reviews

The Madness Needs to Stop. A Review of Allan Lichtman’s Repeal the Second Amendment: The Case for a Safer America

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“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” How did a once inconsequential, dismissed, and somewhat forgotten, sliver of the United States Constitution become such a hotbed of political strife and the source of overwhelming, mass violence? In Repeal the Second Amendment: The Case for a Safer America, Allan Lichtman, a distinguished professor of history at American University, draws upon a wealth of source material and meticulous historical research to explain how the National Rifle Association (NRA) has hijacked the history of the Second Amendment. In an effort to convince gun control advocates that they must pursue the repeal of the Second Amendment, Lichtman probes the history of firearms and gun regulations from colonial times to the present to detail the ways in which the NRA has manufactured a distorted history of gun ownership in America. Lichtman argues that the “iron triangle” of the gun lobby, the gun industry, and an array of pro-gun (mostly Republican) politicians have used a twisted and misleading history of the Second Amendment to advance their own interests, and enrich their pockets, while entrapping Americans into an endless cycle of gun violence.[1] To solve American’s gun violence problem, Lichtman concludes, the Second Amendment must be repealed. 

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Greta Gerwig’s “Little Women” is Awesome. Here is Why.

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If you, like me, loved Gillian Armstrong’s 1994 film, “Little Women,” which starred Winona Ryder as the treasured iconic tomboy, Jo March, you might have been doubtful about the need for yet another Little Women film adaptation. Louisa May Alcott’s cherished nineteenth-century story, Little Women, has been adapted for stage and screen several times, but, for many viewers, the beloved Armstrong version was the definitive visual interpretation of the story. Well, that was the case until Greta Gerwig’s newest film adaptation of “Little Women” hit the theaters this past December. Gerwig’s film stands out not only because it maps new ground for understanding the intricate layers of meaning wrapped in the classic tale, but also because it is a piece of art in its own right. 

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Breaking the Silence: The Historiography of the Haitian Revolution

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“Why am I just now learning about the Haitian Revolution, especially in a modern European history course? Is it really that significant?” She was a young student. Although I cannot fully remember, I think she was a freshman. I stared back at her desperately trying to pretend that I was not frantically searching my brain for a clear answer. The problem was not a lack of answers; on the contrary, the problem was an overflow of ideas. It was my first semester working as a teaching assistant for a course on the history of modern Europe. At this stage, I still thought that as the instructor, I was supposed to know everything and anything at any given moment. In these early days, my discussion sections felt like twice-weekly pop quizzes.

Returning to the young student, I cleared my throat, broke my silence, and insecurely delivered what I prayed was a satisfactory answer. Gazing at her inquisitive eyes and feeling the other student’s predatory stares, I explained how the Haitian Revolution is significant to our understanding of the French Revolution.[1] I continued: “The Haitian Revolution reveals the inconsistencies within the French Revolution.” Gaining a little bit more confidence, I turned the question back to my class exclaiming, “The Haitian Revolution makes us ask, ‘was the French Revolution about liberty and equality, or was it about private property?” I finished: “It makes us question the nature of revolutionary movements.”

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Revolutionary Style: A Review of Caroline Weber’s Queen of Fashion

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For decades, scholars have attempted to capture the circumstances that led up to the French Revolution. In The Coming of the French Revolution, for instance, Georges Lefebvre explains the causes of the French Revolution with a socioeconomic interpretation. In particular, Lefebvre argues that the rising dominance of the bourgeoisie produced the political turmoil of the revolution.[1] In other works, scholars, such as Francois Furet, Robert Darnton, and Keith Michael Baker, underscore the importance of political ideologies and culture for understanding the causes of the revolution.[2] Still others historians, such as Timothy Tackett, contend that the ineptitude of the royal family also helped to bring about the war. Tackett, for example, insists that the salacious and careless actions of the royal family before and during the war undermined the public’s perception of the family as a symbol of sacred authority.[3]

Similar to Tackett’s analysis, Caroline Weber also draws attention to the significance of the royal family in Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution.[4] The central aim of Weber’s study is to show how Marie Antoinette used the appeal of court fashion to exert political power. Through a comparison of Marie Antoinette to her famous ancestor, Louis XIV, Weber argues that the queen “identified fashion as a key weapon in her struggle for personal prestige, authority, and sometimes mere survival.”[5] In all, Weber concludes that Marie Antoinette fought her political adversaries with style.

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Book Review: Daniel Rodgers, Atlantic Crossings (1998)

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Book Review: Daniel Rodgers, Atlantic Crossings: Social Politics in a Progressive Age (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University, 1998).

In Atlantic Crossings, Daniel Rodgers discusses American social politics from the Gilded Age through the New Deal. In the process, he uncovers the international roots of social reforms such as city planning, workplace regulation, rural cooperatives, municipal transportation, and public housing. For Rodgers, ideas shaped progressive social politics while individuals carried those ideas back in forth across the Atlantic. Rodgers examines an array of sources, including doctoral dissertations, magazine and newspaper articles, books, and public documents, to describe the tapestry that was trans-Atlantic world of social politics in the Progressive Era.[1] Ultimately, Rodgers seeks to unearth a distinct trans-Atlantic period in America’s past.[2]

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