George McKenna

In the preface to Crisis of the House Divided , his 1959 work on the Lincoln“Douglas debates of 1858, Harry Jaffa, who had just turned forty, announced that the book was to be “the first part of a two“part study of Lincoln’s political philosophy.” He already had in mind . . . . Continue Reading »

Imagine a new land colonized by peoples from many countries. They push aside the natives, who offer varying degrees of violent resistance and are put down with merciless force. Imagine that after a perennial series of skirmishes between colonial powers, one of them finally wins”but then loses . . . . Continue Reading »

When Abraham Lincoln entered a nearly empty Richmond, Virginia, on April 4, 1865, black dock workers crowded around him, hailing him as a messiah. Shocked, Lincoln said, “Don’t kneel to me. That is not right. You must kneel to God only, and thank Him.” Despite Lincoln’s . . . . Continue Reading »

Jefferson: Political Writings Edited by Joyce Appleby and Terence Ball Cambridge University Press. 623 pp. $59.95 American Virtues: Thomas Jefferson on the Character of a Free People By Jean M. Yarbrough University Press of Kansas. 256 pp. $35 Thomas Jefferson and the Education of a Citizen Edited . . . . Continue Reading »

It is hard to find many encouraging prospects for the culture of life in the new century. The culture of death seems to be on a roll. In 1973, after Roe v. Wade was decided, pro-lifers predicted that the right to kill unborn children would turn into the right to kill already-born children and other . . . . Continue Reading »

National Review senior editor Richard Brookhiser has followed up his successful 1996 biography of George Washington ( Founding Father: Rediscovering George Washington ) with a biography of Alexander Hamilton. Like the Washington biography, this is a compact, readable volume filled with vivid . . . . Continue Reading »

A Thread of Years By John Lukacs Yale University Press. 481 pp. $30 Historian John Lukacs has written a year-by-year meditation on the twentieth century, or most of it anyway. The book starts in 1901 and ends in 1969, when, according to Lukacs, Anglo-American civilization finally petered out. Each . . . . Continue Reading »

American Catholic: The Saints and Sinners Who Built America’s Most Powerful Church by Charles R. Moris Times Books, 511 pages, $27.50 Social historian and commentator Charles Morris’ new study of the development and current situation of the Catholic Church in America is an important, . . . . Continue Reading »

Love and Saint Augustine By Hannah Arendt Edited by Joanna Vecchiarelli Scott and Judith Chelius Stark University of Chicago Press, 233 pages, $22.50 I first met Hannah Arendt in 1964, while I was writing my dissertation on her political thought. I called her up and asked if I could interview her, . . . . Continue Reading »