America, Empire of Liberty: A New History of the United States

--Joseph J. Ellis, author of Founding Brothers and The Quartet

Thomas Jefferson envisioned the United States as a great "empire of liberty." In his riveting single-volume history of the United States, award-winning historian David Reynolds takes Jefferson's phrase as a key to the American saga. He examines how the anti-empire of 1776 became the greatest superpower the world has seen--and how the country that offered liberty and opportunity on a scale unmatched in Europe nevertheless founded its prosperity on the labor of black slaves and the dispossession of Native Americans. Reynolds also reveals how these tensions between empire and liberty have often been resolved by faith--both the evangelical Protestantism that has energized US politics since the founding of the nation and the larger faith in American righteousness that has impelled the country's expansion.

Written with verve, insight, and humor, America, Empire of Liberty is a magisterial depiction of America in all its grandeur and contradictions.