Two Nations, Indivisible - by Jamie L Bronstein (Hardcover)

About the Book

"As this book will show, economic inequality has been a persistent, detrimental feature, in the United States since its founding, although the extent of the exploitation has changed over time. At the same time, a critique of inequality has also been ubiquitous, growing louder during some periods (the Depression years, for example) and more muted in others. Cyclically, the topic of inequality in the United States has emerged again in the twenty-first century. The New York Times in 2005 ran a series of articles on class, pointing out for its readership that, contrary to popular belief, the United States is not the most upwardly mobile country in the world"--Introduction.

Book Synopsis

While examining the arguments made in favor of egalitarianism, this book debunks the notion that the United States is now or has ever been a nation offering equal opportunity to all.

In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson famously asserted that "all men are created equal." Likewise, social mobility--the idea that any child can grow up to be president--has been key to the myth of what makes America great. Yet the hard truth is that inequality of both opportunity and resulting condition has been a defining feature of America's story. Written by a comparative labor historian, this book combines economic and social history with intellectual history to reveal the major trends of inequality that have been evident in America from Revolutionary times through the present.

The book opens with an introduction to the burgeoning issue of inequality in America. The following chronological chapters describe how inequality was manifest in various periods. Each chapter not only provides a full survey of the secondary literature related to the topic of inequality in the particular time period but also examines prescriptions from thinkers who espoused equality, including Thomas Paine, Thomas Skidmore, Henry George, Jane Addams, Upton Sinclair, and Harry Caudill. By assessing these and other arguments relevant to social change, the work helps readers understand the cases made for and against equality of opportunity and condition throughout U.S. history.

About the Author

Jamie L. Bronstein, PhD, is professor of history at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, NM.