Howe maintains this general dichotomy as he wanders down thirty-odd years of national history. In the other corner sat the Whig’s ideology of national improvement through an active government and strong internal commercial expansion. In one corner sat the Democrat ideals of Andrew Jackson, which lay out a path of white male individualism, territorial and racial conquest, and limited federal government. Howe approaches this task by looking at the nation’s growth through the eyes of the two ideological competitors fighting for its future. In an academic climate of sometimes numbing specialization, What Hath God Wrought is boldly and refreshingly big. Howe is fearless in shouldering the daunting task to chart the the United States’ tumultuous adolescence. Of course, the tome is monumental in every sense of the word, in its subject matter, scope, weight, and approach. That’s my five-word summary of Daniel Walker Howe’s Pulitzer-Prize winning, 900-page, career-defining work What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848.
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