American Presidents History

Abraham Lincoln was born into poverty in a log cabin and was raised on the frontier primarily in Indiana. He was self-educated and became a lawyer, Whig Party leader, Illinois state legislator, and U.S. Congressman from Illinois. In 1849, he returned to his law practice but became vexed by the opening of additional lands to slavery. He reentered politics in 1854, becoming a leader in the Republican Party, and reached a national audience in the 1858 debates against Stephen Douglas.

New York Times best-selling author and legendary political insider Roger Stone lashes out with a blistering indictment that exposes the true history and monumental hypocrisy of the Bushes. In his usual "go for the jugular" style, Stone collaborates with Saint John Hunt - author, musician, and son of legendary CIA operative E. Howard Hunt - to make this a "no-holds-barred" history of the Bush family.

This audiobook exists at the tense intersection of the conflict between politics and prophecy - of whether we embrace political resolution or moral redemption to fix our fractured racial landscape.

In 31 Days, Barry Werth takes listeners inside the White House during the tumultuous days following Nixon's resignation and the swearing-in of America's "accidental president", Gerald Ford. The congressional hearings, Nixon's increasing paranoia, and, finally, the devastating revelations of the White House tapes had torn the country apart. Within the White House and the Republican Party, Nixon's resignation produced new fissures and battle lines and new opportunities for political advancement.

In Lincoln and the Power of the Press, Harold Holzer shows us an activist Lincoln through journalists who covered him from his start to the night of his assassination. In a wholly original way, Holzer shows us politicized newspaper editors battling for power and a masterly president who used the press to speak directly to the people and shape the nation.

When one is looking quickly over the lives of the Presidents of the United States, it is easy to overlook William Henry Harrison. After all, he only served as the Chief Executive for 30 days, and he spent the majority of those in bed, fighting for his life and eventually losing. However, to ignore Harrison because he served such a short time in the White House is just as foolish as ignoring Patrick Henry or Alexander Hamilton because they were never elected to the nation's highest office.

Abraham Lincoln, unlike most of his political brethren, kept organized Christianity at arm’s length. He never joined a church and only sometimes attended Sunday services with his wife. But as he came to appreciate the growing political and military importance of the Christian churches, and when death touched the Lincoln household in an awful, intimate way, the erstwhile skeptic effectively evolved into the nation’s first evangelical president. The war, he told Americans, was in some fashion divine retribution for the sin of slavery.

The founding fathers of the United States created a unique institution, the presidency, as they were determined to authorize an effective chief executive but wary of monarchy. They endowed this office with broad prerogatives and power but hedged it in with limitations. The presidency that developed over the next generation, however, was fashioned less by the clauses in the Constitution than by the way that the first presidents responded to challenges such as sectional enmity and the vexing Napoleonic warfare that jeopardized maritime rights.

In this first interpretative comprehensive history of Barack Obama's presidency in its entirety, Claude A. Clegg III situates the former president in his dynamic, inspirational, yet contentious political context. He captures the America that made Obama's White House years possible, while insightfully rendering the America that resolutely resisted the idea of a Black chief executive, thus making conceivable the ascent of the most unlikely of his successors.

Before the consecutive two-term administrations of Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, there had only been one other trio of its type: Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and James Monroe. Kevin R. C. Gutzman's The Jeffersonians is a complete chronicle of the men who served as president from 1801 to 1825 and implemented the foreign policy, domestic, and constitutional agenda of the radical wing of the American Revolution, setting guideposts for later American liberals to follow.

But in darkness, leaders emerge to shine a light of hope to guide people. During the American Civil War, Ulysses S. Grant emerged to guide the nation to victory, then to the beginnings of reconciliation.

Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower, consecutive presidents of the United States, were Midwesterners alike in many ways - except that they also sharply differed. William Lee Miller interweaves Truman's and Eisenhower's life stories, which then also becomes the story of their nation as it rose to great power. Listening to their story is a reminder of the modern American story, of ordinary men dealing with extraordinary power.

In The Other Madisons, Bettye Kearse - a descendant of a slave named Coreen and, according to oral tradition, President James Madison - finally shares her family story, exploring legacy, race, and the powerful consequences of telling the whole truth.

How is the election of 1876 stolen from Samuel Tilden, and why does the Compromise of 1877, which is part of the deal, all but ends the moral issue of concern for the ex-slaves?

From historian-in-residence at the Presidential Pet Museum, Andrew Hager, comes a fond, fascinating, and often surprising look at the dogs who were the best friends of the presidents, featuring unforgettable photographs.

The culmination of years of work on Abraham Lincoln's political thought, Michael Zuckert's A Nation So Conceived argues for a coherent center to Lincoln's political ideology. Zuckert provides invaluable guidance to understanding both Lincoln and the politics of the United States between 1845 and Lincoln's death in 1865 by focusing on roughly a dozen speeches that Lincoln made during his career. This listener-friendly chronological organization is motivated by Zuckert's emphasis on Lincoln as a practical politician who was always fully aware of the political context of the moment.

The Presidency of George W. Bush is the first balanced academic study to analyze the entirety of his presidency - domestic, social, economic, and national security policies - as well as the administration's response to 9/11 and the subsequent War on Terror. In so doing, John Robert Greene argues persuasively that the judgment of most scholars - that the Bush administration was a complete failure - has been made in haste and without the benefit of primary sources.

There have been innumerable biographies for Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States - the leader most widely known for leading the US through the American Civil War and ending slavery, but none quite stand apart from the rest like The Every-Day Life of Abraham Lincoln, published in 2013.

The legacy of President Franklin D. Roosevelt enjoys regular acclaim from historians, politicians, and educators. But is that true? Deploying an abundance of primary source evidence and well-reasoned arguments, historian and distinguished professor emeritus David T. Beito masterfully presents a complete account of the real Franklin D. Roosevelt: a man who abused power, violated human rights, targeted dissidents, and let his crude racism imprison American citizens merely for being of Japanese descent.

Horace Busby was one of LBJ's most trusted advisors; their close working and personal relationship spanned twenty years. In The Thirty-First of March he offers an indelible portrait of a president and a presidency at a time of crisis.