The Quest for Evolutionary Socialism. Eduard Bernstein and Social Democracy. By Manfred B. Steger

Eduard Bernstein was a friend and protégé of both Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx, who came to oppose orthodox communism. Bernstein saw that the predictions of his close friends (that capitalism would crumble by virtue of inherent economic tendencies and that workers would flock to communism) had not come to pass. Quite to the contrary, capitalism in the 1890s First World was healthier than ever, and both European and US workers were more interested in obtaining their piece of the capitalist pie than in risking their lives during a violent overthrow of the system. Because of this evidence, Bernstein concluded that a gradual approach to social change through participation in democratic systems would be more effective than revolution. As such, he became one of the revisionists of Democratic Socialism. However one may feel about socialism, communism or capitalism, one can admire Bernstein’s ability to change his mind based on empirical evidence, rather than remaining committed to a disproven orthodoxy. That change created a great deal of discomfort for Bernstein. Internally, he had to deal with the dislocation anyone who challenges their own long-held beliefs must face. Externally, his apostasy turned some friends into enemies and alienated him from his political cadre.

The book is arranged chronologically regarding the elements of both biography and developments in political theory during Bernstein’s life. It is composed of three parts. Part One: “Preparation,” takes us through the subject’s early life, focusing mainly upon the period of his political awakening, and extending to the time of his questioning of Marxist theory. Part Two: “Vision,” is necessarily the most theoretical of the sections as we pause to consider the political landscape and meaning of socialism in fin de siècle Europe, along with Bernstein’s defection and the alternatives he proposes. Part Three: “Disappointment,” removes the reader from her holding pattern in theoretical purgatory and drops her back into the whirling political fray of 1890s Germany. There, Bernstein is elected to Parliament and must battle both the orthodox Marxists and the opportunistic, instrumentalist politicians of his own party, the Marxist-Socialist SPD.

Manfred Steger is well-suited to the challenge of presenting both the biographical and theoretical components of his project. He brings-out the areas of conflict; those within the socialist movement and between the socialists and the autocratic Prussian Emperor, whose executive branch truly controls the political process. If parliamentary process, political maneuvering, wars of words and dissent, are exciting to the reader, she will not be disappointed. At the same time, the nuances of socialist theory are fully, (sometimes painfully), elucidated in an organized manner which even uninitiated non-fiction readers can follow. A brief epilogue permits Steger to flex his own ample theoretical muscles, as he addresses the role that Evolutionary Socialism can still play in a post-Soviet, information age of global economic challenges.

By the end, a reader will have attained three objectives:  First, a clear portrait of a remarkable, intellectually flexible, evidence-based figure. Second, an understanding of the political environment in fin de siècle Germany and its relation to socialism. Third, a grasp of the prevailing currents that existed among European socialists of the late 19^th and early 20^th Century. All told, the attainment of these objectives is no mean accomplishment.

Steger, Manfred B. The Quest for Evolutionary Socialism. Eduard Bernstein and Social Democracy. Cambridge: The University Press, 1997.

By The Books. A Bi-Partisan Chronology Rejecting Trump’s Claim That Obama Founded ISIS.

In the media, Donald Trump has consistently referred to President Barack Obama as “the founder of ISIS.”** It is just another in a long line of false claims that does not square with recorded history; but serves to inflame his supporters. There are numerous, reputable books and periodicals on the subject that present a clear-eyed view on which US president is responsible for the rise of ISIS, employing chronological evidence, rather than demagogic self-serving motives.

Richard Engel, author of And Then All Hell Broke Loose and Chief Foreign Correspondent for NBC News, wrote that “President Bush had been aggressive and reckless in the Middle East, attacking Iraq for no reason and then claiming to be fighting terrorism while actually creating more terrorists.” (Engel, p. 156). These terrorists became ISIS. But I expect Richard Engel to hold liberal views denigrating the Bush White House. Engel lived in the Middle East prior to becoming a reporter. He has a strong affinity for the people and empathy for their suffering. What I did not expect was to hear Richard Engel’s arguments coming from Doug Bandow.

Doug Bandow is a former special assistant to Ronald Reagan. His writings include Beyond Good Intentions. A Biblical View of Politics. In spite of his conservative credentials, Bandow writes in terms that strongly condemn the son of Ronald Reagan’s Vice President. He does so in The National Interest, a bi-monthly publication of the Center for the National Interest created by Richard Nixon. In his article “The Collapse of Iraq and the Rise of ISIS: Made in America?” Bandow lays out his case:

“First, President Bush used a terrorist attack conducted by Saudi citizens trained in Afghanistan as an excuse to invade Iraq…Second, after ousting the Sunni dictator whose authoritarian rule held the nation together, the administration…disbanded the military, creating a large pool of angry and unemployed young men…[and Third] continued to support the Maliki government even as it ruthlessly targeted Sunnis.” (Bandow, p. 1).

The pool of angry, unemployed men became the soldiers of Al-Quaeda in Iraq (which did not exist before the Bush invasion). The unemployed Ba’athist generals of Saddam Hussein became their generals. The Sunni community, under attack by the Shiite Maliki government, looked to Al-Quaeda to save them. “Al-Quaeda in Iraq survived, mutating into the Islamic State.” (Bandow, p. 1). Bandow closes his article with “Although President Barack Obama shares the blame, George W. Bush made the most important decisions leading to the destruction of Iraq and rise of ISIL. No candidate unable or unwilling to learn from their disastrous mistakes is qualified to sit in the Oval Office.” (Bandow, p. 3). See the link below for the full article.##

Both Engel and Bandow lay the fault for the destruction of Iraq and the rise of ISIS directly at the feet of George W. Bush. They also agree that Obama shares the blame, but that his role was secondary. When individuals from opposite ends of the political spectrum agree on an interpretation, it has a greater likelihood of being true.

The media today, which includes our worldwide internet, has the capability of sharing vast quantities of information for the benefit of humankind. It is one of the instruments that can supply us with hope against the socio-political challenges we face. Unfortunately, those same media tools also have the capability of transmitting falsehood around the globe. When opportunists like Trump lie about history and current events to serve their own quests for power, it is up to world citizens to employ their incisive and reflective abilities. We must sift through that vast quantity of information and come to responsible conclusions which set the record straight.

## http://nationalinterest.org/feature/the-collapse-iraq-the-rise-isis-made-america-13913

** http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/11/politics/donald-trump-hugh-hewitt-obama-founder-isis/

Engel, Richard. And Then All Hell Broke Loose. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2016.

The Village. By John Strausbaugh.

John Strausbaugh’s portrait of Greenwich Village is sometimes romantic, often squalid, and most frequently magnetic in its ability to sustain a reader’s attention. It is a story told by a writer who has a deep bag of tricks to dazzle his audience, and who transparently employs them all in the service of creating a popular history. In the process, he advances the thesis that the Village was a “culture engine—a zone that attracts and nurtures creative people…creating work and developing ideas that change the culture of the world…Classical Athens was a culture engine, and Elizabethan London, and Paris and Berlin in the 1920s.” (Strausbaugh, p. ix).

But Strausbaugh will wander distantly from that point, presenting short biographies of colorful, forgotten eccentrics (like the emotionally disturbed poet Else Plotz or the poet/barfly/alcoholic Maxwell Bodenheim). Even exciting, unconnected events (like John Stanley Wojtowicz’s robbery of a downtown bank; subject of the film “Dog Day Afternoon”), pop-up. If it allows him to mesmerize his readers further, he’ll try it. To be fair, unsuccessful poets and mentally ill people are always part of a creative scene. They are attracted by the cheap living arrangements and expressive freedoms that also draw innovative artists or thinkers. Sometimes the only difference between the two is luck or critical recognition. Both groups are part of an unconventional landscape and presenting that scene fully can be defended, even if it leads to writing excesses and complete non-sequiturs. Sometimes the lost and mentally ill faction whom Strausbaugh exposes can inspire their more successful counterparts with expressions of individuality or abandon. Creativity can be overlooked by conventional society if one is not an effective self-promoter. While this is so, Strausbaugh will occasionally go beyond the bounds of what is suitable or relevant. His choice to begin the chapter “Off-Off-Broadway” with the graphic suicide of a little-known dancer is a questionable. Though he does make one pay attention.

The arrangement of The Village follows a traditional chronology. Beginning with the Dutch settlement of Manhattan, it moves quickly to the first Bohemians of the 19^th Century. This is where the book begins to flourish. Edgar Allen Poe and Walt Whitman make early appearances as Village residents. The first LGBT and freed African American communities are established. Political radicals like Emma Goldman, John Reed and Max Eastman begin populating its streets. Artists find their studios in former industrial buildings. Now famous dives, as well as more organized salons like those of Mabel Dodge Luhan and Marie Jenny Howe, allow creative cross-pollination. Institutions like the New School are devised by educators dissatisfied with stultifying orthodox ways of learning. At this point, the number of artists and innovators begins to astound. One Village acting class of then unknowns includes Harry Belafonte, Marlon Brando, Rod Steiger, Walter Matthau, Elaine Stritch, Wally Cox, Bea Arthur and Tony Curtis. (Strausbaugh, p. 279). The late 1940s – early 1950s music scene includes innumerable Jazz and Folk figures who collaborate with Post-Modern Dancers and Beat poets. The Village’s creativity explodes into the Sixties as the careers of Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendricks, Andy Warhol and a hoard too vast to recount here, share their inventiveness. Then Stonewall happens, and the LGBT movement changes the culture in ways that continue to reverberate fifty years later. The seemingly perpetual culture engine continues to generate talent and ideas even through the recession of the 1970s, when abandoned buildings allowed Off-Off Broadway plays to triple in number. It only begins to run down into the 1980s as rents become more and more untenable.

The Village ends by describing the current, vapid, yuppie shadow of what it once was. But Strasbaugh has some of his protagonists make the point that, while the zeitgeist may be over in the Village, it exists elsewhere. Rock photographer, Bob Gruen, states “Who cares…if people are not making art in downtown Manhattan anymore…the Village isn’t what it used to be…Nothing will ever be the way it used to be. Things always change… [innovation] didn’t disappear. There are still young people and young bands.” (Strausbaugh, p. 549). This is the positive note on which the story ends: There will always be culture engines in the world. Unknown artists and intellectuals will find other refuges of low rents and open permissive attitudes that are invisible to the conventional aspects of a civilization. There, they will create, innovate and change the culture without most people noticing where that transformation is happening.

Strausbaugh, John. The Village. 400 Years of Beats and Bohemians, Radicals and Rogues. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2013.

The German Genius. By Peter Watson.

Peter Watson’s The German Genius is a comprehensive study of German intellectual history. The author does a superb job of marshalling secondary historical resources to present an informative chronology. However, a reader is required to overcome some retrograde editorializing by the author.

The first area of difficulty appears in his introduction. Watson states “Hitler and the Holocaust are preoccupying the world to such an extent, I suggest, that we are denying ourselves important aspects elsewhere in German history. We must not forget the Holocaust…but at the same time we must learn to look past it.” (Watson, p. 28). To explore German history beyond the period of 1933 to 1945 is a perfectly reasonable suggestion. If one is to understand a culture, focusing only upon the period of its greatest atrocities does not offer a complete picture. If Watson had stopped there, few would have opposed his plea for balance. Unfortunately, he begins to employ a not so subtle technique used by conservative US political organizations. Often, when conservatives wish to argue against voting laws that benefit minorities, they use a minority spokesperson; when they wish to oppose abortion legislation, they use a female spokesperson. Similarly, Watson employs Jews where he wishes to make some  of his more unjust points: When he wants to say that he wishes the  Holocaust would just go away, he uses Charles Maier saying “[keeping the Holocaust alive] has disadvantages” (Watson’s brackets) and “It is possible to make a fetish of Auschwitz.” (Watson, p. 28). When he wishes to smear Holocaust victims to reduce sympathy and interest, he uses Peter Novick saying “those who have survived are not the  fittest…but are largely the lowest Jewish elements, who by cunning and animal instincts have been able to escape the terrible fate of the more refined and better elements who succumbed.” (Watson, p. 8).  Watson does not recognize that Germany and the rest of the world have chosen to carefully examine the Holocaust because there is value in that study; value that is specifically related to an important concept that runs throughout his book: “bildung.” Bildung “refers to the inner development of the individual, a process of fulfillment through education and knowledge, in effect a secular search for perfection, representing progress and refinement both in knowledge and in moral terms, an amalgam of wisdom and self-realization.” (Watson, pp. 53-4). Examination of the Holocaust has greatly contributed to international and German bildung. Internationally, knowledge of this period has expanded Holocaust studies into genocide studies and contributed to efforts to prevent genocides. In Germany, required study of the Holocaust in the schools has given that nation one of the most humane outlooks in the world. Compare Austria, who killed Jews but did not take responsibility through education, with Germany, who did, and one sees a tremendous difference: When Austria elected ex-Nazi Kurt Waldheim as its leader; Germany elected Nobel laureate Willy Brandt. Austria’s minority party is the racist “Freedom Party;” Germany’s is the “Green Party.” Perhaps it is more useful and healthy for the world to have Holocaust education than to have knowledge of the great German poets and composers. But there is no reason why we cannot have both. Who among us couldn’t benefit from learning a little more? In Watson’s defense, he does spend more than 100 pages upon the Nazi period and its destruction of German intellectual life. In addition, he includes numerous Jews in his tome, representing them, as they would have wished, as German citizens.

Another area of difficulty is misleading chauvinism. Among the more easily debunked claims of Watson’s are: 1) “The Italian Renaissance was a German idea.” (Watson, p. 91). Jules Michelet would disagree as he is the individual who coined the term. 2) “Only in 1885 did Karl Benz, in Mannheim, construct a machine that would lead to the automobile age.” (Watson, p. 375). This statement ignores the 25 years of automobile construction prior to Benz. 3) Germany created “the first coherent school of sociology.” (Watson, p. 441). One would have to overlook August Comte, who is widely regarded as the founder of this field. These are just a few examples of chauvinism. A writer’s identification with his subject is one thing; but exaggeration to the point where history is misrepresented is quite another.

Practically every culture has had a period of cultural and educational efflorescence; of genius. Italy’s 200-year Renaissance, France’s 75-year Enlightenment, Greece’s 200-year Golden Age, India’s 300-year sultanate, China’s 300-year Tang dynasty, these are just a few of the notable long-term periods of cultural contribution to the world by  a people at their best. During each of those ages, a short-sighted chronicler could have made an argument for that culture’s superiority; and many did. Germany’s chief period of cultural achievement, as elucidated by Watson, was a 185-year stretch from about 1750 to 1935. He does make a markedly weaker argument that this period continued after Hitler’s demise. Nonetheless, this is a tiny period of time in human history. Additionally, it is a mistake to pronounce a definitive value judgment on Germany, or any culture, based upon either a golden age or upon a period of atrocities. Peter Watson’s attempt to define German culture by the book’s time frame is flawed to its core exactly because of this myopia. This period, even if one were to include the post-war era, is a bubble on an ocean-long continuum.

So what can one say for Peter Watson after describing him as a short-sighted chauvinist who wants to avoid the nasty bits of history so that he can gush about Schiller? In spite of his failed perspective, his book is still worth reading. Watson will introduce one to a glittering time of brilliant minds from Herder to Nietzsche; of brilliant composers from Bach to Schubert; of brilliant scientists from Humboldt to Einstein. The contributions are magnificent and the story of this period is uplifting. Golden ages give us hope for the future of humanity and show us what a culture can accomplish with enough persistence. Watson does a thorough job of researching and elaborating this history. There is a great deal to learn and avenues for further exploration.

Watson, Peter.  The German Genius. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 2010.

Undaunted Courage. Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson and the Opening of the American West. By Stephen E. Ambrose.

There are many who are captivated by the adventure of Lewis and Clark. But what these two military men accomplished, both positive and negative, was far more important than just an exciting story. Their exploration helped to expand a nation from Atlantic to Pacific under one flag. It also facilitated the genocide of western Native American nations. During their travels, Meriwether Lewis described 122 species of fauna and 178 species of flora that were formerly unknown to US and European science. Conversely, this journey also sped the widespread extinction of flora and fauna across this continent. However one chooses to assess the value of their effort, the mission, (established by Thomas Jefferson to map a water route to the Pacific and describe the land, flora, fauna and tribes along the way), had an immense impact on the history of North America.

Undaunted Courage is both a biography of Meriwether Lewis and a chronicle of his famous journey. By taking Lewis separately from his co-commander, we are able to delve more deeply into the mind, demons, character, motivations and personal history of this complex Enlightenment man. Ambrose writes a popular history, rather than a strictly factual academic history. As a result, there are several speculative pictures he paints, such as the rendezvous of Lewis and Clark off of the Ohio River at Clarksville where the expedition began. Characteristically, the author indicates that his description is how it might have gone, given that “we don’t have a single word of description of the meeting of Lewis and Clark.” (Ambrose, p. 117). While Ambrose knows the audience wants an adventure tale, he is usually careful to point out when his description of a buffalo hunt or a confrontation with Native Americans is colored, for public consumption. Even where he does not, discerning non-fiction readers will be able to extract the facts from the legend, by assessing where the author is attempting to get one’s blood pressure to rise.

It is a difficult task, for any author, to write a biography of a Virginia planter turned western explorer. One must provide a fair enough account of the era’s injustices, while presenting the individual as a product of his time. The skill, to give slavery, sexism, and Native American genocide the place they deserve, while not judging an Eighteenth Century man by Twenty-first Century values, will remain a perplexing challenge for historians. Lewis owned slaves. We don’t know if he personally whipped them, but he had an overseer and they were, no doubt beaten. We do not know if he raped slave women, but he would have been unusual among his peers if he had not. While Ambrose will speculate, offering imaginative description regarding travel events throughout his story, he does not offer speculation on these subjects. He comments that “the glittering social, intellectual, economic and political life of Virginia rested on the backs of slaves. Those backs were crisscrossed with scars.” (Ambrose, p. 34). Slavery is covered sporadically throughout the book. Ambrose sensitively portrays the plight of York, Captain Clark’s slave on the journey, who “crossed the continent and returned with his childhood companion, only to be beaten because he was insolent and sulky” when he was “denied not only his freedom but his wife.” (Ambrose, p. 458). This historian covers the constricted lives of white women in less detail. Also, his descriptions of Sacajawea’s role in the party are not as prominent as those in feminist accounts. There is slightly more attention given to the destruction of Native American cultures, and the white attitude of “get out of the way or get killed” (Ambrose, p. 348).  This author intersperses his narrative with brief discussions concerning all of these issues, but they are not principal themes no matter how much they shaped the lives of both oppressor and oppressed. We cannot separate the planters from the slaves, the Native Americans from the pioneers or the men from the women, and hope to have an accurate account of Lewis’s environment. Though the theme of Undaunted Courage was not about these issues, they are an integral part of the history surrounding both the journey and the life of Lewis. While Ambrose did not ignore these concerns, neither did he permit a generous focus upon them.

Though Ambrose only touches upon injustice, he is not uncritical of Lewis. Certainly, he portrays this figure as a superb explorer for his leadership, woodcraft and scientific skills. But the author is quick to point-out failures in judgment or problems of temperament. Ambrose critically examines Lewis’s decisions, (like his determination to divide the party on the return trip), his depressions and his suicide, with as thorough a view as possible given the available information.

The entire project of Undaunted Courage is accomplished without the use of primary sources. Even the letters of Lewis and Clark to their contemporaries are quoted from other historian’s compilations. No new data is contributed by the author. On a positive note, there are also no hare-brained theories or misleading views. There is nothing wrong with marshalling existing resources into an exciting tale; especially when that tale permits a wider audience to access a wealth of history they would not otherwise read. Ambrose created a bestseller that informed hundreds of thousands of readers on a subject they would never have approached. For a non-fiction reader who is looking for an entertaining account of Lewis and the expedition that covers its most important facts, this book is a fine choice.

Ambrose, Stephen E. Undaunted Courage. Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson and the Opening of the American West. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2003.

Atheism and the Holocaust. With Consideration of Wiesel and Faust.

The Holocaust has always provided an excellent argument for atheism. Its utter inhumanity leads one to the classic three options to the question “How could an all-powerful, all-knowing deity have allowed this to happen”: 1) God is not all-knowing and all powerful, so is therefore not the god of the Bible. 2) God is all-knowing and all-powerful, so therefore must be malevolent. 3) There is no God. While this progression of ideas makes sense to evidence-based thinkers, religion is based on beliefs. Beliefs are, by definition, ideas that do not have evidence to support them.

Victims of the Holocaust are anything but mute on the existence of God. At Mauthausen Concentration Camp in Austria, one victim wrote on the wall next to his bunk “If there is a God, he will have to fall on his knees and beg my forgiveness.” Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel is eloquent on this point in his memoir Night. There, Wiesel recalls attending a religious service, while he was an inmate at Auschwitz, where those present are blessing God. He writes “Why should I bless Him? In every fiber I rebelled. Because He had had thousands of children burned in His pits? Because He kept six crematories working night and day, on Sundays and feast days? Because in His great might He had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many factories of death? … My eyes were open and I was alone –terribly alone in a world without God. (Wiesel, pp. 64-5).

After his liberation from Auschwitz, Wiesel’s religiosity does rebound. His relationship to the God of his childhood is permanently changed. But he identifies himself as a believer. This is not an uncommon reaction to trauma or inhumanity. The book This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War chronicles the continuing faith in God. Northern citizens saw their victory as evidence of God’s championing of their righteous cause. Southerners saw their loss and devastation as a test of their faith provided by God. Only a minority contemplated the fields of slaughter and thought “there is no God.” Of course tragedies like the Civil War and the Holocaust do produce their share of atheists. But the majority of people fall back on their faith as a support through times of crisis and loss. For many, the idea that there is some all-powerful creature watching over them, even though they do not understand their suffering, is more attractive than the idea that there is no one in charge and events are open to chaos or chance. Rare is the cancer patient who throws-off her religion the day of her diagnosis; or the civilian during wartime who decides there is no God when the bombs are falling. These examples exist, but they are the minority. People like order and protection in their world. But that’s the way people are: afraid of the void.

Even as atheists, we have to admit that the Judeo-Christian happy ending is more attractive than our version of the finale. The picture of one’s self moving on to an afterlife when she dies; purportedly one where a friendly cosmic father welcomes her and she gets to party with dead loved ones for eternity, is more appealing than the scientific facts accepted by most atheists. Accepting rational, scientific conclusions, means facing a stark reality where you end when your brain ceases to function.

So, if the world is capable of having repeated genocides like the Holocaust, and the human population persists in the belief in an invisible super-dad, then we have a long road ahead towards a total acceptance of science and reason. We may as well make the journey with equanimity. There’s no point in frustration over the failure of most people to see what is evident to any rational, scientific mind. We do not need others to validate our perspective. Let’s leave that insecurity to the religious, whose worldview is based upon a more ethereal foundation than ours. Sure, we are going to need to respond to political abuses by believers with competence and intelligence. The fundamentalist shooters (be they Christians at women’s health clinics or Muslims at airports), the “God Hates Fags” protesters at funerals of LGBTQ soldiers, the attempts at censorship and the attempts to impose religion on government, these all require response. But let’s not lose sight of the rationality that brought us to atheism. Let’s leave the emotionalism, which burns those who bear it, to people of faith. There is no point in struggling to make others accept our ideas. No one’s going to hell if they do not swallow our catechism; that’s someone else’s story. If we have not learned to take that cleansing breath in the face of religion, perpetual anger and bitterness will be our reward.

So, when facing issues like the Holocaust, where one faith tries to wipe another off the planet, where those of faith persist in belief, we atheists can conduct ourselves sensibly. We have our communities (like this one online). We can be thoughtful and responsive, rather than reactive. We can make our points, share our ideas and live our lives the way we see fit.

Faust, Drew Gilpin. This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War. New York: Vintage Books, 2009.

Wiesel, Elie. Night. New York: Bantam Books, 1982.

Crisis in Freedom. The Alien and Sedition Acts. By John C. Miller

The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 were the first successful laws passed in the United States to repress freedom of speech and eject foreign-born citizens from the country. Sponsored by the Federalist Party, and signed into law by President John Adams, these measures were designed to silence the Republican Party and critics of the federal government during a period of hostility with France.

It was conflict in Europe between the young French Republic and monarchist Great Britain which set the stage for passage of these US laws. The pro-British Federalist Party had signed Jay’s Treaty with Great Britain, inciting the ire of the French Republic and that of the pro-French Republican Party. Crisis in Freedom follows the events, beginning with the signing of Jay’s Treaty. John C. Miller proceeds to elucidate the use of the Alien and Sedition acts as an instrument of repression. Newspaper editors and writers were jailed; Americans born in Europe were deported; and several papers ceased to publish. He also examines resistance to these measures that led to the downfall of Adams and the Federalists in the following elections. Subsequently, one witnesses the decline and extinction of this once dominant party in the young USA.

It is a story with a happy ending, which the author presents in story form. Professor Miller’s dedication of his book reveals a decided preference for storytelling: “To Samuel Eliot Morison, in whose hands history becomes enduring literature.” This is not to say that Miller plays loosely with the facts. His narrative is comprehensively researched. The political nuances of the time, and intentions of the players, are fully discussed. Both the structure of the events, and the presentation of the historical figures, reveal the author’s desire to produce a work of history that also has artistic merit. The chapters are numbered in the manner of some novels, rather than titled with subjects. Miller presents the opportunistic villainy of the Federalists, and the heroism of their opposition, in a dramatic genre. In spite of this depiction, one will come away from Crisis in Freedom with an understanding that all is not black-and-white. There were honorable intentions among some Federalists, as well as disreputable behavior by some of their victims. But it’s hard not to cheer for those forces fighting for our First Amendment rights.

Not just the structure of the tale, but also the style of the writing is worth examining. Sometimes Miller is a bit self-conscious that he is creating historical “literature,” and not just plainly representing the past. As a result, he can get carried away with the drama of his narrative. For example, regarding the potential war between France and the US, he says of the Federalists “they resolved to fight gamely to the end…they proposed to show that at least the gentlemen of the United States knew how to die.” (Miller, p. 23). Blinded by the fluidity and passion of his own creation, Miller fails to recognize that the Federalist leaders knew they had no fear of personal bodily injury in combat. Then, as now, politicians sent working-class people into the rain of bullets to defend the brave words of national leaders. Information can become a casualty in historical writing where artistry is prized above empiricism. Fortunately, extravagant flights of words are made infrequent by the author’s conflicting dedication to relate history accurately.

Despite the occasional friction between art and fact, this is a well-told history of events. Miller achieves enough balance between his intentions regarding historical literature and presenting what actually happened. Despite some human error, he generally shows that these factors need not be in conflict. His study of the Alien and Sedition Acts is predominantly told accurately and well.

Miller, John C. Crisis in Freedom. The Alien and Sedition Acts. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1951.