Several years ago, I inaugurated this class in recent United States political history under the title “The Age of Reagan.” Like many historians, I presumed that the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 had been the culmination of a fundamental reorientation of American conservatism. I also presumed that it would have as lasting an impact … More From Goldwater to Trump, A Syllabus
With all the cheerful talk last week about a nuclear confrontation with North Korea, a number of people in my social media feeds have been obsessing about how much our collective civil defense skills have eroded since the 1960s. However, a quick trip to the National Archives digital collections has reassured me that we have nothing … More How to Survive a Nuclear Attack
We are all still breathless from last week’s near-repeal of Obamacare. As two Republican Senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, stood between the American public and a bill that would cut Medicare, defund Planned Parenthood, and throw the insurance industry into turmoil, keeping the consequences of the different bills straight became … More When Women Fight for Health Care: Public Seminar, July 31, 2017
Forty-five years ago today, a dozen women representing the Women’s Caucus at The New York Times began a civil rights revolution in journalism. Their July 19, 1972 confrontationwith publisher Arthur Ochs “Punch” Sulzberger and his board was, by 1974, a class action employment discrimination lawsuit, Boylan v. New York Times. In an earlier letter, the Caucus had … More When Women Sued the New York Times
Forty-five years ago today, all the President’s men were nervously awaiting the results of a planned break-in at an office at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. where the Democratic National Committee had established its 1972 campaign headquarters. Naughty, naughty. The White House’s shadow arm was a jolly crew nicknamed “the Plumbers:” among those who … More Watergate: A History Lesson
In the past few weeks, we in the community formerly known as women’s history have suffered some difficult losses. Marilyn Blatt Young, Professor of History at New York University specializing in China and US foreign policy died on February 19; and Mary Maples Dunn, a colonial historian and Dean at Bryn Mawr College, the eighth … More Why Don’t You Stay (Just a Little Bit Longer)?
On January 30, the American Historical Association (AHA) joined numerous scholarly organizations in condemning Donald Trump’s executive order of January 27, 2017. This act closed the United States border to travelers, migrants and refugees from seven countries, including many legal residents, for ninety days. Although spokespeople for the Trump administration deny this interpretation, the order is generally understood … More The Intellectual Integrity of Our Spaces: The Proposed Boycott of International Academic Conferences
As former Goldwater Girl Hillary Rodham Clinton is poised to become the first woman president of the United States, it is worth asking: what prevented Elizabeth Dole — Clinton’s former Senate colleague — from breaking that historic barrier? Sexism, not just within the Republican Party but also in a larger political world saturated by media … More The Woman Who Might Have Been President
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