From the Pulitzer Prize-winning scholar comes a history of the constitutional changes that built equality into the nation's foundation and how those guarantees have been shaken over time.
The Second Founding reflects Foner’s rigorously researched, now mainstream view that Reconstruction was 'a massive experiment in interracial democracy'; the changes wrought by the Civil War amendments were the product of decades of debate and so radical that they represented, in the words of one Republican leader, 'a constitutional revolution' ... Foner’s authority and magnetism as a Bancroft- and Pulitzer Prize-winning scholar stem partly from his conviction that history is neither primarily about the past nor...'simply a series of myths and inventions.' The Second Founding reveals how an exemplary historian can plumb The Congressional Globe and other primary sources to capture the ideas and intentions of those who shaped the Civil War amendments. The result is scholarship that is disciplined, powerful and moving ... [an] important book ...
The Second Founding...demonstrates [Foner's] talent at unearthing insights about the Civil War and Reconstruction eras, in particular how Americans defined and acted on the ideals of freedom and democracy. It’s a slim volume that synthesizes the vast library of works devoted to Reconstruction. But he uses that rich scholarship to highlight the radicalism of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments and how, over the past 150 years, clever and powerful conservatives have diligently sought to undermine their egalitarian promise ... Foner’s new book is also a guide to nearly all of his scholarship, which examines not only the rights and better living conditions gained through extended contests for power but also the ambiguous consequences of what were, as a rule, only partial victories. The sensibility that drives his work was likely born out of his experiences on the left and the frustrations of a period of American radicalism that helped do away with legal apartheid and spearheaded movements for gender equality and the protection of the environment but also failed to mount a serious challenge to the conservative tilt of both major parties ... He expresses these judgments in what another eminent historian, Christopher Lasch, called 'plain style': direct and vivid prose without a trace of specialized language, which anyone with a passing interest in the subject can read, learn from, and enjoy.
... a slender yet potent study that illuminates how the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments...were hammered into the Constitution ... With The Second Founding, Foner offers a taut, absorbing companion piece to his magisterial Reconstruction, published three decades ago ... Foner strikes a note as clear as a bell: We cannot sustain a third founding.
