Election History

BEST BOOKS of 2017 SELECTION by * THE WASHINGTON POST * NEW YORK POST * The harrowing, but triumphant story of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, leader of the Liberian women’s movement, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and the first democratically elected female president in African history. When Ellen...

In this sometimes shocking and always riveting book, Robert G. Kaiser who has covered Congress, the White House and national politics for The Washington Post since 1963, explains how and why over the last four decades, Washington became a dysfunctional capital.

All but forgotten today, Five Points was once renowned the world over. Its handful of streets in lower Manhattan featured America's most wretched poverty, shared by Irish, Jewish, German, Italian, Chinese, and African Americans. It was the scene of more riots, scams, saloons, brothels, and drunkenness than any other neighborhood in the new world. The story that Anbinder tells is the classic tale of America's immigrant past, as successive waves of new arrivals fought for survival in a land that was as exciting as it was dangerous, as riotous as it was culturally rich.

Everyone has heard of Erdogan: Turkey’s bullish, mercurial president is the original postmodern populist. Around the world, other strongmen are now following the path that he has blazed. For the first time, Erdogan Rising tells the inside story of how a democracy on the fringe of Europe has succumbed to dictatorship. Hannah Lucinda Smith, Turkey correspondent with The Times of London, has witnessed all that has befallen Turkey and the wider region since the onset of the Arab Spring.

Just before the Roaring Twenties, Al Smith, a proud son of the Tammany Hall political machine, and Franklin Roosevelt, a country squire, formed an unlikely alliance that transformed the Democratic Party. Smith and FDR dominated politics in the most-powerful state in the union for a quarter-century, and in 1932, they ran against each other for the Democratic presidential nomination, setting off one of the great feuds in American history. The relationship between Smith and Roosevelt, portrayed here, is one of the most dramatic untold stories of early 20th-century American politics.

Publishers Weekly describes this book as "the most meticulously researched Lincoln biography ever written. Burlingame's Lincoln comes alive as the author unfolds vast amounts of new research while breathing new life into familiar stories. It is the essential title for the bicentennial." Publishers Weekly also notes, "The book need not be heard in one sitting. Each part stands alone." Now Gildan Media brings to you, chapter by chapter, what Doris Kearns Goodwin calls a "…profound and masterful portrait."

It seems that every time a presidential election rolls around in America, voters are told that the nation is at a critical fork in its history, and that the decisions reached and the candidates elected will change the course of history. While this is always true to some extent, there are times when it is true to a critical extent. Such was the case in 1876, when the country, weary of four years of Civil War and more than a decade of Reconstruction, was once again on the brink of splitting.

The Electoral College that governs America has been with us since 1804, when Thomas Jefferson's supporters redesigned it for his re-election. The Jeffersonians were motivated by the principle of majority rule. Gone were the days when a president would be elected by acclamation, as George Washington had been. Instead, given the emergence of intense two-party competition, the Jeffersonians wanted to make sure that the Electoral College awarded the presidency to the candidate of the majority, rather than minority, party.

In 1800, Thomas Jefferson beat sitting President John Adams, albeit narrowly, and denied Adams the second term he coveted. Adams escaped to Massachusetts and left a curt note about the state of the White House stables behind. No congratulations were exchanged, and the two men did not speak to one another for over a decade afterwards. Jefferson's election to the presidency also left an important electoral legacy.

The voters must have been happy after the election was over. For months, they had endured vicious attacks made by members of two warring parties against each other as time and time again issues were ignored in favor of personal attacks.

Best-selling author Chris Mooney uses cutting-edge research to explain the psychology behind why today’s Republicans reject reality - it’s just part of who they are. From climate change to evolution, the rejection of mainstream science among Republicans is growing, as is the denial of expert consensus on the economy, American history, foreign policy, and much more. Why won’t Republicans accept things that most experts agree on? Why are they constantly fighting against the facts?

Originally published in 2000, The Right to Vote was widely hailed as a magisterial account of the evolution of suffrage from the American Revolution to the end of the 20th century. In this revised and updated edition, Keyssar carries the story forward, from the disputed presidential contest of 2000 through the 2008 campaign and the election of Barack Obama. The Right to Vote is a sweeping reinterpretation of American political history as well as a meditation on the meaning of democracy in contemporary American life.

With 2016 promising to be an interesting and hotly contested election year, Votes of Confidence offers young listeners an essential guide to the past, present, and future of American elections.

Elections are, and always have been, the lifeblood of American democracy. Often raucous and sharply contentious, sometimes featuring grand debates about the nation's future, and invariably full of dramatic moments, elections offer insight into the character and historical evolution of American politics. America at the Ballot Box uses the history of presidential elections to illuminate American political democracy and its development from the early Republic to the late 20th century.

Although many have written about the BPP in memoirs and polemics, Survival Pending Revolution contributes to a new generation of objective, analytical BPP studies that are sorely needed. Alkebulan displays the entire movement's history, drawing a description that both understands the inner workings of the BPP and its role in the greater society.

In their new book, Unfit for Command, John O'Neill and co-author Jerome Corsi bring together the words of more than 200 Navy veterans who served with John Kerry and who feel it their duty to tell why Kerry is unworthy of the presidency.

Down for the Count explores the tawdry history of elections in the United States - a chronicle of votes bought, stolen, suppressed, lost, miscounted, thrown into rivers, and litigated up to the US Supreme Court - and uses it to explain why we are now experiencing the biggest backslide in voting rights in more than a century. This thoroughly revised edition, first published to acclaim and some controversy in 2005 as Steal This Vote, reveals why America is unique among established Western democracies in its inability to run clean, transparent elections.

On May 4, 1886, a bomb exploded at a Chicago labor rally, wounding dozens of policemen, seven of whom eventually died. A wave of mass hysteria swept the country, leading to a sensational trial that culminated in four controversial executions and dealt a blow to the labor movement from which it would take decades to recover. Historian James Green recounts the rise of the first great labor movement in the wake of the Civil War and brings to life an epic 20-year struggle for the eight-hour workday.

The young adult edition of the unconventionally honest, deeply personal, and sharply funny account from Michigan governor and rising Democratic star Gretchen Whitmer “will appeal to readers interested in politics and those seeking insights on leadership and attaining success” (Kirkus...

One of the most important news stories of the last two centuries comes to life in this "eyewitness account" of America's first Federal elections, the First Congress, and President Washington creating the Bill of Rights. In this swift-moving and colorful chronicle, written by St. John as though he were an on-the-scene reporter, listeners will discover how Congressman James Madison became, in the formative months of the new Republic, the power behind Washington in the executive branch...