Review of Three Roads to Gettysburg

Book Author: Tim McGrath

tags: history, biography 

Someone once wisely said that no individual is created in isolation. Each of our lives is intertwined with that of countless others. The same applies to the lives of the all-time greats, or those who have left a mark on history. Because of this, in studying one man, we must inevitably study more than one man; we must study the men and women around him, some great, some not so great; some forgotten, some as well remembered as the principal.

Much as William C. Davis's masterpiece Three Roads to the Alamo, Tim McGrath's new release, Three Roads to Gettysburg, is not a story of the battle, though of course the latter does figure prominently, but the story of the battle-makers. One of them is universally admired, and for good reason: Abraham Lincoln's moral clarity, both before the presidency and during it, is one of the great strengths of our American republic. The Gettysburg Address is perhaps the most memorized, most repeated, and most memorable speech ever given on American soil. How many students have been required to memorize the speech in its two-minute entirety simply by virtue of the fact that it possesses some of the qualities we most admire, both in oratorical skill and in the embodiment of the moral citizen?

Robert E. Lee, on the other hand, is a more complex figure. Certainly, he has become, by some measure, the embodiment of the Lost Cause myth, which views the grievances of the South as legitimate and the encroachment of the North as a morally viable casus belli. On the other hand, Lee is despised by many revisionist historians who seek to demonize him as a racist who tried to keep human beings enslaved simply because of their skin color. Yet others see Lee as somewhere in between; as a man of personal conviction and upright character who was, sadly, by circumstance and familial allegiance, forced to take part in a war against the country which his father had helped to found.

The general who actually led the Union to victory at Gettysburg occupies a different place in American history altogether. George Gordon Meade is, unlike Lincoln, rarely, if ever, remembered as a hero of the Union cause. Ulysses S. Grant is remembered largely because it was under him that the war was ended. George McClellan is remembered mainly due to his young and dashing but ultimately unsatisfactory performance as commander of the Army of the Potomac. Also, unlike Lee, few outside military historians would place Meade in the midst of endless controversy. Yet, argues McGrath, this lack of attention makes him no less compelling.

Unlike many historians, McGrath is content to leave Lincoln atop his monument in D.C. He is content to leave Lee in the muck and mire of history, sinking in the swamp of infamy until a new biographical boat comes along to lift him out of it once more and into the sunshine of public acclamation. The one figure whose legacy he does contest is that of Meade. McGrath avoids any type of moral situating. He does not try to argue that Meade was the savior of the Union cause, nor that he was an entirely loyal Northerner who supported emancipation. Instead, he simply places Meade back in the historical imagination. In this he succeeds.

Beginning with the story of Meade's father, the influential though eventually bankrupt Richard Meade, and then describing Meade's, as well as Lee's, involvement in the Mexican-American War, one of the most interesting things that McGrath does is to show how these two men, who would eventually fight each other in a real war, were learning from two men who, though on the same side of a real war, were on different sides of a diplomatic one. George Meade served under General Zachary Taylor, the unflappable father-in-law of Jefferson Davis, who would also briefly serve as president. The calm Taylor at times resembles the calm Lee, respectful of authority, cool under fire, in short, "Old Rough and Ready." Yet Lee admired not Taylor but Scott. Meade, on the other hand, admired Taylor, yet in personality much resembles General Winfield Scott, with a flammable temper, colorful language, yet also brilliance on the field of battle.

It would be tempting to see Lee and Meade as simple protégés or continuations of these two generals, yet that is far from the truth. The story McGrath tells is not of how the younger generals became the next Scott or the next Taylor, but how they learned from them, and how the lessons they drew would serve them well, or let them down, at Gettysburg.

Indeed, a theme of this book is the fact that influence does not of necessity imply imitation. Lee inherited neither Scott's temperament nor Taylor's command style in full, and Meade certainly was not a full reflection of either man. The roads to Gettysburg, McGrath reminds us, were never straight.

The author also shows us how Gettysburg's lines of battle were drawn not only along the dimensions of North and South, but also between generals, soldiers, commanders, and others. No man can truly cease to be a man when he becomes a soldier, and that is true both in his humanity and in his human nature. Although many have noted how soldiers also feel repulsed at the sight of death, fewer have noted how commanders are repulsed by the sight of each other. From the battles between McClellan and Lincoln to those between Meade and Hooker and Meade and Dan Sickles, the legacy of battle, the story that will be told, may be influenced far less by what objectively happens on the field and more by who has the ear of the media, the ear of the politicians, the eye of the public and of the president, and finally, who lives longer and tells their side of the story to more people.

This does not mean that lessons cannot be drawn, that conclusions, moral ones even, cannot be reached. Indeed, to deny that history can teach moral lessons is to deny one of the chief reasons for studying it in the first place. Yet any conclusions must be reached only when events are first understood through the lens of the men and women who made them. To understand Lee properly is to understand, first of all, why he fought for the South. It is not to excuse him for doing it, explanation is not exoneration, but explanation will lead to either exoneration or condemnation. Neither of the latter can, of themselves, lead back to the explanation.

McGrath succeeds ultimately not in telling history better than other historians, or in explaining factors which would cast a new light on or enable us to reach a new verdict about this battle, nor yet in doing something new at all, but in doing something as old as the universe itself: saying that one did such and such a thing for a reason and then asking the reader, by judging the reason, to judge the man.

Review Written by Caleb A. Gerber

June 12th, 2026

Review of The Making of the American Mind

Book Author: Matthew Spalding

tags: history, philosophy, jurisprudence, Christian 

How did our national consciousness evolve? How did our perception of ourselves as Americans form, and from whence did it come? Argues historian Matthew Spalding, it came from the Declaration of Independence.

Before 1776, Americans did not think of themselves as Americans. They were British subjects who were members of their own colony: Virginians, New Yorkers, Pennsylvanians; each colony had its own leadership, its own predominant social class, be it the farmer of Massachusetts, the printer from Pennsylvania, or the Virginia aristocrat. They were brethren, yes, but they were not yet a people. When the immortal words “We hold these truths” were written from the Continental Congress, that all began to change: a new nation would form. By 1863, when President Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address, declaring that "four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal," the transformation was complete. For Lincoln, as for the founders, America was a nation, but not only a nation, not a mere nation; it was a nation founded upon an idea.

Spalding begins his work by discussing a term we have all heard mentioned: patriotism. Spalding writes that a true understanding of this term, which can mean so many things to so many people, “has always been the civic antidote to what C. S. Lewis called ‘the poison of subjectivism.’” Borrowing from Alexis de Tocqueville, the nineteenth-century French philosopher who toured America in its first couple of decades, Spalding posits that there are two types of patriotism: the first can breed the nationalism of Otto von Bismarck or the self-serving, self-interested geocentrism that has today gained a foothold in some of our governmental institutions. This is not a patriotism based on anything longstanding or permanent; it is mere loyalty, a sheer blind love based only on a sense of community and on nothing more. The second type of patriotism is the American brand: the type that allows soldiers to fight the Nazis on the beaches of Normandy and to plant the American flag on Iwo Jima. It is not because we hate what is in front of us, as Chesterton wrote, nor yet because we like what is behind us, or feel some sort of emotional attachment; it is because we understand that the principles for which we fight are longstanding, permanent, and true. It is because they are all these things that we can give our last full measure of devotion, as did the Union soldiers during the Civil War.

The clarification of terms, such as patriotism, that Spalding does in the early pages of this work makes it easy to follow, yet not easy to skim. It makes you think, as great books do, yet does not cloud your judgment through vague terminology.

Quoting Augustine, Spalding makes clear from the start what the purpose of this book is. Nothing, according to the great theologian of the early church, can be truly loved unless the object of love is known. For us today, that means that for true patriotism, selfless in its purpose, determined in its cause to exist, we must understand exactly why the Declaration of Independence was written, how it was written, and what that changed.

The story of the Continental Congress is not new. Many books have been written on this critical period. The chapters that Spalding spends discussing the history of the Congress, the roles of its players, the international response, and its broader geopolitical place are clear in purpose but vague in accomplishment. For those well versed in American history, nothing illuminating will be gained from these chapters. Similarly, Spalding focuses a large part of his time on the particulars: what the complaints laid out in the Declaration were. This is, of course, important for a political historian, much less so for a philosophical one or for the average reader. Certainly, the validity of the claims made by Jefferson and others played a central role in their day, yet it becomes difficult to see how they could make any difference to ours.

The real strength of this book is its philosophy. Why is it that there are certain “unalienable rights”? What makes these “self-evident”? Who determines that among these are “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”? The answer takes us back into intellectual history. From the Greeks' understanding of reason (logos), which was then transmitted down to the Christian church, for proof, simply read John 1:1, came the realization that as human beings endowed with the imago Dei, we have the capacity, through our reason, to reach truths about our life, about the human condition, about our telos. From a Christian perspective, which the author shares, it is this knowledge that enables us to know the moral law in the first place, and then realize that we have transgressed against it, which in turn forces us to recognize our depravity and need for redemption. In the political arena, this means that the law can be known without being spelled out. Critically, before the Bill of Rights, there was already a bill of rights written in the universe. Before the Constitution, there was a constitution written on the mind. For this reason, the founders did not appeal to English common law, as some would have wished them to do. Jefferson understood that even without English common law, even without the Magna Carta or the Glorious Revolution, their cause would still be just; the universe would still have the same moral structure and natural law because it would have the same architect and the same lawgiver.

This understanding carries profound implications for modern political thought, especially in jurisprudence. We have come to see law as simply that which guarantees the greatest good for the greatest number; this utilitarianism would have been alien to the founders. We have also come to see government as the institution that preserves our rights. This is, of course, exactly what the founders intended, yet today, some carry it a step further; they reason, wrongly, that if government preserved the rights, then government gave the rights in the first place. Yet if government gave, government could take away. However, if they originate in nature and nature’s God, then government is subject to a higher tribunal, and the Supreme Court is not really the Supreme Court.

Jefferson’s ideas did not simply come from looking up at the sky and racking his own brain, using his own reason to determine that certain rights existed and were being usurped by Parliament and the King. He had come from a rich philosophical and theological tradition that dated back from Augustine and Aquinas, down through Algernon Sidney and John Locke. This was the more political side of philosophy. With natural law come natural rights. Unlike contemporary monarchical systems, which saw the monarch as the divinely appointed leader, the founders saw such a concept as flawed. They saw government as a servant of the people, and the people as servants of God. “But where, says some, is the King of America?” wrote Thomas Paine. “I’ll tell you, Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain.”

The author dives into the theological background of the Declaration. The fact that the first entity mentioned in the Declaration is not the King of Britain, but the King of Heaven, at least signifies that these were writers who believed in a divine Providence. “As in its opening, the Declaration here appeals to a standard above and beyond human events to vindicate its cause. And the appeal, as before, is not to some overarching sense of history or to ‘the opinions of mankind.’ But it is also not to ‘the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God,’ which man knows through reason. This appeal of the Declaration is to an omniscient God who not only knows all men but also knows the intentions of each man’s heart. While they declared their cause to the opinions of mankind, in the end the Continental Congress seeks a ruling from a higher court.” Spalding goes further, arguing that they had a specifically Christian understanding both of the role of government and of the role of man in relation to government. Writes Spalding: “Only a truly benevolent King, one who is divine and not subject to the passions of man, could be an absolute sovereign. And since governments are instituted among men and not angels, and no individual on this earth has the divine wisdom and authority to rule absolutely, the powers of government must be limited, divided, and checked to ensure the rule of law rather than the arbitrary reign of worldly men.” The Declaration’s signers were not all orthodox Christians; certainly the author, Jefferson, had some unorthodox beliefs, but they were all, down to the last man, versed in the basic presuppositions of Christianity that were predominant in the late eighteenth century, and it was these presuppositions that were basic in the writing, drafting, and approval of this document.

Inextricably linked to a Christian understanding of God is a Christian understanding of man, which the signers also had. These were Protestants, with the exception of Charles Carroll, but they were Protestants familiar and comfortable with the natural law beliefs and writings of Richard Hooker. Man was a rational animal, capable of understanding right and wrong, if not of actually choosing right and eschewing wrong. “It is by his reason, not by allowing the passions to rule or blindly following conventional mores, that man distinguishes between reality and myth, good and evil, the just and the unjust. Nature, as a structure of reality that is unchanging and permanent, and that can be accessed by reason, is the standard of right in making these distinctions. And as man seeks relationships with others to fulfill that nature, man is a political animal, as Aristotle famously observes, men come to live in communities based on agreed purposes and a common understanding of justice.” The author then makes an even more stunning, but likely accurate, claim: “This argument is the basis of Western thought about man and politics.”

Of course, reason is not the only reason. There is a place for faith; in fact, faith is necessary in a Christian society, though not necessarily in the way modern secular critics often imagine. Spalding’s discussion of human nature is especially enlightening in this regard; society today seems to oscillate between two extremes: the utopianism of Marx, Rousseau, and the Romantics, which assumes that human beings are fundamentally good and that social problems can be solved through proper institutions, and, on the other hand, sheer cynicism, such as that found in Thomas Hobbes, which sees humans as utterly depraved, needing a government to compel them to some form of social stability. Instead, Spalding writes, the founders had a diametrically opposed conception of man: “This is not Thomas Hobbes’s brutish world of man against man, violently seeking to avoid death, or of petty man constantly dominated by narrow self-interests and lowly desires. This is a sacred conception of man, altogether human yet willing to sacrifice and suffer for the highest of ends.”

Spalding demonstrates that the Founders understood liberty not as the freedom to do whatever one wishes, but as the freedom to do what one ought. Rights existed alongside duties; freedom existed alongside virtue. The American experiment depended not merely upon constitutional structures, but upon the character of the citizenry itself. People incapable of self-government could not remain free for long. A people who do not know what they love will not love it for long. Failing to understand where we came from will result in a failure to go where we ought.

Review Written by Caleb A. Gerber

June 3rd, 2026

Review of Rasputin: The Downfall of the Romanovs

Book Author: Antony Beevor

tags: history, Russian 

Mystic guide or heretic? Unsung hero, or the villain who changed the history of the twentieth century? Many descriptions, conflicting ones at that, but all are focused on a single man.

Talented military historian Antony Beevor turns his attention to one of the most overlooked and mysterious players in Russian history and focuses not only on Grigory Rasputin, but on the world into which he was born, in which he lived, and in which he was killed: the world of Orthodox Russia before the Bolshevik coup and the abdication of Nicholas II, which marked the end of the Romanov dynasty. Rasputin was born into humble origins, but he would eventually rise to the top and be introduced into the most powerful and elite circle in czarist Russia. His supposed mystical powers would win him a reputation which, when it came to the ears of the Tsarina Alexandra, would mark the beginning of his rise to the top and the beginning of the Romanovs' fall to the bottom.

For a military historian, Beevor is certainly an interesting writer. Many historians specializing in the history of warfare tend to get bogged down in the details while missing the overall picture. Not so with Beevor, who, with a wealth of sources, manages to encapsulate both the particulars and the universals: both Rasputin the man and the men and women around that man.

Interestingly, this is one of Beevor's shorter works, coming in at around 350 pages of substantive writing, plus footnotes and bibliography. The fact that Rasputin, like all men, lived a full life, and further, the fact that his life was by no means dull, will of course mean that many details which may interest the reader will inevitably be left out. Certainly, this is one of the impressions that will be received when reading the book. Beevor's biography of Rasputin is not a typical biography. Only a couple of pages are given to the first decades of Rasputin's life, while a full three chapters are focused on his assassination. While many biographies will only briefly mention the players who figure prominently in the life of their protagonist, Beevor goes deeper. Not only does he introduce the characters in their relationship with the mystic, but he also presents them as dynamic characters themselves, showing the reader their world as well as Rasputin's, even when the two do not necessarily intersect. At times this makes the overall thrust of the work feel vague, but on the flip side, it adds much depth, both cultural and political, that is not normally found in a simple biography.

While this style may, to some, seem distracting, this unconventional structure ultimately works to the book's advantage. Instead of focusing on Rasputin's birth, early decades, and formation, which would in most cases be desirable, the author's emphasis on the world of late imperial Russia helps underscore the fact that although Rasputin may have been the catalyst for the downfall of the Romanovs, he was not the only, or even the principal, figure. Beevor does not make this explicit, though I wish he did, but this underlines an interesting historical point: everyone should ultimately bear responsibility for his or her own actions. Blame for the fate of a nation may hinge on a particular person, but that hinge should not be mistaken for the door. The author demonstrates that the collapse of the dynasty cannot and should not be attributed to Rasputin alone, despite the enduring popular myth that he single-handedly brought down the entire empire.

Although not in depth, several philosophical and theological questions are tossed around by the author through the people in this story. Rasputin's perverted behavior can be seen, in part, as the consequence of his belief that, to be forgiven much, it is necessary to sin much. Obviously, this is dangerously unorthodox, not in the denominational sense, teaching, as it places a strong emphasis on sinning instead of any attempt to avoid illicit behaviors and acts. The consequences of this mistaken belief may become obvious at once to those more versed in biblical theology and will add a layer of depth to this book which could very easily be missed by those who are not as well versed. Indeed, the opportunity to engage not only with the political philosophy of Nicholas and Alexandra, as well as that of the moderates and those on the right and left of the political spectrum, but also with the theological and philosophical questions which played such a role in the Russia of the early twentieth century, is one of the most enjoyable and commendable parts of this work.

Two areas of weakness in this book are of note. Firstly, with a subject as complex as Rasputin, and with contrasts so stark between the "man of God" that the Czar and the Czarina saw him to be and the "man of the world," the carnal Rasputin accused and likely guilty of rape, the facts alone cannot suffice. Most readers, upon concluding the read, will be left confused as to Rasputin's legacy. Certainly, history is full of shades of gray, but the shades of gray do not negate the black and the white which, when summed, the grays produce. Beevor's attempt at objectivity, while commendable and understandable, is unsatisfactory because it leaves the reader with little sense of historical judgment. Was he good or bad? Perhaps the author intends to leave this question unanswered; perhaps he believes the question is unanswerable; or perhaps he wishes to leave it up to the reader to decide, to weigh the evidence in the balance of history and make the decision for himself. Yet the brevity of the work, coupled with the conflicting facts, makes such a task nearly impossible. Beevor is a master at narrating facts; he is less successful at drawing conclusions from them. Consequently, the central question of who Rasputin truly was remains frustratingly unresolved.

The second area of criticism is less universal and will likely not be shared by all readers. Once more it centers on the author's attempt at objectivity. The way in which he deals with Rasputin, who was after all a primarily religious figure, is almost entirely secular. He narrates what those around him, in a highly superstitious culture fed by Eastern Orthodox mysticism, thought about Rasputin's actions and whether they came from a divine origin, but notably, Beevor never attempts either to debunk any claims of spiritualism or to confirm them. The conflict within the Russian Church is also of note here; not everyone inside the church hierarchy agreed on Rasputin and how the church should deal with him. Beevor also shows that the Tsar's attempts to interfere with ecclesial authority were not welcome, yet no contrast is shown between the orthodoxy of the Orthodox and the orthodoxy of Rasputin. To those readers unfamiliar with the teachings, practices, and liturgy of Orthodoxy, this may be a problem.

Despite these criticisms, Rasputin is a highly worthwhile work and a welcome contribution to the study of late imperial Russia. Readers will emerge with their interest in this period not satisfied, but decidedly piqued. It is a good starting point, a good beginning to a road that will lead deeper into the struggles of history and the struggles of the soul.

Review Written by Caleb A. Gerber

May 31st, 2026

Review of In the Garden of Beasts

Book Author: Erik Larson

tags: history 

It was the worst of times; it was the worst of times. It was the ascent of progress; it was the ascent of depravity. It was an age of love; it was an age of love. In short, it was, as the present age, an age when the good encountered evil… and who would prevail was a question of who had the will to do so and, to a degree, who had Providence on their side.

Much has been told, and many pages filled, with the rise of isolationism at home. Few pages have been devoted to the consequences of isolationism abroad; certainly, few books have been written which have focused on the immediate consequences of isolationism in the garden of the beasts, or, even more so, in the mouth of the dragon. This book is intriguing, therefore, for the reason that it covers not an unknown period of time, but an unknown place in that period. That is not to say that there have been few works on the rise of Hitler; there haven’t. But there has been remarkably little scholarly inquiry into what the American experience was in Hitler’s Berlin.

Erik Larson, with his typical dramatic flair for the good, the bad, and the ugly, traces the lives of two main people: the American ambassador to Germany, William Dodd, and his vivacious and promiscuous daughter, only in her second decade of life, yet already divorced, the flamboyant Martha. From love affair to love affair and diplomatic meetings to diplomatic meetings, Larson shows us, in an intimate way, I mean intimate quite literally, what life was like with Hitler’s rise, and what life was becoming.

The Germans we see in this picture are not the warlike and evil geniuses of World War II, though they were fast becoming that. Rather, Hitler and his government were at a desperate point, their government hanging by a lifeline. Largely, their survival was held in the balance by international perception, and since international perception was largely dictated by the letters of the American ambassador, William Dodd was bombarded with propaganda from the moment he landed on German soil. Instead of showing Hitler, Goring, and Goebbels as idiotic madmen intent on destroying the Jewish race, Larson gives a far more accurate, and far more disturbing, portrayal of the original Nazis. Despotic men, perhaps, but they were still men, and, like all men, had a distinctly personal side. Before they were masters of war, they were masters of diplomacy, yet never, and Larson makes this very clear, did Hitler or his inner circle ever consider stopping what they considered to be in the common good, the attaining of Lebensraum, the decimation of the Jewish population, or the persecution of Bolshevik sympathizers, for the sake of scoring foreign victories. Instead of compromising for the sake of gain, they gained exactly what they wanted without giving an inch, by lying. Larson shows us one lie after another put forth by Hitler, the head of the Gestapo, or Hermann Goring. In some cases, the lies were believed by the teller, but this did not make them any truer.

Secondly, this book shows the progressive distrust inside Hitler’s own coalition. This distrust would ultimately lead to a split, with courageous yet unsuccessful men such as Franz Papen taking a stand against Hitler, and other bloodthirsty opponents of Hitler, such as the head of the sexually perverse SA, Ernst Rohm, suffering the ultimate penalty for their ambition, with the culmination of the break coming on the Night of the Long Knives.

Larson’s chief strength is his ability to show not only the political or the military, but the personal. Certainly, I wish he would have spent less time discussing the ins and outs of Martha Dodd’s love life and more time focusing on the inner turmoil of the senior Dodd’s conscience as he came to realize that he was being used, but either way, this is historical narrative at its best. Perhaps it would not be the equivalent of an academic essay or a biography of William E. Dodd; it certainly does not compare to William Shirer’s Diary from Berlin during this period, but it doesn’t have to. The point is not to show what has already been shown, but to show something new and, with it, to give a new perspective.

Perhaps the most striking and fascinating part of this book is the fact that William Dodd left the United States as an avowed Wilsonian isolationist. He desired intensely to cooperate with Germany. Martha Dodd, too, initially mocked anti-Nazi protestors. Both were skeptical of Jewish persecution, with the ambassador urging President Roosevelt repeatedly to do nothing or to calm the outrage of prominent Jewish intellectuals in America over the rise of Hitler’s antisemitic efforts. Yet by the time of Dodd’s departure, a departure which occurred precisely because the ambassador no longer believed that permanent peace with Germany was possible, Dodd had come to realize the evil of the looming threat, and its intensity. He started the journey a skeptic; he returned a convert. This was not ideological fervor that pushed him to intense criticism of Hitler and Germany; if anything, Dodd was too hesitant to realize the threat. It is through the eyes of Dodd’s family that we can realize the incompleteness and dishonesty of revisionist histories which suggest that the war was by no means a foregone conclusion, that a negotiated peace could have been settled, and that antisemitism was perhaps a fluke and not a foundation. Such a narrative has no grounds in the truth, and Larson shows it masterfully.

In the end, Dodd realized what all men must at some point realize: that, as Bonhoeffer said, “Silence in the face of evil is evil itself,” or, better yet, Burke, who stated that “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Though this book is history, it is a history of a movement, a movement which could well replicate itself in our day and age, for there truly is nothing new under the sun. Perhaps Larson never intended it this way, but this book is, above all, a call to action. 

Review Written by C. A. Gerber

May 12th, 2026

Review of Alito

Book Author: Mollie Hemingway

tags: politics, jurisprudence

The Supreme Court is an institution filled with history—good, bad, and ugly. It is an institution which has, in its record, handed down decisions both accurate and misguided, well-reasoned and socially legislated. Its justices have at times been well-equipped to address the deepest questions of government’s role, and in other cases, they have been people whose names will forever linger as those who failed to exercise their gift of reason, or who reasoned from faulty premises. In Mollie Hemingway’s most recent book, she does not simply give a history of a justice or a biography of Samuel Alito, but a history of the institution and a biography of the Court itself.

Hemingway has a remarkable gift for making complex subjects simple without losing their complexity. She has gone to great lengths to personally interview those who knew Alito when he was serving on the Court of Appeals, as well as those who have come to know him intimately—not only as a judge, but as a husband, a citizen, and even as a baseball fan. Her facts are well documented, and the one area where there is room for critique is not that she has under-documented the portrait she attempts to paint, but that at times she has over-documented it. In her pursuit of exactitude, she occasionally includes quotes that border on the vulgar. Notwithstanding this, it is admirable that instead of simply presenting Alito the justice, she has also shown us Alito the man.

Certainly, while always remaining within the bounds of the facts—all the facts—Hemingway has arranged them in such a way as to make the reader sympathetic to Alito and his interpretation of the law. She offers many critiques of other justices, both liberal and conservative. Sonia Sotomayor bears a large share of the blame for some of the more controversial decisions made by the Court, as does Chief Justice John Roberts. Neil Gorsuch, Clarence Thomas, Elena Kagan, and Amy Coney Barrett are presented as figures who are at times in real opposition to what Alito considers the necessary course of action. Ketanji Brown Jackson, I must admit, is treated with considerable contempt, and in this I do not disagree. Even someone as widely respected as former Justice Antonin Scalia is, at times, criticized by Hemingway through Alito. Indeed, one of the most interesting aspects of this book is that it not only shows the Court as it is now, but also as it once was, with in-depth descriptions of justices such as Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, John Paul Stevens, Anthony Kennedy, and David Souter. This greatly enriches the narrative, as it shows Alito in relation to others who were at times more famous, who at times outshone him, but from whom he always earned respect and admiration.

The name of Justice Samuel Alito will likely be remembered for his opinion in the decision in Dobbs, which struck down a fifty-year precedent that protected what you describe as the right of some human beings to murder other human beings. In some ways, the history of every Court since Roe v. Wade, from Rehnquist down to Roberts, has been the history of a colossal failure to adequately respond to what you view as an egregious abuse of constitutional law and constitutional telos. Samuel Alito was a young man studying at Yale when Roe was handed down. Now in his seventies, he helped to strike it from the record.

The author also devotes a significant portion of the book, intermittently, to Alito’s judicial philosophy. I was quite surprised to learn that Alito is not, as I had imagined, a pure constitutional originalist in the same sense as Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas. What Hemingway calls Alito’s “all steak, no sizzle” approach to judicial review is, she argues, his defining characteristic as a Supreme Court justice. He is, in a way, a very original originalist. Unlike Scalia, he takes a more practical approach; he believes in the Constitution and in the values it embodies, but he also believes in common sense. It is not only by reading the Constitution of the United States that we can understand Alito’s philosophy; we must also read what might be called the constitution of nature.

This practicality, without descending into a legal positivism that sees man as nothing more than a subject of law, is what gives Alito’s jurisprudence its distinctive texture. He is not content with a cold recitation of clauses, nor does he wander into the fog of untethered moral invention. Instead, Hemingway presents him as a judge who reads the Constitution with one eye on its text and the other on the enduring realities of human nature. Law, in this view, is neither an abstract game nor a malleable instrument, but a framework built for real people within a real moral order.

This should be required reading in classes on jurisprudence and the American legal system. Hemingway, in a move that is rare among explicitly biased political reporters—even on the conservative spectrum—has managed, to a remarkable degree, to stay out of the political realm, for which she deserves admiration. Certainly, she does not hesitate to call things as she sees them, or as Alito sees them, but her goal is not primarily political, and in reading this book, ours should not be either.

Review written by C. A. Gerber

May 4th, 2026

Review of What Conservatives Believe

Book Author: Mike Pence

tags: politics, leadership 

Estranged from party leadership, abandoned by the populace, yet refusing to surrender, this is the final call—one which we have all heard before—from the honorable and sincere former Vice President Mike Pence. Shortly before his run for President in 1964, Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater published a book titled Conscience of a Conservative. Pence’s attempt is to create anew the fervor for the truth that conservatives have embodied before and can embody again. By once more returning to these principles, believes Vice President Pence, we can return to more firm a foundation.

The book is designed much as I believe Goldwater’s work is designed, and as one would expect a political manifesto to be designed: chapter by chapter, Pence illuminates the most critical elements of policy in our day, from immigration to tariffs to the right to life. Each chapter covers a different topic, yet each is also unified in that it presents a coherent and structured worldview, one that is, surprisingly, mostly untinged by political bias. Although complete objectivity is, of course, impossible—and Pence certainly remonstrates on the accomplishments of the Trump-Pence administration of the first term—the fact that he is willing both to praise and to criticize the new Trump administration, delivering praise where it is due and criticism where it is warranted, is a refreshing break from the far more politicized, highly personal politics to which we have now become accustomed. 

I began with some praise, and before moving on to the chief thesis of the book, I will offer a few short criticisms. Although much—indeed, most—of what is contained herein is true and needs to be repeated, it is exactly that: repeated. This is by no means a new message. Perhaps Pence would argue that the essence of conservatism is not that it is new, but that it is good despite, or even because of, its age. Yet that may obscure something different, namely that nearly everything Pence says has been said by him before. While reading his book, it at times reads more like an essay, or the transcription of a speech, than a new, logically structured argument. From cover to cover, I must acknowledge that this was not a read I wanted to continue, but one I felt I needed to continue because, despite its style, it was true—and because it was true, it deserves reading. I assure you that this will not become the new Pulitzer Prize–winning political treatise, regarded as groundbreaking research into the nature of politics. Likely, it will be forgotten in the recesses of a bookstore. Yet the fact remains that truth is often like that; concealed behind the guise of the ancient, or of that which is no longer popular, we seem to have embraced chronological snobbery even in our reading habits. Perhaps this book will cure us of it. 

Pence’s thesis is to recall conservatives to life. He urges us to reconsider the prevalent view that conservatives are winning in America. We are not, states Pence. Although the populist right is closer to conservatism than the progressive left, Pence argues that we are not even close to being the same, and our differences should not be forgotten, even if it may be politically convenient to do so. Chapter by chapter, Pence dismantles the problems with each of the two ditches on either side of the road called sanity into which we may be tempted to stray. On the right lies populism, which for decades was seen as antithetical to conservatism, but which has today gained a foothold. On the left lies the clear and present danger that we have long acknowledged, and which still beats at our door. One interesting thought I had during the reading process is that both of these enemies bear a remarkable resemblance. Although in the modern arena they have diverged—partly because the group on the left has become far more radicalized—if traced back in history, both progressivism and populism emerged from the same source: the Democratic Party of the 1890s, followed by the presidencies of Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, as well as the repeated presidential candidacy of William Jennings Bryan. An important distinction that Pence makes is that populists are not necessarily fighting for the wrong things, or even for different things than conservatives; they simply have a different way of fighting for them. While conservatives must be content to wait, to abide within the system and change it from within, populists, in their search for immediate and substantial victories, undermine the systems they strive to protect, achieving short-term success at the expense of long-term prosperity. It is not that the populist right lacks principles; the problem is that at times it fails to act consistently with those principles. 

This book contains a message that needs to be heard and considered. If, after reading it, you remain unconvinced, that is an acceptable outcome, but you will emerge substantially wiser and better equipped to engage in thoughtful conversation. This is not a light topic; in all seriousness, the future of our country is the subject of this work—something that should neither be gambled away nor protected so overzealously that, in defending it, we destroy that for which it stands. I believe that Vice President Pence has made his point, and made it well. After reading it, perhaps you will think otherwise; but, as I was, you will be compelled to admit that this book was written in all sincerity, with deep care and concern, and with clear-eyed vision. 

Review Written by C. A. Gerber

May 1st, 2026

Review of The Fate of the Generals

Book Author: Jonathan Horn

tags: history, biography, leadership 

In times of war, there are two types of people: the victors and the losers, but is it possible that both are fighting for the same thing and against the same enemy? Is it even possible that for victory to be achieved, losses must also be sustained, losses that involve a degree of self-sacrifice, an eschewing of self-aggrandizement, and an acceptance of fate incomparable under almost any other circumstances? If so, the battle for the Philippines, during the opening shots of World War II in the Pacific theatre, is exactly such a situation, and historian Jonathan Horn has invited us to step back into time and witness for ourselves the cost of victory: the fate not only of the generals, as the title suggests, but of the nation which the generals represented.

Nearly everyone who has even a rudimentary understanding of World War II, and of the American strategy during it, exemplified by a Europe-first approach embraced by Chief of Staff George C. Marshall, has also heard of the self-serving yet brilliant general who pushed for a front that prioritized what he saw as a more immediate threat: the rising sun of a Japanese empire. Such a man was Douglas MacArthur, and in the half century since his death, his actions during both the Second World War and the subsequent Korean War, in which he would serve admirably but would be discharged dishonorably, the man’s legacy has been fiercely disputed by historians, political strategists, and military commanders alike. Two rival visions of MacArthur’s personality have overwhelmed the imagination of our time. Jonathan Horn does not take either of the two most typical approaches as regards MacArthur, either presenting him in an entirely positive or negative light or, compromising between the two and showing an image that is neither positive nor negative, but neutral. Horn avoids neutrality like the plague, painting a portrait of MacArthur that is at once entirely positive and entirely negative. Strengths and flaws become inseparable, and for once, Douglas MacArthur has come to life.

Far less common in discussions of military commanders is the story of Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright, the commander left behind by MacArthur upon his retreat from the Philippines, who courageously but unsuccessfully tried to defend Bataan and Corregidor islands from an oncoming Japanese onslaught. Yet through these pages, he too comes to life, as a far less complex figure than MacArthur—perhaps it is this lack of complexity that made him vulnerable to caricature in the first place—but a figure nonetheless compelling. Loyal and true to his superiors, yet perpetually doubting his moves and struggling through the acceptance of reality and the desire to protect his troops, this is a man to admire, and Horn compels us to admire the alcoholic general who would nearly die in a Japanese POW camp.

Horn brings in the background story of both of these figures, though he spends considerably longer on MacArthur for the simple reason that he had a far longer story to tell. Using quotes from Wainwright’s diary during the war, as well as the correspondence of Douglas MacArthur, his aide Sutherland, the loyal Lew Beebe, George C. Marshall, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, this book is meticulously researched and wonderfully written. At times it is necessary to stop and contemplate the sheer beauty of the writing, despite the ugliness of the situation which it describes. Here is one example:

“They had feared the coming of the rainy season on Bataan, and now it found them midway up Luzon’s central plain, in the town of Tarlac. They had dreamed of taking showers on Corregidor, and now they struggled to keep their bunks dry. They had cursed the dust blinding their eyes, and now they saw mud and mildew everywhere. They had lain awake through bombardments, and now they tried to sleep through thunder…”

As I mentioned in the opening paragraph, Horn makes this story center on the sacrifice of Jonathan Wainwright. It may appear that Horn’s purpose is to put MacArthur down; certainly, that is how some have interpreted this work, but I do not think that this is the purpose of the work, or how it should be read. Rather, Horn does not make the reader admire Wainwright and despise MacArthur, but love MacArthur because of Wainwright. Without the latter’s sacrifice, the former’s triumph would have been impossible. Without the former’s triumph, the story of the latter would never have been told. In a strange way, Wainwright completes the picture of MacArthur that we have always wanted but never had. It is by showing MacArthur’s faults that Horn has shown his greatest strength. Through the sacrifice of one, the victory of the other, and the courage of both, the nation as a whole could emerge from what Winston Churchill called its darkest hour, not unscathed, but undefeated, not as angels, but as men whose actions showed the world clearly the better angels of our nature.

Review Written by C. A. Gerber

April 29th, 2026

Review of Hero of the Empire

Book Author: Candice Millard

tags: history

Every great man must have a formative experience that made him great. Nearly all great men are formed in some sort of conflict, a conflict that informs both their character, personality, and outlook on life. Abraham Lincoln would not today be remembered were it not for the Civil War; without the French Revolution, history would not have produced Napoleon Bonaparte; and without the Boer War, claims Candice Millard, Winston Churchill would never have become the guiding force and moral leader of Western civilization during the crucial years of World War II.

This conflict is not often remembered as a war that would make or break an empire. Certainly, although by the end of it the geographical redistribution and proportions of South Africa would have changed significantly, the geopolitical effects would be virtually null. For those outside of Great Britain and the Dutch-controlled African colonies, the Boer War, though perhaps a topic for conversation at the time, would quickly fade away and recede into distant memory, especially with the onset of World War I barely a decade after its conclusion. Yet for young Winston Churchill, the Boer War would prove to be the path to engraving his name on history. “History will remember me,” he wrote, “for I intend to write it.” During this war, he did write it, first as a reporter, then as a participant whose fate was anxiously watched by both the Boer settlers and the British aristocracy.

Candice Millard brings her characteristic clarity to the forefront of this narrative. Clearly, she has deeply researched both the South African landscape and the characters who make their appearances throughout this storyline, for both come alive in the pages of this book. Her key strength lies in her ability to make the story feel real; you, I, each one of us who reads this book becomes a player, a character whose fortune lies intertwined with that of Churchill. With hindsight in our possession, we can cringe each time that Churchill comes within inches of death; we can laugh every time he makes a prediction about the survival of the empire he so loved; we can cry as he cried for lost opportunities; and we can sweat under the South African sun, even as he sweated, all from the comfort of our living room couch.

Beginning with several previous occasions on which Churchill’s courage was tested, including at the Battle of Omdurman, when British forces under General Herbert Kitchener crushed the Mahdist forces, Millard introduces us to this young, dashing man of famous lineage, confident in his own ability to a degree that he constantly risked his life. Was the physical bravery he showed simply the product of courage, or was it a naïve belief in himself and a disregard for his own safety? Perhaps it was both. Whatever the case, Winston Churchill pressed his luck time and again, daring, as it were, destiny to do something about it. Each time he emerged the victor, and each time he showed the watching world that he was a Churchill, and that a Churchill had to be reckoned with.

There is, however, a tension in Millard’s narrative that invites critique. While her even-handed treatment lends credibility, it occasionally drifts into moral neutrality where moral clarity might have strengthened the work. Conflict, after all, is not merely a stage upon which character is displayed; it is also a test of principles. To portray both sides vividly is commendable, but to refrain from deeper judgment risks flattening the very stakes that give such conflicts their enduring significance. On the other hand, another of her strengths is her ability to bring the culture of the Boers to life. Instead of straw-manning the Boers, as Churchill and many others did at the beginning but later came to regret, Millard paints a convincing picture of independent, individualistic, yet deeply devoted Christians seeking to defend their homeland. Unlike a standing army, it was the duty of every man over the age of fifteen to participate actively in the conflict, to do his duty and protect his culture—and what a culture it was. We see Churchill through the eyes of the daring Boer leader Louis Botha, through those of the man who would eventually lead South Africa during World War II and become Churchill’s close friend, Jan Smuts, and through the eyes of the…

In the end, Churchill would escape, and his daring escape made him perhaps wiser, certainly more equipped to deal with the problems of the next half-century. When history called, as at last it would, Winston Churchill would not be standing idle; he would be walking, hand in hand with destiny.

Review Written by C. A. Gerber

April 28th, 2026