The World in Time

Richard Kreitner

Friday, September 04, 2020

The Spirit of the Union, by Currier and Ives, 1860. Smithsonian American Art Museum, gift of the family of C.B. Shafer.

“Disunion—the possibility that it all might go to pieces—is a hidden thread through our entire history,” the journalist and historian Richard Kreitner writes in Break It Up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America’s Imperfect Union. “Our refusal to recognize this, like patients who insist, against all evidence, that they are not ill, has been a major cause of our political dysfunction and social strife. Secession is the only kind of revolution we Americans have ever known and the only kind we’re ever likely to see.” On this episode of The World in Time, Lewis H. Lapham and Kreitner start at the beginning of the United States of America and trace this history of disunion up to the present.

 

Lewis H. Lapham speaks with Richard Kreitner, author of Break It Up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America’s Imperfect Union.

 

Thanks to our generous donors. Lead support for this podcast has been provided by Elizabeth “Lisette” Prince. Additional support was provided by James J. “Jimmy” Coleman Jr.

Discussed in this episode

More Podcasts

October 13, 2017

The World in Time:

Mark Kurlansky

Lewis H. Lapham talks with Mark Kurlansky, author of Paper: Paging Through History. More

Lady in Colonial Dress Striking a Gentleman with Her Fan, by Thure de Thulstrup, 1895.

June 25, 2021

The World in Time:

Alan Taylor

Lewis H. Lapham speaks with the author of American Republics: A Continental History of the United States, 1783–1850. More

May 31, 2019

The World in Time:

Brenda Wineapple

Lewis H. Lapham talks with the author of The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation. More

Rehab Hiding the Spies in Jericho, c. 1405. The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.

July 13, 2018

The World in Time:

Roland Philipps

Lewis H. Lapham talks with Roland Philipps, author of A Spy Named Orphan: The Enigma of Donald Maclean. More

May 15, 2017

The World in Time:

William Hogeland

Lewis Lapham talks with William Hogeland about the creation of the United States’ first standing army and its victory over a coalition of Indian forces that sought to halt the country’s expansion. More

June 15, 2011

The World in Time:

To End All Wars

Lewis Lapham talks with author Adam Hochschild about the struggles of the antiwar movement in World War I–era Britain. More