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1912 political cartoon of the Aldrich Plan depicted as an octopus with tentacles on a bank, a factory, and a farm while spitting coins into the NYSC.

A Popular History of the Fed

On Populist programs and democratic central banking.
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Bernie Sanders’s Campaign is Over, but His Populist Ideas Will Survive

Suspending his presidential campaign might be the best way to advance Sanders’s movement, but it could leave some supporters bitter.
Political cartoon of the Populist Party python eating the Democratic Party donkey.

Historians Have Long Thought Populism Was a Good Thing. Are They Wrong?

Today’s populist resurgence has us rethinking the role these movements play in U.S. politics.

Populism Now Divides, Yet Once it United the Working Class

Our difficulties today are far removed from what the Populist Party tried to tackle. But their movement can nourish our imaginations.
Donald Trump speaks at a rally in July in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

What’s the Matter With the Democrats?

Two new books reveal the shortcomings at the heart of the liberal critique of Trump voters.
Crowd marching on Wall Street.

Nationalize the Banks

Grassroots support for public banks early in the 20th century revealed the popularity of socialism-aligned economic ideas.
Engraving of "We the People," in which the words "We" and "the" are painted over.

How Do We Survive the Constitution?

In “Tyranny of the Minority,” Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt argue that the document has doomed our politics. But it can also save them.

The People, It Depends

What's the matter with left-populism? A review of Thomas Frank's "The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism."
Artistic photo with american flags

Richard Hofstadter’s Discontents

Why did the historian come to fear the very movements he once would have celebrated?

What Richard Hofstadter Got Wrong

The late historian and author of “The Paranoid Style in American Politics” misdiagnosed the fate of modern conservatism.

Populist Persuasions

The promise and perils of left populism.
Trump speaks to auto workers.

Forget Trump – Populism is the Cure, Not the Disease

Populism is typically presented as a new threat to liberal democracy. But properly understood, it is neither modern nor rightwing.

From Progress to Poverty: America’s Long Gilded Age

The America that emerged out of the Civil War was meant to be a radically more equal place. What went wrong?
Political cartoon of the Populist Party python eating the Democratic Party donkey.

The Myth of 'Populism'

It's the transatlantic commentariat’s favorite political put-down. It’s also historically illiterate.
Political cartoon depicting fat-cat tycoons sitting on money on a dock made of commodities held aloft by struggling laborers.

From Fat Cats to Egg Heads: The Changing American 'Elite'

American has long been suspicious of “elites”, but just who they are has changed a lot over the last 200 years.
Andrew Jackson

The Five Most Powerful Populist Uprisings in U.S. History

Populism stretches through the American experience.

Why Did White Workers Leave the Democratic Party?

Historian Judith Stein debunks liberal myths about racism, the New Deal, and why the Democrats moved right.
A portrait of Ignatius Donnelly.

The Peculiar Case of Ignatius Donnelly

The politician presents a riddle for historians. He was a beloved populist but also a crackpot conspiracist. Were his politics tainted by his strange beliefs?
Donald Trump

Donald Trump Would Be Weaker the Second Time Around

Donald Trump wants the ideology of William McKinley and Gilded Age Republicanism, but with a totally different social base. It won’t work.
Campaign poster for Tom Watson

The Original Angry Populist

They say there’s never been a man like Donald Trump in American politics. But there was—and we should learn from him. Look back to early-20th-century Georgia.

Mildred Rutherford’s War

The “historian general” of the United Daughters of the Confederacy began the battle over the depiction of the South in history textbooks that continues today.
Cover of "Freedom's Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance To Federal Power"

The Little Man’s Big Friends

A new book seeks to explain why many Americans, especially but not exclusively in the South, have understood freedom as an entitlement for white people.
photo of C. Vann Woodward, c/o William R. Ferris, Van Every Smith Galleries

What Is There To Celebrate?

A review of "C. Vann Woodward: America’s Historian."
Middle class neighborhood with sold home sign

Our Segregation Problem

The consequences of racial separation are significant for left political organizing aimed at building a multiracial working-class majority.
Timeline of the history of American political parties to 1880, depicting intertwined streams of Democrats, Whigs, and Republicans.
original

What is Political Realignment?

An annotated collection of resources from the Bunk archive that help explain the shifting sands of American politics.
Illustration of W.E.B DuBois

W.E.B. Du Bois’s Abolition Democracy

The enduring legacy and capacious vision of Black Reconstruction.

We Can’t Blame the South Alone for Anti-Tax Austerity Politics

The legacy of slavery is often invoked to explain the stunted welfare state. But the strongest resistance to taxation and redistribution came from the Northern ruling class.
Political cartoon depicting the menace of monopolies and trusts (1899)

Degeneration Nation

How a Gilded Age best seller shaped American race discourse.
Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders
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Postal Banking is Making a Comeback. Here’s How to Ensure it Becomes a Reality.

Grass-roots pressure will be key to turning the idea into reality.
Program for the National American Woman Suffrage Association procession in Washington, DC, 1913, featuring a woman on a horse heralding votes for women and leading marchers toward the capitol.

The Thorny Road to the 19th Amendment

A new book chronicles the twists and turns of the 75-year-path to securing the vote for women.

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