James MacGregor Burns

For decades, James MacGregor Burns has been one of the great masters of the study of power and leadership in America. Now he turns his eye to an institution of government that he believes has become more powerful, and more partisan, than the founding fathers ever intended. Much as we would like to believe that the Court remains aloof from ideological politics, Packing the Court reveals how often justices behave like politicians in robes.

An “immensely interesting” account of how Theodore, Franklin, and Eleanor led the United States through some of its most turbulent decades (David McCullough).
 
The Three Roosevelts is the extraordinary political biography of the intertwining lives of Theodore, Franklin, and Eleanor Roosevelt, who emerged from the closed society of New York’s Knickerbocker elite to become the most prominent American political...

Pulitzer Prize–winning historian James MacGregor Burns's definitive look at the power of transformational leadership, from Moses to Machiavelli to Martin Luther King Jr. Historian and political scientist James MacGregor Burns has spent much of his career documenting the use and misuse of power by leaders throughout history. In this groundbreaking study, Burns examines the qualities that make certain leaders-in America and elsewhere-succeed as transformative...

The Pulitzer Prize–winning author’s stunning trilogy of American history, spanning the birth of the Constitution to the final days of the Cold War. In these three volumes, Pulitzer Prize–­ and National Book Award–winner James MacGregor Burns chronicles with depth and narrative panache the most significant cultural, economic, and political events of American history. In The Vineyard of Liberty, he combines...

The second volume of Burns's acclaimed history of America, from the end of the Civil War to the beginning of the Great Depression   Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address pointed to a new way to preserve an old hope-that democracy might prove a vibrant and lasting form of government for people of different races, religions, and aspirations. The scars of the Civil War would not soon heal, but with that one short speech, the president held out the possibility...

The first volume of Burns's stunning account of American history, from the birth of the Constitution to the dawn of the Civil War The years between 1787 and 1863 witnessed the development of the American Nation-its society, politics, customs, culture, and, most important, the development of liberty. Burns explores the key events in the republic's early decades, as well as the roles of heroes from Washington to Lincoln and of lesser-known figures....

James MacGregor Burns's stunning trilogy of American history, spanning the birth of the Constitution to the final days of the Cold War In these three volumes, Pulitzer Prize–­ and National Book Award–winner James MacGregor Burns chronicles with depth and narrative panache the most significant cultural, economic, and political events of American history. In The Vineyard of Liberty, he combines the color and texture of early American life with...

Leading scholars define the special contributions and qualifications of our first president. Washington's legacy is a successful experiment in collective leadership, great initiatives in establishing a strong executive branch and the formulation of innovative and lasting economic and foreign policies. Along with highlighting these accomplishments, the authors also trace Washington's later dissatisfaction with public life and the seeds of dissent and...

Examines the contributions of America's first president, tracing his accomplishments as a Revolutionary War hero and explaining how his decisions as president established precedents for the future governing of America.