This history book traces America's heritage, from Ancient and Medieval times, through the Civil War. It shows how the U.S.A. was founded on Greco-Roman, Judeo-Christian principles. It shows how the American Founding Fathers established a limited government.

The Story of Liberty, America's Heritage through the Civil War links the ancient and medieval worlds with the United States of America, then explores America's crucial role in the history of liberty. Do you know the answers to the following questions? Read to find out! How did Judaism, Christianity, Greece, and Rome influence the American Founding Fathers? How were the founding principles of America introduced in the ancient and medieval worlds? How did England play a crucial role in the development of representative democracy? How did Columbus' great discovery change the history of the world? What was the Enlightenment and how did it influence the founding of the U.S.A? What is American Exceptionalism? What makes America unique? How did the colonial experiences prepare American men and women to establish the modern world's first republic? How do the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution reflect Jewish and Christian principles? What made the American Founding Fathers great men and leaders? Why did the American Founding Fathers establish a limited government? How did free market capitalism allow for the world's most dynamic economy of the 19th century? Which Presidential policies went against the Constitution and state laws? How did America's expansion spread individual rights? How did immigration shape the U.S.A? Why were leaders of the Women's Rights Movement of the 19th century against abortion rights? How did the presidencies of Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln affect the size and scope of the American government? How were the ideals of the United States of America more fully realized with the freeing of the slaves in 1865? Historian: In The Story of Liberty, written for ages 11 to young adults, America's foundations are traced from the Hebrews and the Christian religious traditions to the Greek and Roman political traditions to the establishment of government in the English colonies in America. The Story of Liberty highlights---often with primary source documents such as the "Mayflower Compact" the first Thanksgiving Declaration, a section from the account of Paul Revere's ride---fleshes out the narration with easily-readable charts on such things as the differences between Republicans and Federalists or the size of early American cities.The book ends with Lincoln's assassination, and a second volume from 1865 to the present is planned. Loosely based on A Patriot's History of the United States by myself and Michael Allen (who did the foreword), The Story of Liberty strongly integrates the timeless principles of the sanctity of life, freedom of choice, government by representatives, trial by jury, division of power in government, and more. Strongly recommended. "John has a unique way of telling the story of the United States. He places special emphasis on America's place in the history of advancing Western Civilization. He begins with our classical roots and ties to ancient Hebrew, Greek, Roman, and Western European institutions. Just as importantly, he accurately weaves the story of Christianity and Christian values into the American story... John relates the truth about the American past by telling about our many good qualities and accomplishments as well as the setbacks our nation has endured during its long history...Young American history students and their teachers have long yearned for a book like the one you now hold in your hands." -Dr. Michael Allen, co-author of the #1 New York Times best-selling book, A Patriot's History of the United States. Professor at the University of Washington, Tacoma and Editor of The Story of Liberty, America's Heritage Through the Civil War

The bestselling author of "Washington's Crossing" and "Albion's Seed" offers a strikingly original history of America's founding principles. Fischer examines liberty and freedom not as philosophical or political abstractions, but as folkways and popular beliefs deeply embedded in American culture. 400+ illustrations, 250 in full color.

"This book is about the relationship between the Civil War generation and the founding generation," Timothy S. Huebner states at the outset of this ambitious and elegant overview of the Civil War era. The book integrates political, military, and social developments into an epic narrative interwoven with the thread of constitutionalism—to show how all Americans engaged the nation's heritage of liberty and constitutional government. Whether political leaders or plain folk, northerners or southerners, Republicans or Democrats, black or white, most free Americans in the mid-nineteenth century believed in the foundational values articulated in the Declaration of Independence of 1776 and the Constitution of 1787—and this belief consistently animated the nation's political debates. Liberty and Union shows, however, that different interpretations of these founding documents ultimately drove a deep wedge between North and South, leading to the conflict that tested all constitutional faiths. Huebner argues that the resolution of the Civil War was profoundly revolutionary and also inextricably tied to the issues of both slavery and sovereignty, the two great unanswered questions of the Founding era. Drawing on a vast body of scholarship as well as such sources as congressional statutes, political speeches, military records, state supreme court decisions, the proceedings of black conventions, and contemporary newspapers and pamphlets, Liberty and Union takes the long view of the Civil War era. It merges Civil War history, US constitutional history, and African American history and stretches from the antebellum era through the period of reconstruction, devoting equal attention to the Union and Confederate sides of the conflict. And its in-depth exploration of African American participation in a broader culture of constitutionalism redefines our understanding of black activism in the nineteenth century. Altogether, this is a masterly, far-reaching work that reveals as never before the importance and meaning of the Constitution, and the law, for nineteenth-century Americans.

Did you know that many of America’s Founding Fathers—who fought for liberty and justice for all—were slave owners? Through the powerful stories of five enslaved people who were “owned” by four of our greatest presidents, this book helps set the record straight about the role slavery played in the founding of America. From Billy Lee, valet to George Washington, to Alfred Jackson, faithful servant of Andrew Jackson, these dramatic narratives explore our country’s great tragedy—that a nation “conceived in liberty” was also born in shackles. These stories help us know the real people who were essential to the birth of this nation but traditionally have been left out of the history books. Their stories are true—and they should be heard. This thoroughly-researched and documented book can be worked into multiple aspects of the common core curriculum.

In the decades of the early republic, Americans debating the fate of slavery often invoked the specter of disunion to frighten their opponents. As Elizabeth Varon shows, "disunion" connoted the dissolution of the republic--the failure of the founders' effort to establish a stable and lasting representative government. For many Americans in both the North and the South, disunion was a nightmare, a cataclysm that would plunge the nation into the kind of fear and misery that seemed to pervade the rest of the world. For many others, however, disunion was seen as the main instrument by which they could achieve their partisan and sectional goals. Varon blends political history with intellectual, cultural, and gender history to examine the ongoing debates over disunion that long preceded the secession crisis of 1860-61.

In this remarkable collection, ten premier scholars of nineteenth-century America address the epochal impact of the Civil War by examining the conflict in terms of three Americas—antebellum, wartime, and postbellum nations. Moreover, they recognize the critical role in this transformative era of three groups of Americans—white northerners, white southerners, and African Americans in the North and South. Through these differing and sometimes competing perspectives, the contributors address crucial ongoing controversies at the epicenter of the cultural, political, and intellectual history of this decisive period in American history. Coeditors William J. Cooper, Jr., and John M. McCardell, Jr., introduce the collection, which contains essays by the foremost Civil War scholars of our time: James M. McPherson considers the general import of the war; Peter S. Onuf and Christa Dierksheide examine how patriotic southerners reconciled slavery with the American Revolutionaries’ faith in the new nation’s progressive role in world history; Sean Wilentz attempts to settle the long-standing debate over the reasons for southern secession; and Richard Carwardine identifies the key wartime contributors to the nation’s sociopolitical transformation and the redefinition of its ideals. George C. Rable explores the complicated ways in which southerners adopted and interpreted the terms “rebel” and “patriot,” and Chandra Manning finds three distinct understandings of the relationship between race and nationalism among Confederate soldiers, black Union soldiers, and white Union soldiers. The final three pieces address how the country dealt with the meaning of the war and its memory: Nina Silber discusses the variety of ways we continue to remember the war and the Union victory; W. Fitzhugh Brundage tackles the complexity of Confederate commemoration; and David W. Blight examines the complicated African American legacy of the war. In conclusion, McCardell suggests the challenges and rewards of using three perspectives for studying this critical period in American history. Presented originally at the “In the Cause of Liberty” symposium hosted by The American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar in Richmond, Virginia, these incisive essays by the most respected and admired scholars in the field are certain to shape historical debate for years to come.