brazil's history, it is fully understandable that its current president, a retired military man from the Brazilian middle class, has a genuine admiration for Trump and his followers.
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The Origins of American Hegemony in East and Southeast Asia – And Why China Challenges It Today
Wen-Qing Ngoei
Examining the origins of American hegemony in this region helps us better understand the history of the Cold War.
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The Cold War Spy and CIA Master of Disguise Writing the History of CIA Tactics in the Cold War
Aleisha Smith
An interview with Jonna Mendez. A former Chief of Disguise with 27 years in the CIA, she discusses her latest book (co-authored with her husband Tony Mendez), her experience in the CIA, and her role at the Spy Museum.
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The Origins of the Lost Cause Myth
M. Andrew Holowchak
States’ rights and slavery, while theoretically distinct, were in praxis intertwined. Here's what a Jeffersonian analysis of Jubal Early’s lost-cause apologia can teach us.
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Silent Spring: Why Rachel Carson’s words still ring true today
Catherine Whitlock
Any future US president would do well to heed the likes of Rachel Carson and her successors and invest in clean energy policies, protect the environment, and promote biodiversity.
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Make History Accessible: The Case for YouTube
Rohit Kandala
Youtube presents a great opportunity for both professional history educators and amateurs to enhance the public’s interest in history.
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A Fresh Take on Watergate Illuminates the Present
James Thornton Harris
While Richard Nixon’s rise and fall has been repeatedly examined — there are more than a dozen biographies of him — John Farrell’s book, Richard Nixon, a Life, offers many new insights.
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Environmental Historian Sara Dant: "History Is As Relevant Today As Ever."
Korina Ike
"We have many challenges - environment, politics, social, cultural - that are the end-product of our historical arc. Understanding how we got here, what has worked and what hasn’t in the past, gives us the best chance of moving forward successfully."
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Ideologies and U.S. Foreign Policy International History Conference: Day 1 Coverage
Marcelo Carocci
The conference brought together academic and independent historians and political scientists from universities all-round the US and England to discuss the history of ideology and US foreign policy from many different points of view.
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Ideologies and U.S. Foreign Policy International History Conference: Day 2 Coverage
Miriam Lipton
What was the global significane of the Civil War? What exactly is the definition of “freedom?” How are Donald Duck, Indiana Jones, and anti-modernizationistsconnected? The second day of the Ideologies and U.S. Foreign Policy International History Conference was highlighted by experts’ bold answers to these ambitious questions.
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"Donald Trump and Ideology:" Dr. James Lindsay Delivers the Governor Tom McCall Memorial Lecture
Miriam Lipton and Marcelo Carocci
History and Trump's ideology of American power and foreign relations.
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Blog
Photographs From My First Trip to China
Steve Hochstadt
Steve Hochstadt shares images from China in 1989, about a month before the Tiananment Square Massacre.
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Roundup Top 10!
This week's broad sampling of opinion pieces found on the Internet, as selected by the editor of HNN.
News
- Kevin Kruse Discuses Revisionist History on the Bulwark Podcast
- Leading historians and academics to launch five-year project to chronicle the UK's history dating back to 1603
- Holocaust historians divided over Warsaw ghetto museum
- The Holocaust Survivor Who Deciphered Nazi Doublespeak
- Peter Selz, Curator and Art Historian Committed to the New, Is Dead at 100