Contested truths Book

From de Tocqueville's day to our own, observers of the U.S. have been struck by the power and extravagance of its political rhetoric. In this major reinterpretation of American political culture, Daniel Rodgers describes the deeply contested history out of which the language of modern politics emerged. The language of argument uses particular words with particular, sometimes shifting, meanings and to know what they are and what they have meant over time is a critical contribution to political history. It is true that politicians may act as though they are part of no particular ideological tradition, but history shows that, more often than not, they use an understood meaning to enhance their actions. Rhetoric, as Rodgers shows, has real consequences. Contested Truths is an eloquent account of the ways in which Americans have struggled for control of the keywords in the American political 'creed' during the two centuries since the Founders tried to establish certain political truths as 'self-evident'. The recurrent battles over language reflected and fueled the nation's sharpest struggles over politics itself: the Revolution, the crises over democracy and slavery, the nation's confrontation with industrial capitalism and with 20th-century political propaganda. Rodgers shows how a Revolutionary vocabulary of 'natural rights' and 'popular sovereignty' came under increasing assault in 19th- and 20th-century America, describes the ambivalence with which our political vocabulary incorporated concepts of the 'state' and 'interests', and concludes with a provocative account of the word 'freedom' in contemporary political talk.