Roundup

Coronavirus School Closings: Don’t Wait Until It’s Too Late

by Howard Markel

In the history of medicine, we have never been more prepared to confront this virus than we are today. But this history also teaches us that when it comes to school closings, we must always be ready to act today — not tomorrow.

The Latest Battle over the Confederate Flag Isn’t Happening Where You’d Expect

by Megan Kate Nelson

Confederate actions in the Far Western theater of the war reveal the extent to which the Confederate flag became a symbol of white supremacy and conquest.

I Helped Fact-Check the 1619 Project. The Times Ignored Me.

by Leslie M. Harris

The paper’s series on slavery made avoidable mistakes. But the attacks from its critics are much more dangerous, argues historian Leslie M. Harris.

The 1619 Project’s outrageous, lying slander of Abe Lincoln

by Allen C. Guelzo

Humanities scholar Allen C. Guelzo defends Lincoln in the face of The 1619 Project's scrutiny.

Bernie Sanders is the Left's Ronald Reagan

by Sam Tanenhaus

Bernie Sanders remade his party with a youth movement he built from the outside. Just like the Gipper did.

Obama and I took a class about socialism's dark side. Bernie would have learned a lot.

by Jonathan Zimmerman

Imagine if Sanders praised Hitler for reducing cigarette smoking or Mussolini for making the trains run on time. The American left would be up in arms.

What the 1619 Project Really Means

by Timothy Messer-Kruse

Professor Timothy Messer-Kruse argues that critics from both ends of the political spectrum have misunderstood the project.

Roundup Top Ten for March 6, 2020

The Top Ten Roundup Articles of the Week

Experience 1930s Europe Through the Words of Two African American Women

by Ethelene Whitmire

In the pages of the “Chicago Defender,” the cousins detailed their adventures traversing the continent while also observing signs of the changing tides.

Critics of Bernie Sanders’s trip to the Soviet Union are distorting it

by Yana Skorobogatov, Yakov Feygin and Artemy M. Kalinovsky

Historians Yana Skorobogatov and Yakov Feygin and Eastern European scholar Artemy M. Kalinovsky contextualize Sanders' opinions on the Soviet Union.

Can 50 Years of Minimizing Nuclear Proliferation Continue?

by Ivo H. Daalder

The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty has mostly succeeded in keeping more countries out of the nuclear club. But as U.S. alliances fray, its future success is not assured.

Little Women: Greta Gerwig’s Love Letter to the 19th-Century Novel

by Christine Jacobson

It’s thrilling to see the historic Roberts Brothers publishing house richly imagined in the film’s first scene and to watch Jo spar with her editor over the rights to her novel and its ending.

What Can the Black Death Tell us About The Global Economic Consequences of a Pandemic

by Adrian R. Bell, Andrew Prescott, and Helen Lacey

There will be winners and losers economically as the current public health emergency plays out.

Onward, Christian Soldiers: The Triumph of Christian Nationalism

by David Austin Walsh

The Christian Right wields wide-ranging political power in contemporary America. We live in the country that the movement has created.

So What if They Made the Trains Run on Time?

by Rafael Medoff

Sen. Bernie Sanders’s praise for some policies of the Cuban and Soviet regimes speaks to a broader question that has long attracted public interest: Should our view of authoritarian governments be affected by the fact that their trains run on time?

The Case for a Free or Inexpensive Coronavirus Vaccine

by Deborah Levine

Jonas Salk understood that his polio vaccine was a common good. We should follow his lead.

What the Plague Can Teach Us about the Coronavirus

by Hannah Marcus

The distant past is not our best source of advice for pathogen containment. But it does offer clear lessons about human responses to outbreaks of infectious disease.

On Behalf of All 'Future Historians,’ Leave Us Out of Your Brexit Rants

by Charlotte Lydia Riley

The people who invoke historians of the future are less keen on listening to actually existing historians today.

Pennies and Nickels Add Up to Success: Black Banking Pioneer Maggie Lena Walker

by Crystal M. Moten

Maggie Lena Walker was one of the most important Black businesswomen in the nation, and today too few people have heard of her.

Democratic Socialism All Around: What Bernie Sanders’s New York Can Teach Us about America’s Future

by Joshua Freeman

Mid-20th-century New York had serious flaws, including poverty, economic inequality (though not as bad as today), and racial and gender discrimination. But it stands as an example of what can be done when the power of government is combined with a capacious vision of human rights, equality, and democracy.