The Age of Acrimony

After the Civil War, citizenship increased, and yet voter turnout decreased. Why? Jon Grinspan joins the show to discuss his latest book The Age of Acrimony: How American Fought to Fix Their Democracy. As a curator at the National Museum of American History (Smithsonian), Jon is uniquely placed to discuss the historical parallels to American politics today.Essential Reading:Jon Grinspan, The Age of Acrimony: How American Fought to Fix Their Democracy (2021).Additional Reading:Richard Franklin Bensel, The American Ballot Box in the Mid-Nineteenth Century (2004).Rebecca Edwards, Angels in the Machinery: Gender in American Party Politics from the Civil War to the Progressive Era (1997).Joanne Freeman, The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War (2018).Mark Lawrence Kornbluh, Why American Stopped Voting: The Decline of Participatory Democracy and the Emergence of Modern American Politics (2000).Michael E. McGerr, The Decline of Popular Politics, The American North 1865-1928 (1986).Mark Wahlgren Summers, Party Games: Getting, Keeping, and Using Power in Gilded Age Politics (2004). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.