Description
Trade Review“I feel confident in saying that Thomas Jefferson would’ve approved of Andrew Burstein’s interpretation of his political afterlife in this book. I do so because—as Burstein so thoroughly and entertainingly chronicles—seemingly everybody else in American history has felt confident in saying Jefferson would’ve approved of whatever they were doing or saying about him.” —Keith OlBermann
“Andrew Burstein’s book focuses tightly on the uses and abuses of Thomas Jefferson’s legacy. . . . Burstein observes that it is hard to challenge the politically sacred without being labeled unpatriotic. Therein, he says, ‘lies tyranny over the mind’—the very tyranny that Jefferson warned against throughout his political life. . . . Eminently readable.” —
Wall Street Journal“Burstein reviews both how presidents from Franklin Roosevelt to Barack Obama have harnessed the image and words of Thomas Jefferson to bolster their respective campaigns and initiatives and how recent scholars and schemers have grabbed hold of Jefferson’s words and memory to do battle over questions of race, science, and religion. . . . Burstein writes engagingly, and, at times, quite entertainingly.” —
Daily Beast“
Democracy’s Muse describes a Jefferson whose authority generations of liberals and conservatives have regularly cited, usually through cherry-picked quotes to advance their respective agendas.” —
Choice
