The Road to Now

The Constitution empowers the electoral college to select the President, but the process for counting electors' votes remains in the hands of Congress. In this episode, Constitutional Law Professor Edward Foley explains the origins of the electoral college, how and why the 12 th Amendment changed the process for electing Presidents, and the concerns that led Congress to codify the procedure for co...

Most accounts of women in mid-20 th century American politics highlight trailblazers such as Frances Perkins or the handful of women elected to Congress in those years. But women's participation in politics- both as voters and as party activists- was far more significant than most Americans realize, elevating a group of white middle-class women into positions of influence over Presidents from Fran...

On the surface, the election of 1872 might seem insignificant in US history; Ulysses Grant easily won reelection to the White House and his Republican Party maintained their dominance in both houses of Congress. In the south, however, the violence that followed the election at the state and local level was an ominous sign that the era of Reconstruction might soon be over. And, according to Dana Ba...

In 2021, Neil King Jr. threw a few basic items into a backpack and walked from his home in Washington, DC to New York City. Over the next 26 days/330 miles, he met new people, uncovered forgotten moments of history, and spent many days thinking about America. In this episode, Neil joins Ben and Bob to discuss his book, American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal , and the lessons he learned alon...

For a long time, it seemed like not much happened in the 1970s. Today it seems like so much of what's happening can be traced back to those same years. The 1970s was a pivotal decade in American history. In a ten-year span, the United States admitted defeat in Vietnam, saw a President (and Vice President) resign in shame, and came face to face with its leaders' abuse of power at home and abroad. A...

The debates over school curricula, banned books, and what educators can teach in their classes have become increasingly polarizing in recent years, but they are nothing new in the US. For those who researched, wrote and taught about the Soviet Union under Stalin during the Cold War, following the evidence to a conclusion that challenged America's established narrative could lead to denunciations a...

John Adams' single term as President has long been cast as a low point in his political career, but Lindsay Chervinsky sees it differently. "George Washington created the Presidency," she writes in her new book Making the Presidency, "but John Adams defined it." In this episode, Lindsay joins us to share why she sees Adams as a crucial figure in transforming an office that had been established for...

The 2024 Presidential election is in full swing and so is the parade of personal attacks, appeals to emotion and (most important for us) grandiose and unsubstantiated claims about history. And of the many statements that fall in that last category, one stands out as both exceptionally ridiculous and a perfect setup to connect today's politics to the past: Donald Trump's claim that Kamala Harris is...

With a sitting VP running for President for the first time since Al Gore's failed bid for the White House in 2000, there's been a lot of talk about the role the VP plays in government, the impact a VP pick has on a Presidential campaign, and just how much Kamala Harris' record as VP/relationship to President Joe Biden can show us about her own agenda, should she win the White House. So today we be...

On August 15th, 1824, the Marquis de Lafayette returned to the United States for a grand farewell tour. It was his first visit since leaving the US in the late 1780s. The tour was a unifying moment for a deeply divided country.  In the wake of a crippling economic downturn, and a fracturing over the Missouri question and the issue of slavery, the nation was in the midst of a bitter Presidential el...

Journalist  David Menconi  has documented the people and sounds of North Carolina's music scene for almost three decades. In this episode, Ben and guest co-host Dolph Ramseur speak with David about his book  Step It Up and Go: The Story of North Carolina Popular Music, from Blind Boy Fuller and Doc Watson to Nina Simone and Superchunk ,  and how the music of "The Old North State" is both reflected...

The Stone Pony and its hometown of Asbury Park, New Jersey are iconic settings in the story of some of America's greatest rock musicians, including Bruce Springsteen, Steven Van Zandt, and Southside Johnny Lyon. The Pony's path from high-risk passion project to iconic venue was, however, anything but direct; from its founding in 1974, the club was caught in the greater forces at work in late-20 th...

Joe Biden has decided to decline the Democratic nomination for the Presidency in 2024 so today we take a look back at Biden's path to seek the nomination in 2020 and Ben shares his thoughts on why July 21, 2024 might be the day that secures Biden's legacy in American history.   Our conversation with Robert Costa on his book Peril , which he co-authored with Robert Woodward, originally aired as RTN...

When the Erie Canal opened in the 1820s, it brought with it an industrial system that radically transformed the daily lives of the American farmers who lived in the region. Out of this disruption came some of America's earliest labor actions, the rise of new Christian sects, and America's first daredevil, Sam Patch, who dazzled the masses and offended the powers that be simply by jumping off highe...

Patricia O'Toole's The Moralist: Woodrow Wilson and the World He Made (Simon & Schuster, 2018) examines the life of a President whose policy was guided by his personal sense of morality. From today's perspective, Woodrow Wilson's time in the White House (1913-1921) seems full of contradictions. He supported a constitutional amendment to ensure women's suffrage, but oversaw the re-segregation of Am...

On July 4 th , we celebrate American Independence. But, as Ben argues in his new intro to this episode, the real gift of the founding generation was more than that: it's the inheritance of the revolution.   George Washington is one of the most revered figures in American history. As Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army, Washington led his troops to one of the most unlikely and world-shaking...

In 1866, the Fenian Brotherhood, comprised primarily of Irish Civil War veterans, led a series of attacks on Canadian provinces just across the border from the United States. Their goal: seize Canadian territory and exchange it for Irish independence. Similar raids continued until 1871, and although they were ultimately unsuccessful, they are part of a greater story of the American Civil War, Iris...

The American Civil War and the end of slavery in the US may seem like one and the same from our modern perspective, but for those living through the conflict, the abolition of human bondage was anything but certain. Even into the last days of the war, slave traders in Confederate-held cities continued to auction off human beings, realizing handsome profits as they imposed violence and family separ...

In 2002, Ashley Capps took a gamble- he rented hundreds of acres in rural Tennessee and put on a music festival. Coming on the heels of the infamous Lollapalooza '99 and an unsuccessful festival at the same site two years earlier, few thought Ashley could pull it off. As you (and the 80,000 people who attended the festival this year) know, Ashley and his partners proved the doubters wrong and crea...

In this episode, music writer Michaelangelo Matos joins Bob and Ben to discuss why 1984 was a pivotal year in music history. Michaelangelo also shares why he loves books about a single year.   Michaelangelos' book, Can't Slow Down: How 1984 Became Pop's Blockbuster Year (Hachette Books) was selected as a Rolling Stone-Kirkus Best Music Book of 2020. You can follow him on substack at @michaelangelo...

We guarantee you will feel better after listening to the Road to Now this week. We are joined by world-renowned soprano and arts/health advocate Renée Fleming and neuroscientist, cognitive psychologist and the best sell author of This is Your Brain on Music, Dan Levitin. We are discussing Renée's new book Music and Mind about how to harness the arts to improve health and wellness. The book is a co...

This fall, the musical Swept Away, which is based on the music of Bob Crawford's band The Avett Brothers is coming to broadway, and to celebrate, we're re-sharing our conversation with writer, John Logan, and lead actor, John Gallagher Jr.   This conversation was recorded just after Swept Away premiered at the Berkeley Repertory Theater in Berkeley, CA in January 2022, and when you hear the passio...

Jon Grinspan has done something remarkable: in his new book, Wide Awake , he tells a thoroughly researched and brilliantly crafted story that may change your understanding of the origins of the American Civil War. In this episode, Jon joins us for a conversation about the Wide Awakes, the anti-slavery youth movement that played an instrumental role in electing Abraham Lincoln in 1860 and took part...

You might know Bushwick Bill as a member of the iconic Houston rap group The Geto Boys, but his contributions to rap music, his role in the debates over free speech in the 1990s, and his overall influence are far more substantial than you probably realize. In this episode, we welcome Charles Hughes back to the show to discuss his new book Why Bushwick Bill Matters (Univ. of Texas Press) and to get...

Jonah Goldberg is one of America's most well-known conservative intellectuals, with a resume that includes more than two decades at The National Review , twelve years as a commentator on Fox News, and two New York Times Bestsellers. In recent years, however, the changing definition of "conservative" in American politics has put Jonah at odds with the party that they once called home. In this episo...