Hardcover. NY, Walker Books, 1st, 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 214 pages. Over the past couple of decades, our national debt has become a favorite political football for Democrats and Republicans alike. Yet few Americans seem aware that the debt has a long and (mostly) honorable history. Alexander Hamilton considered it a kind of political Krazy Glue, which would also spur American industry by keeping taxes high. This borrowing power enabled the North to win the Civil War without wrecking its economy and rescued us from the Great Depression. John Steele Gordon doesn't deny the dangers of an entire nation living on credit; indeed, he believes that our fiscal affairs are a mess. But he puts this mess in fascinating perspective. And he's quick to see the human side of economic behavior: "One problem," he writes, "is that human nature predisposes us to recognize depression easily and quickly, but prosperity, like happiness, is most easily seen in retrospect." Name on front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Knopf, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 599 pages. Don't pick up this fascinating, deeply eccentric book expecting to find a conventional biography of Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926). The fiery American labor leader who founded the Socialist Party of America is not so much the subject as the central figure in a group portrait of utopian dreamers--including Karl Marx, Brigham Young, abolitionist Wendell Phillips, poet James Whitcomb Riley, and detective-agency founder Allan Pinkerton--from the time of the French Revolution through the dawn of the 20th century. Author Marguerite Young is a legendary Greenwich Village bohemian who died in 1995. She devoted the last 25 years of her life to this volume, which was intended as a recapitulation of the issues that had engaged Debs - justice for workers, peace for everyone, racial equality - and continued to galvanize America in the 1960s and beyond. Young doesn't provide a lot of straight factual information about Debs's life, but takes instead a snapshot of his soul as it was formed by reading and experience. The narrative closes (sort of) with the national railroad strike of 1877, a bitter defeat for labor that turned railroad worker and union activist Debs toward greater radicalism. Though not a work for the traditionally minded, Young's genre-bending book will thrill students of American social and socialist history. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, David Mckay, 1st, 1964, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket, 329 pages. "This volume puts together as a continuous narrative the diary of Rutherford B. Hayes from March, 1875 to March 1881 - covering his nomination as the Republican candidate, the campaign of 1876, the disputed election and its compromise, and his Presidency. It is based on a typed copy of the original manuscript supplied by The Rutherford B. Hayes Library of Fremont, Ohio, and its director, Watt P. Marchman. Hayes was an inveterate diary keeper from his youth to his old age. In this record of the presidential years the diary is reproduced virtually in facsimile form. All misspellings, errors in punctuation, and other eccentricities have been retained, as have the deletions and gaps in the original copy." Name on front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Cambridge University Press, 1st, 2005, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 346 pages, b&w photographs. This book shows how Henry Robinson Luce used his famous magazines to advance his interventionist agenda in Cold War China, Korea, Japan, and above all, Vietnam. This is the first balanced work on Luce and his influence, using hitherto undiscovered or inaccessible sources. Luce saw the American Century as the heir to the fading British Empire; he failed to see the hubris and cultural blindness that would lead to disaster in Vietnam - a disaster for which his magazines paved the way. Remainder mark on top edge. Else a very clean, tight copy.

Hardcover. NY, Funk & Wagnalls , 1st, 1893, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, maroon cloth. b&w frontis. portrait, 541 page biography, works of the great nineteenth century American preacher, lecturer, orator, and journalist. From the American Reformers Series. Spine is sunned, gilt lettering on the cover. Ex-lib with endpapers marked, stamped. Interior clean.

Hardcover. NY, Alfred A. Knopf, 1st, 1955, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a worn, chipped dust jacket. 172 pages plus index. "The exciting story of the Democratic Presidential Convention of 1952; a record of what occurred, how it occurred, and why; Told by a leader of the draft movement, who is also a prominent American historian." Clean copy.

Hardcover. Lawrence KS, University Press of Kansas, 1st, 1984, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, lightly worn dust jacket, 211 pages. Small in notations to front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Alfred A. Knopf, 1st, 1986, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. 550 pages. A fascinating historical study using newly-declassified documents from the time the British were in Indochina through the end of the war. A detailed, specific history of the debacle. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Oxford University Press, 1st, 1991, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, price-clipped dust jacket, 268 pages. Focusing mainly on the nine months from November 1964 to July 1965 VanDeMark describes how the Johnson administration progressed along a seemingly inevitable path to double the number of ground troops in Vietnam, polarize the American people, and destroy Johnson's presidency in the short term. Mining a wealth of recently opened material at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and elsewhere, Brian VanDeMark vividly depicts the painful unfolding of a national tragedy. Name on front fly leaf otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Oxford University Press, 1st, 1967, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket, 228 pages. "The period from Andrew Jackson's presidency to the Civil War has traditionally been considered the age of democracy triumphant in the United States. This book sharply contradicts that assumption, contending that while democracy advanced substantially in the political sense, social and economic distinctions became, if anything, more marked. Powerful forces, especially in the economic field, were working toward the stratification of society." Name on the front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Macmillan, Book Club Ed., 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 287 pages. Index, notes, illustrations. A detailed biography of the Virginian who served in the Continental Congress, wrote the Federalist Papers, helped write the Constitution and Bill of Rights, was Majority Leader in Congress, and was the fourth president of the US. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Macmillan , 2nd pr., 1966, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket, 274 pages, clean copy.

Hardcover. Boston, Little, Brown, and Company, 1st, 1932, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, dark blue cloth with gilt design and lettering, 437 pages. Includes [9] leaves of plates, illustrations, portraits, bibliographical references, and index. A fine biography on America's sixth President, and the second Adams to hold that office. Clark gives equal attention to Adams' early diplomatic career, his time in State politics, in the U.S. Senate, as Secretary of State, and of his extensive career as an elder-statesman after his Presidency. Spine gilt faded, corners worn, name on front endpapers, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. Princeton NJ, Princeton University Press, 1st, 2023, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 624 pages, black and white illustrations. The diplomat and historian George F. Kennan (1904-2005) ranks as one of the most important figures in American foreign policy and one of its most complex. Drawing on many previously untapped sources, Frank Costigliola's authoritative biography offers a new picture of a man of extraordinary ability and ambition whose idea of containing the Soviet Union helped ignite the Cold War but who spent the next half century trying to extinguish it. Clean copy.

Hardcover. New York, The New Press, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 515 pages. Hardcover. Gray cover boards, gilt title on spine. In nice shape, Dust jacket unclipped, has just a touch of age yellow. Edges show a little soil (shelfwear). Binding very tight, clean inside. Very good condition.

Softcover. Philadelphia, William S. & Alfred Martien, 1st, 1863, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 20 page booklet, blue wrappers. Two black lines on front cover otherwise clean.

Hardcover. Lawrence KS, University Press of Kansas, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. Through the shadowy persona of Deep Throat, FBI official Mark Felt became as famous as the Watergate scandal his leaks helped uncover. Best known through Hal Holbrook's portrayal in the film version of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's All the President's Men, Felt was regarded for decades as a conscientious but highly secretive whistleblower who shunned the limelight. Yet even after he finally revealed his identity in 2005, questions about his true motivations persisted.Max Holland has found the missing piece of that Deep Throat puzzle--one that's been hidden in plain sight all along. He reveals for the first time in detail what truly motivated the FBI's number-two executive to become the most fabled secret source in American history. In the process, he directly challenges Felt's own explanations while also demolishing the legend fostered by Woodward and Bernstein's bestselling account. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Boston, Charles Little and James Brown, 2nd Ed., 1840, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Two volumes (199 and 278 pages) bound in brown polished calf with raised bands and gilt design on spine, covers with gilt rules. Minor wear to spine edges. Vol. 1 with engraved portrait frontispiece, Vol. 2 with facsimile of Abigail's handwriting. Library bookplate on first blank page (verso of front fly leaf). Some foxing to preliminary pages, otherwise a clean, bright set.

Hardcover. Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1st, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. How did liberalism, the great political tradition that from the New Deal to the 1960s seemed to dominate American politics, fall from favor so far and so fast? In this history of liberalism since the 1930s, a distinguished historian offers an eloquent account of postwar liberalism, where it came from, where it has gone, and why. The book supplies a crucial chapter in the history of twentieth-century American politics as well as a valuable and clear perspective on the state of our nation's politics today. Clean, unmarked copy.

Hardcover. Chicago, Quadrangle Books, 1st, 1968, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in an unclipped dust jacket, 167 pages. Name on front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. Auburn, Derby, Miller and Company, 1st, 1849, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, 404 pages, with tissue guarded frontispiece portrait of Adams and gilt title on spine. Previous owner's signature on front endpaper and fly leaf, spine edge and corner wear, light foxing on some pages. Overall, clean and tight copy.

Hardcover. Netherlands, Dordrecht/Republic of Letters, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, illustrated glossy boards, 281 pages. For the first four decades of the twentieth century Philip Kerr, the Eleventh Marquess of Lothian, hovered on the fringes of power in Britain. As a commentator on public affairs, private secretary to Liberal prime minister David Lloyd George, secretary to the Rhodes Trust, Liberal peer, and ambassador to the United States at the beginning of World War II, Lothian's greatest interest was in preserving and strengthening the British Empire and building close bonds with the United States. This international collection of essays by seven scholars explores Lothian's impact on Anglo-American relations and his role, behind the scenes and as a government official, in forging what would eventually become known as the "special relationship." Clean copy.

Hardcover. Princeton NJ, Princeton University Press, 1st, 1984, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket, 477 pages. INSCRIBED BY COLE on the title page. Donald Cole analyzes the political skills that brought Van Buren the nickname "Little Magician," describing how he built the Albany Regency (which became a model for political party machines) and how he created the Democratic party of Andrew Jackson. Light fading to dj spine, clean copy.

Hardcover. Albany NY, State University of New York Press, 1st, 1967, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn and tanned dust jacket, 208 pages with index. This book attempts to throw new light on that early labor movement, mainly by answering the questions that modern critics have raised concerning its authenticity, but the major concern of the volume is with the labor leaders' views regarding American society. If these were uncommon labor leaders, they were also uncommon Jacksonians. At a time when the mass of Americans seemed to be engaged in a frenzied contest for material gain, and increasingly optimistic about their chances, the labor leaders stood apart both from the pursuit of the main chance and from its moralistic critics. Name on front fly leaf otherwise clean.