Reviews for The Bully Pulpit and the Melting Pot: American Presidents and the Immigrant, 1897-1933

The average rating for The Bully Pulpit and the Melting Pot: American Presidents and the Immigrant, 1897-1933 based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2017-03-07 00:00:00 Darren Chapman A necessary corrective to the versions of Native American activism which focus primarily on the American Indian Movement. Cobb certainly isn't hostile to the militant activism pioneered by Clyde Warrior, Mel Thom and the others who pointed down the path that led to Alcatraz, the BIA takeover and Wounded Knee. But, taking his cue from Vine Deloria's refusal to participate in a conference on "sixties activism," Cobb excavates a largely forgotten history focusing on the work of the National Congress of American Indians and the National Indian Youth Council, both of which bore the imprint of the Workshop on American Indian Affairs, which played a role in Native activism loosely equivalent to that of Highlander in the African American movement. Cobb places the struggle for sovereignty at the center of the story, where it should be. While he doesn't provide a thorough overview of the U.S. government policies that created the mess of the late 1950s, he provides enough so that non-specialist readers will be able to follow. At its core, Native Activism in Cold War America is an engagement with the various strategies (and people who helped shape them) that worked at times in concert and at times against one another. He does an excellent job demonstrating how the Office of Economic Opportunity, centerpiece of LBJ's War on Poverty, did a much better job in Indian country that in most other settings, and how Jim Wilson and Deloria developed strategies that did a decent job of subverting the Bureau of Indian Affairs (deservedly cast as one of the villains of the story). I have a much deeper appreciation of the importance of both the NCAI and the NIYC than I'd had going in. The one problem with the book, which is clearly if not particularly powerfully, written, is that Cobb hasn't quite figured out (or holds back on taking a stand on) where he comes down on the conflict between the NCAI and the NIYC that came to a head around Native participation in the Poor People's March of 1968. Cobb feels some deep sympathy for Thom, Tillie Walker and the others who decided to participate in the march; their frustration, anger and eloquence come through clearly. But throughout the first part of the study, he's developed a compelling case that Deloria and Wilson's "inside out" strategy, working in concert with the OEO, had made real strides in redefining the conversation around sovereignty in Washington. The two approaches came into open conflict around the PPC and Cobb more or less just tells the stories in parallel, rather than weighing them against one another. Important historical contribution. Probably not for general readers, but crucial for those with serious interest in the issues.

Review # 2 was written on 2017-11-14 00:00:00 Keith Gagnon 323.1197 C6532 2008