Description
Book SynopsisWhen well-designed institutions function properly, people thrive. Few institutions have been more ingeniously designed than the U.S. federal government via the Constitution in 1787. This auspicious beginning more than two centuries ago helps explain why the U.S. remains a magnet for opportunity seekers, students, entrepreneurs, dissidents, and persecuted believers.
Yet for decades now, America's federal government has been underperforming. Social Security and Medicare face looming insolvency. The federal government's war on poverty has failed to end poverty and arguably made it worse. In 2012, the United States Postal Service lost more money than the nation spent on the State Department, and Amtrak has lost money every year since being created in 1971. How can an enduring institution, so thoughtfully crafted, now produce such poor results?
The federal government has grown so much because it serves a new and different vision, American Progressivism. American Progressives
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John Nantz’s book is intelligent, well-informed, written with verve, and argued in a compelling manner. This book is a must-read.
-- Paul A. Rahe, Hillsdale College
John Nantz has written an incisive critique of the flaws in theory—and failures in practice—of statist, twentieth-century Progressivism. Impressively researched and boldly argued, his book advocates, as an alternative, a decentralized approach to governance and public policy, rooted in a vibrant civil society and the limited-government republicanism of America's Founders. In our rancorous and increasingly polarized political environment, Nantz's thoughtful volume could not be more timely.
-- George Nash, author of The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945
John Nantz’s American Republicanism Re-Envisioned critically examines the role of government from the Founding Fathers to the present day. He presents both facts and theory why our Progressive experiment has gotten out of control. The solution is a return to a Federalism properly understood.
-- William Campbell, former president of The Philadelphia Society
At a time when American civil society is in desperate need of being revitalized, John Nantz provides a thorough, compelling vision for how to do so.
-- Kevin Roberts, Executive Director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction
Part I: Competing Visions
Chapter 1: A Realistic Founding Vision
Chapter 2: The Progressive Vision
Part II: Observing the Results
Chapter 3: The Big Government Experiment
Chapter 4: Windfall Politics
Chapter 5: The Government Surcharge
Chapter 6: Complexity Failure
Part III: Sovereignty and Solvency
Chapter 7: Rehabilitate the States
Chapter 8: Renewing Civil Society
Chapter 9: Restoring Individual Sovereignty
Afterword: A Path Forward
Bibliography
About the Author
Index
