Enlightening cautionary tale whose fury resonates today.
A harrowing dive into Louisiana’s gubernatorial election of 1872, which pitted defenders of Reconstruction against white supremacists.
CNN journalist Bash and veteran co-author Fisher offer an elucidating case study in America’s bitter history of refusing to recognize election results. In Reconstruction-era Louisiana, election integrity was deeply compromised by vying Democratic and Republican forces. At issue was the refusal of the former Confederates, white supremacists, and Andrew Johnson Democrats to accept the civil rights of formerly enslaved people staunchly supported by Abraham Lincoln’s Republican Party. The charismatic, corrupt “carpetbagger” Republican Henry Warmoth became governor of Louisiana in 1868, allying himself with President Ulysses S. Grant and African Americans and instituting a patronage system. That state’s 1868 election had been marked by violence and fraud, much of it due to the makeshift political system constructed "in the ruins of war." By the gubernatorial election of 1872, the authors comment, "at every step in the process there existed some type of intimidation, cheating or fraud intended to change the outcome.” A feud within the Louisiana Republican Party led to Warmoth backing Democrat (and Confederate war hero) John McEnery against Republican William P. Kellogg, a member of the faction that charged Warmoth with betraying the African Americans who had helped elect him. Weeks after the 1872 election, ballots were still being tabulated; observers and reporters were frequently denied access to observe the counting, and both sides claimed victory. Dueling inaugurations took place, along with open insurrection and a massacre of Blacks in Colfax County. Court cases vied to decide the issue, essentially leaving the matter up to the states in US v Cruikshank, a blow to Reconstruction that laid the foundation of Southern segregation. The authors manage to render the tortuous details of these political shenanigans engaging, and the consequences timely and fresh.
Enlightening cautionary tale whose fury resonates today.Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9781335081070
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Hanover Square Press
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2024
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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