This is an age of the world when nations are trembling and convulsed. A mighty influence is abroad, surging and heaving the world, as with an earthquake. And is America safe? Every nation that carries in its bosom great and un-redressed injustice has in it the elements of this last convulsion. As I was reading…

I am re-reading Shelby Foote’s massive, three-volume history of the Civil War. Foote, who played the role of courtly southern scholar and mischievous scamp on Ken Burns’ heralded PBS Civil War documentary, was one of my favorite human beings. He was erudite, witty, and—a startling claim for a historian, really—supremely soulful. He could sift through…