Roundup

Mythbusting Ancient Rome: did Christians ban the ancient Olympics?

by Caillan Davenport and Shushma Malik

The idea that the athletic contests – held in honour of the Greek god Zeus for over a thousand years – were shut down by a puritanical Christian emperor makes for a good story. But is it true?

Video of the Week: “I am a Slave”

A video from the TV show, "black-ish” celebrating Juneteenth, the day former slaves chose to celebrate the end of slavery.

Five types of gun laws the Founding Fathers loved

by Saul Cornell

The Second Amendment is one of the most frequently cited provisions in the American Constitution, but also one of the most poorly understood.

The American public has power over the gun business – why doesn’t it use it?

by Brian DeLay

The American public has more power over the gun business than most people realize. Taxpayers have always been the arms industry’s indispensable patrons.

The Soul of W. E. B. Du Bois

by Ibram X. Kendi

How the 1899 lynching of Sam Hose affected the writing of W.E.B. Du Bois's classic.

Michelle Obama and the black women of the White House

by Martha S. Jones

What the former first lady's new portrait reveals.

Literally drunk on genocide: how the Nazis celebrated murdering Jews

by Edward B Westermann

The role of alcohol in the Nazi genocide of European Jews deserves greater attention.

Liberalism After Liberalism

by Win McCormack

The civic republican tradition and its lost treasure

When Immigrants Were Welcomed

by Jim Sleeper

Congress has failed immigrants again. But in the 1920s, this plan quieted xenophobes and nurtured new Americans.

Roundup Top 10!

This week's broad sampling of opinion pieces found on the Internet, as selected by the editors of HNN.

The Case for “Retreatism” in the Trump Era

by Jeet Heer

Centrist columnists David Brooks and Andrew Sullivan are in despair over today's politics. An essay from the Great Depression suggests a cure.

The UK Treasury’s tweet shows slavery is still misunderstood

by David Olusoga

The modern equivalent of £17bn was paid out to compensate slave owners for the loss of their human property. Some people believe the British should be proud.

Abraham Lincoln's Secret Visits to Slaves

by William R. Black

In the mid-1930s, the Federal Writers’ Project interviewed thousands of former slaves, some of whom claimed the president came to their plantations disguised as a beggar or a peddler, telling them they’d soon be free.

The failed president who almost got ousted

by Donald Nieman

Who’s the most vulgar, racist, thin-skinned, vituperative U.S. president?  Donald Trump and Andrew Johnson have much in common.

MLK's '68 struggle for economic justice still marching on

by Michael Honey

The bonds of memory and today’s vast disparities in wealth and well-being tell us that we must continue the struggle launched by workers and by King in the spring of 1968.

News Flash: History Is Not Just for Straight People

by Hugh Ryan

"Without queer history, we cannot truly understand history, full stop."

From the ‘Pocahontas Exception’ to a "Historical Wrong"

by Arica L. Coleman

The Hidden Cost of Formal Recognition for American Indian Tribes

FDR had a military parade, too

by Susan Dunn

It was in January 1941, after Franklin D. Roosevelt's inauguration to an unprecedented third term in office.

The Strange, Dark History of North Korea and the Olympics

by Sheila Miyoshi Jager

The world is hoping a collaboration at the Games will help calm the threat from Pyongyang. The experience of 1988 says we shouldn’t count on it.

Who Killed More: Hitler, Stalin, or Mao?

by Ian Johnson

7 years ago historian Timothy Snyder asked the provocative question: Who killed more, Hitler or Stalin? Maybe he should have included Mao, too.