Book: 'A People's History Of The United States' by Howard Zinn

Summary of the Book

In A People’s History of the United States, Zinn aims to write an account of American history
from the perspective of persecuted, powerless, marginalized people, rather than the usual
pantheon of heroes and elites. He begins by studying Christopher Columbus’s conquest of the
New World in 1492; over the following century, European explorers wiped out entire Native
American tribes and brought tremendous wealth back to their own countries. English settlers
came to North America in the early 1600s, and soon afterwards, they were involved in a series of
wars with the Native American tribes, during which they used terrorist tactics to assert their
domination.
Another important feature of early colonial life in North America was slavery. English settlers
used slaves kidnapped from their homes in Africa for free labor, and they also hired indentured
servants—poor white people who were forced to spend years paying off their debts. Slaves
frequently staged revolts and uprisings against their white masters; indeed, many elites in early
colonial America were frightened that black slaves would unite with poor whites and take control
over the colonies. Elites instituted policies designed to drive poor whites, Native Americans, and
black slaves apart, and use them as “a check upon one another.”
In the late 18th century, the Founding Fathers were responsible for organizing a revolution
against the British. However, these figures weren’t particularly radical in their vision of the
future—rather, they were wealthy, powerful people who saw an opportunity to become even
more powerful by manipulating the working classes against an external enemy, Britain. It was
during the Revolutionary War that American leaders developed the rhetoric of freedom and
equality, which is, to this day, one of the most important tools that leaders use to control their
people. In the 1780s, the Founding Fathers drew up the Constitution, which provided for a strong
federal government, largely so that they would have a way of protecting their own property and
interests.
In the 18th and 19th centuries, American women of all classes and backgrounds asserted their
radicalism again and again, in spite of the pervasive sexism of their society. After it became
more common for women to attend college in the early 19th century, educated women became
more active in feminist causes.
In the early 19th century, America became a major imperialist power, first by expelling Native
Americans from their ancestral lands (violating treaties that the American government had
signed), and then by annexing Mexican territory in the Southwest. The Mexican-American War
of the 1840s set a paradigm for American militarism: again and again, the American government
would find a flimsy pretext for starting a war, and then use this pretext to acquire new territory
and resources.
The Civil War is often remembered as the event that prompted the federal government to
intervene and end slavery forever. But in fact, the federal government only did so because it had
been pressured by generations of radical Americans who staged uprisings, slave revolts, and
exercised their right to petition the government. When the government finally did free the slaves,
it did so in a way that gave African-Americans minimal support. Indeed, in the years following
the Civil War (the period known as Reconstruction) the federal government provided some
financial and military support for African-Americans in the South. However, following 1876, the
federal government backed away from supporting African-Americans and instead aligned itself
with the interests of Southern business elites. In the second half of the 19th century, the federal
government became bolder about cooperating with business; indeed, it supported military
interventions, especially in Latin America, that were designed to strengthen American business.
Nevertheless, there was widespread resistance to America’s aggressive, imperialist foreign
policy.
The 19th century was also a time of widespread labor and union activity. Faced with the fact that
the law and the government didn’t even pretend to protect the common American worker,
laborers went on strike, protested in the streets, and demanded better wages and shorter hours. In
response, the federal government again and again showed its support for the business
establishment by deploying troops to break up strikes and enforcing business as usual. When the
government did help the common worker, it was careful to provide modest, superficial reforms
to the system, which were designed to satisfy the American people without helping them in any
profound way. In the face of the government’s dismissive attitude, laborers embraced
Anarchism, Socialism, and Communism—ideologies that questioned the capitalist premise that
private business should own production and manufacturing.

During World War One, the American government sent its poorest citizens to die in a conflict
that had nothing to do with them. It also passed a series of laws preventing citizens from
speaking out against the war in any way. Indeed, many Socialist activists of the era were
imprisoned for daring to state the obvious—World War One was a corrupt, imperialist conflict.
During the Great Depression, the federal government continued its policies of moderation and
pacification: it passed some policies that benefitted workers, but did nothing to fundamentally
challenge capitalism or the American business elite.
During World War Two, the U.S. claimed to be fighting for purely moral reasons: to end
Fascism in Europe. In fact, Zinn argues, the government fought in World War Two because it
saw the chance to make America the world’s leading power. By the time the war was over,
America had made inroads with leaders around the world, ensuring that its own businesses
would be granted free trade rights abroad. The war ended when the American government
detonated two atomic bombs in Japan that killed massive numbers of civilians, a decision made
largely to assert America’s new status as the world’s leading superpower.
During the Cold War—the standoff between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., the world’s other leading
superpower—the U.S. government tried to frighten the American people by warning of a global
Communist takeover. The government funded coups and right-wing dictatorships around the
world, often deposing democratically-elected Socialist leaders in the process, always with the
claim of protecting democracy and fighting Communism. In reality, the Establishment was trying
to protect its own business interests, ensuring that the world’s leaders would continue to
cooperate with American corporations.
During the 1960s, America experienced an outpouring of pent-up radical frustration. The people
fought for civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights, environmental protection, Native American
reparations, and hundreds of other radical populist causes. In many cases, the government’s
response to its people’s actions was to institute tepid, superficial reforms that didn’t address the
root causes of the problem. For example, the government reformed the voting process to protect
African-Americans’ voting rights, but did nothing about the systematic poverty and racism that
many black people faced every day.
In the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, radicalism seemed to die down in America. But in large part, this was
because the media stopped reporting on popular protests. Meanwhile, the American government,
despite shifting back and forth between Republican and Democratic leaders, enforced a virtually
consistent political agenda, in which welfare was cut back and the military budget increased.
Even after the end of the Cold War, America’s military budget continued to grow. Americans
joined together in record numbers to protest the meeting of the World Trade Organization in
Seattle in 1999, a sign that radicalism wasn’t dead in America.
In the final chapter of the book, Zinn discusses the “war on terror,” during which the government
deployed troops to the Middle East, supposedly to fight Muslim terrorists. Zinn concludes that,
while it’s too soon to see what the American reaction to the war on terror will be, the American
people need to decide if they stand on the side of morality and decency, or if they support
imperialism and military aggression.

Themes from the book:

1. The American People
As its title would suggest, Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States is, above all, a
history of the country from the perspective of the American people. However, when he talks
about the “American people,” Zinn means something very different from “every person who has
ever lived in America.” Zinn is talking specifically about the American people who have the
least power and political representation, and who are least likely to be treated with respect in
their society. At times, Zinn offers a numerical estimate of what he means by “the American
people”—the ninety-nine percent of Americans with the least income (rather than the richest one
percent of Americans, from whose perspective, Zinn claims, most works of history are written).
At other times, Zinn talks about different demographics that, put together, comprise the least
powerful and most commonly ignored American people: African Americans, women,
homosexuals, etc. Most frequently, however, Zinn, an admirer of Marxism, defines the American
people not by their race or gender, but simply by virtue of the fact that they are exploited by the
wealthy, powerful Establishment (see Establishment theme).
Zinn acknowledges that the American people aren’t all alike: they represent thousands of
different religions, ideologies, and experiences. However, he argues that, by virtue of their
common oppression at the hands of the powerful, the American people have in common a certain
view of the world. Indeed, Zinn argues that the American people have almost always opposed
unethical actions and causes that benefit the few at the expense of the many. Throughout
American history, Zinn claims, the people have opposed many of the wars in which their country
has been involved. Most dramatically, the vast majority of American people opposed America’s
involvement in Vietnam during the 1960s and 70s, even before the federal government had
reinstated the draft. This might suggest that the American people opposed intervention in
Vietnam not simply because of self-interest, but because they recognized that the Vietnam War
was morally wrong. Zinn documents many other points in American history when the vast
majority of the American people have opposed government policies that threaten their livelihood
and contradict the principals of equality and fairness.
At times, Zinn admits, the American people have also thrown their support to causes that, in
retrospect, seem bigoted or ill-advised. For instance, during the 19th century, Populist farmers’
opposition to the greed of the East-Coast Establishment was laced with anti-black rhetoric and
violence. Zinn also admits that, during the Mexican-American War, the majority of Americans
supported America’s imperialist aggression in the Southwest, despite the fact that the war
endangered their own lives and was premised on a series of calculated provocations by the
federal government. However, in cases where the American people’s behavior seems to
contradict the left-wing causes that Zinn himself supports, Zinn tends to mitigate these examples.
For instance, in the case of the Mexican-American War, he argues that the jingoistic media
manipulated the American people into voicing their support for a corrupt war that they otherwise
wouldn’t have supported. Zinn further shows that the American people have voiced their support
for left-wing, populist causes that favor the many over the few through riots, demonstrations,
peaceful protests, petitions, and politically-charged works of art. Throughout American history,
he repeatedly argues, the people have consistently used such means to push for freedom,
independence, and skepticism of authority.
Zinn’s vision of American history has not been without its critics, both on the left and the right.
One of the most common criticisms of A People’s History of the United States, voiced by many
prominent historians, is that it paints an overly simplistic, even monolithic view of the American
people. The Pulitzer Prize-winning radical historian Eric Foner, for example, has argued that
Zinn doesn’t pay enough attention to the divisions and changes within the enormous category of
the American people. Zinn spends relatively little time discussing the rise of the middle-class in
the 20th century, nor does he address the strong correlation between poverty and conservative
voting patterns in the past twenty-five years. Similarly, critics have suggested that Zinn
deliberately plays down racial and ethnic conflicts between different working-class groups,
attributing such conflicts to the “manipulations” of the Establishment, rather than the “true”
intentions of the American people. In short, critics suggest, Zinn lumps together many mutually
antagonistic groups, calls them “the American people,” and attributes to them a degree of unity
and solidarity that they never really felt.
Another closely-related criticism of A People’s History of the United States is that Zinn
“intervenes” too much in his own evidence, writing off counterexamples to his arguments
without any proof. He suggests that the American people didn’t truly support the Mexican-
American War, but were only tricked, through propaganda, into supporting it; this claim that
calls into question how Zinn could possibly know what people’s true motives were, and what it
means to believe or support any government action. In spite of its critics, however, A People’s
History of the United States remains an important history text. Even if one accepts that Zinn’s
portrait of the American people is sometimes simplified and idealized, his book may be a
necessary antidote to the vast majority of history textbooks that ignore the common American
people and valorize elites.
Chapter 2 Quotes:
Only one fear was greater than the fear of black rebellion in the new American colonies. That
was the fear that discontented whites would join black slaves to overthrow the existing order. In
the early years of slavery, especially, before racism as a way of thinking was firmly ingrained,
while white indentured servants were often treated as badly as black slaves, there was a
possibility of cooperation.

2. The Establishment
Although Zinn’s book is, first and foremost, about the American people, he argues that American
history is, in large part, about the clashes between the least powerful Americans and their
opposites: powerful, influential, Americans, which Zinn terms the Establishment (and uses
interchangeably with “the elite” and “the rich”). Much like the category of “the American
people,” Zinn’s notion of the Establishment incorporates many different people, groups, and
institutions, sometimes with mutually contradictory agendas. However, Zinn discusses some of
the historical events and trends that have formed a loose coalition between the different members
of the Establishment.
Perhaps the single most important milestone in the history of the Establishment was the alliance
that arose between the federal government and the business community following the end of the
Civil War. In this period, businessmen began donating more and more money to presidential
elections in order to ensure that the government would protect business interests. With the
growth of the business sector in the 19th century, businessmen began funding the university
system, too, ensuring that generations of American college graduates would be trained to accept
the status quo and, implicitly, to honor the interests of the government and the business sector.
Zinn isn’t saying that business, government, and university elites are members of literal
organizations whose goal is to maintain power (although sometimes, he argues, they are). Rather,
he argues that the most powerful people in America, more often than not, have strong incentives
to cooperate with one another, and therefore, they will act in their own best interest by
cooperating. Thus, the common characteristic that unites all members of the Establishment is that
they have power and that they can cooperate with one another, both consciously and
unconsciously, to ensure the continuation of their power.
One of the key strategies that the Establishment has used in the last century is cutting taxes for
the wealthiest Americans; indeed, tax rates for the wealthy have gone down dramatically since
World War Two. Moreover, Zinn shows that some of the key pieces of legislation lowering the
tax rates for the wealthy were proposed by Democratic and Republican senators working
together, confirming the point that powerful people often have more in common with each other
than with the struggling “common man.” By the same token, the Establishment has cut welfare
programs for the working classes in recent decades. While Zinn admits that Democratic
politicians have done more than their Republican counterparts to protect welfare, neither political
party, he argues, has fought for anything more than a “pitiful” increase in welfare, suggesting a
basic “consensus” between Democrats and Republicans, and between all Establishment elites. A
final strategy that the Establishment has used to strengthen itself is to invade and take control
over other countries. In these conflicts, elites ensure that those countries’ resources flow back
into the U.S., benefitting elites far more than they benefit ordinary people. (For more, see
Militarism theme.)
But it’s not enough for the Establishment to fight to ensure its own health, Zinn argues—it must
also work to weaken the American people. Zinn argues that, traditionally, the Establishment has
tried to weaken and divide the American people by pitting different races, especially black
people and white people, against each other. As far back as the colonial period, Zinn shows,
elites deliberately passed laws preventing poor white servants and laborers from associating with
(and, implicitly, befriending) black slaves, partly out of fear that poor whites and black slaves
would rise up against their masters. Indeed, Zinn suggests that racism intensified in the colonial
period because elites took great care to isolate and divide poor whites and slaves. Another key
strategy that the Establishment has used to weaken the American people is to emphasize the
rhetoric of equality and freedom. The American traditions of patriotism, equality, and
meritocracy, Zinn argues, have the effect of masking the true inequalities of American society. In
effect, Establishment rhetoric is the “opiate of the American masses”; it encourages people to
accept their misery, or even blame themselves for it. The Establishment has also weakened the
American people by declaring frequent wars, which have the effect of focusing the people’s
energies outwards, toward other countries, instead of inward, toward the Establishment itself.
At times, Zinn’s discussion of the Establishment can seem overly simplistic. As with his
treatment of the American people, he doesn’t spend much time discussing the divisions and
conflicts within the Establishment. For example, he treats President Franklin Roosevelt as a
typical Establishment figure, rather than discussing the derision that Roosevelt faced from the
wealthy elite for promoting policies to help the poor. Furthermore, Zinn offers no proof that
Democratic politicians who fought for minor welfare reform were cooperating with Republican
members of the Establishment. Zinn’s descriptions give the impression of unity and solidarity
within the Establishment when, in fact, there has been a lot of controversy and competition.
However, Zinn’s treatment of the Establishment gives a sense of the informal cooperation that
sometimes arises between powerful people, and of the growing divide between the rich and the
poor, a theme that has recently become more relevant to American life than ever.
Chapter 9 Quotes:
Under congressional policy approved by Lincoln, the property confiscated during the war under
the Confiscation Act of July 1862 would revert to the heirs of the Confederate owners.

3. Radicalism Vs. Reform

In many ways, Howard Zinn’s version of American history is depressing: again and again, he
shows how the powerful Establishment uses violence and propaganda to thwart the American
people’s efforts to fight for change. However, at times, Zinn acknowledges that American
society has seen significant changes for the better: women won the right to vote, black slaves
won their freedom, and life expectancy and the literacy rate have risen. Zinn often offers a
counterintuitive interpretation of these positive changes. In a Marxist mode, he argues that
changes to American society have been small and relatively superficial, meaning that, ultimately,
they have strengthened the power of the Establishment. In making such an argument, Zinn draws
an important distinction between radical, revolutionary change—that is, fundamental changes to
the system of American society, especially in the arena of property and ownership—and mere
reform (i.e., small changes that do not address the basic injustices of American society). While
reform may benefit people and improve the average American’s quality of life, Zinn argues that
it also staves off the radical change that could transform the people’s live for the better and
instead perpetuates injustice and inequality in America.
Zinn argues that reform staves off radical change in two main ways. First, reform removes some
of the energy and indignation necessary to fuel revolutionary change. For example, the Civil
Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s culminated in the federal government initiating a series
of laws, such as the Voting Rights Act, designed to protect the rights of African Americans. In
Zinn’s terminology, these laws are textbook examples of reform. The Voting Rights Act, for
instance, protected black people’s right to vote, but it did not address the core problems that
African Americans faced in American society, such as their impoverishment, the systematic
discrimination they faced every day, etc. However, the superficial “success” of the Voting Rights
Act took some of the fire out of black activism—some African Americans, thinking that they’d
emerged victorious, stopped fighting for radical change. Thus, in the early 1970s, there was no
national black activist movement comparable with that of the 1960s, which is evidence that
reform had deprived the movement of its full strength. In general, Zinn argues, the result of
reform is to pacify the American people by giving them a tiny portion of what they really want.
Zinn also argues that reform staves off radical change in the sense that reform, because it is
almost always conducted through the federal government, strengthens and legitimates the
structures of the Establishment. For example, in the early 20th century women won the right to
vote. As Zinn sees it, winning the right to vote is a classic example of reform, since women’s
victory did not address the root causes of sexism and misogyny in American society. By voting,
women were effectively “honoring” the American electoral system—a major institution of the
federal government and, therefore, of the Establishment. Throughout the 20th century, women
almost never had the opportunity to vote for a female, or feminist, presidential candidate, since
the Republican and Democratic parties consistently nominated male candidates with moderate,
or sometimes sexist, views on gender politics. In short, the result of voting reform in the early
20th century was that a) women won a superficial, symbolic victory, b) women were not able to
use their right to vote as a way of electing leaders who shared their interests, and, most
importantly of all, c) the institution of voting—and with it, the Establishment itself—won new
respect and loyalty from the female population of the United States. By offering a mild reform
(suffrage) the Establishment boosted its respectability in the eyes of the American people while
sacrificing none of its own power. In general, Zinn argues, reform has the effect of increasing
people’s respect and admiration for the federal government and the Establishment far more than
it increases people’s freedom and economic well-being. As a result, reform staves off radical,
revolutionary change.
It’s important to recognize that Zinn isn’t saying that reform is “good” or “bad”; he’s making a
much more sophisticated argument. In many ways, reform has benefited the American people,
giving them better wages and healthier lives. However, reform has also staved off the equality
and freedom that all Americans deserve. In effect, reform is good, but not good enough.
Chapter 13 Quotes:
What was clear in this period to blacks, to feminists, to labor organizers and socialists, was that
they could not count on the national government. True, this was the "Progressive Period," the
start of the Age of Reform; but it was a reluctant reform, aimed at quieting the popular risings,
not making fundamental changes.
Chapter 24 Quotes:
Clinton claimed to be moderating his policies to match public opinion. But opinion surveys in
the eighties and early nineties indicated that Americans favored bold policies that neither
Democrats nor Republicans were willing to put forward: universal free health care, guaranteed
employment, government help for the poor and homeless, with taxes on the rich and cuts in the
military budget to pay for social programs.

4. Militarism and Conquest

From 1492 onwards, conquest has been one of the key themes of American history. The New
World was founded on Christopher Columbus’s military conquest of Haiti and, in the centuries
that followed, Spanish and English explorers’ bloodthirsty conquest of the Native American
tribes who’d lived in the Americas for thousands of years. Throughout his book, Zinn shows how
militarism—both the literal act of conquering other people with military force, and the more
abstract ideology that celebrates fighting and conquering—has strengthened the American
Establishment and weakened the American people.
Zinn offers a few different senses in which militarism strengthens the Establishment. On the
most literal level, militarism has brought new wealth to the Establishment. Much of the land that
America acquired during the Mexican-American War of the 1840s, for instance, ended up under
the control of powerful railway companies. Even the land that went to poor farmers was often
repossessed by large industrialized agricultural businesses, since many 19th century farmers
struggled to pay their debts. In more recent years, however, militarism has strengthened the
Establishment by bringing it into contact with new markets, plentiful resources, and cheap labor.
Zinn argues that, during most of the Cold War, corporate interests encouraged the American
government to conduct wars in countries where Socialist uprisings threatened corporations’
ability to trade freely. In Vietnam, Chile, Iraq, and dozens of other countries, a major factor in
the government’s decision to go to war was the plentitude of resources. As Zinn sees it, the
federal government wanted to ensure that American businesses would be able to access those
resources. While the government offers many reasons for going to war—including, throughout
the Cold War, the deadly threat of a worldwide Communist takeover—its real reasons are often
much simpler: it wants to protect business.
Militarism doesn’t merely strengthen the Establishment; it also weakens the American people.
By focusing the people’s attention on external threats (such as a global Communist takeover), the
Establishment mitigates popular resistance to its own unjust policies. During World War Two,
for example, labor unions pledged not to go on strike out of support for America’s war with
Germany and Japan. Similarly, war ensures that many young, energetic people are abroad,
fighting for their country, rather than back at home, fighting against their government. Finally,
militarism weakens the American people by bolstering patriotism, making citizens more loyal to
their country and, therefore, to their government.
It’s important to recognize that Zinn isn’t saying that the American government intentionally
starts wars to strengthen itself. (Indeed, Zinn spends several pages refuting one of the most
beloved left-wing conspiracy theories, that Franklin Roosevelt provoked the Japanese attack on
Pearl Harbor in order to enter World War Two). Zinn fully acknowledges that many elites
sincerely believe they’re taking their country to war to protect their own people. Nevertheless,
Zinn argues that, whatever people’s motives for war, the overall effect of war is to strengthen the
Establishment and weaken the American people. Furthermore, Zinn argues that at least some
elites in American history have supported war with the intention of benefitting themselves.
Chapter 9 Quotes:
Under congressional policy approved by Lincoln, the property confiscated during the war under
the Confiscation Act of July 1862 would revert to the heirs of the Confederate owners.
Chapter 22 Quotes:
After the bombing of Iraq began along with the bombardment of public opinion, the polls
showed overwhelming support for Bush's action, and this continued through the six weeks of the
war. But was it an accurate reflection of the citizenry's long-term feelings about war? The split
vote in the polls just before the war reflected a public still thinking its opinion might have an
effect.

5. Bias and Historiography

Howard Zinn’s book is a history of the United States, but it’s also a critique of other books on
the same subject. Zinn argues that many previous histories of the United States haven’t been fair
in their accounts of the past; in particular, they’ve glorified Establishment figures, marginalized
or demonized the contributions of the ordinary American people, and celebrated superficial
reforms for being revolutionary. While Zinn doesn’t offer a full-scale investigation of bias in
American history, he suggests that many historians write biased versions of history because
they’ve gone through an education system that’s funded by the Establishment (see Establishment
theme), and they have been trained to give authority and tradition too much respect. With this in
mind, A People’s History of the United States represents Zinn’s attempt to balance out some of
the more unfortunate biases in American history texts. Because most books marginalize the
American people and overemphasize the Establishment, Zinn chooses to do exactly the opposite.
Unlike many historians, Zinn acknowledges his ideological and political biases upfront: he
writes that he’ll emphasize the American people’s contribution to history. Furthermore, Zinn was
frank about being sympathetic to some of the political ideas of Karl Marx, the founder of
Communism; partly as a result, his book treats history as a conflict between people of different
classes.
In what ways does Zinn’s version of history differ from other, more mainstream versions? At
times, Zinn’s approach is to write about a familiar, well-known historical event, but from an
unfamiliar perspective—that of the persecuted people. When he discusses the “discovery” of
America, for instance, Zinn refrains from glorifying Christopher Columbus in the manner of
most elementary school textbooks. Instead, he draws his readers’ attention to the suffering of the
Arawak Native Americans whom Christopher Columbus murdered, tortured, and kidnapped. At
other points in the book, however, Zinn makes an effort to write about events that are relatively
unfamiliar to the average American, usually because they revolve around working-class people,
and, as a result, have been omitted from history textbooks. Zinn spends many chapters analyzing
the organized labor strikes of the 19th century, which had a profound impact on American
society but which too-rarely show up in student textbooks.
Zinn also avoids the tendency to write about history by concentrating on the lives of a few
important individuals. While his book is full of fascinating people, no single figure in A People’s
History—not even Dr. Martin Luther, Jr. or Abraham Lincoln—is portrayed as having played an
indispensable part in changing the country. Instead, Zinn shows individuals like Lincoln and
King to be responding to the will of the American people. At other times, Zinn’s approach to
history is more abstract; he idealizes alternative visions of society. For example, he devotes
several pages to conveying the beauty and complexity of Native American society before the
arrival of Columbus, and he even posits that Native American society was happier, more
equitable, more democratic, and more stable than European society in the 15th century. By
celebrating the societies that European conquest wiped out in America, Zinn challenges one of
mainstream historians’ most dangerous forms of bias: the assumption that society progresses
over time, and that European society “improved” America by replacing Native American culture
with science and rationality.
Zinn has been criticized by many writers and historians for being too one-sided—deliberately
one-sided, in fact—in his account of American history. However, Zinn is open about his biases,
and in interviews and other books, he repeatedly said that he didn’t want A People’s History of
the United States to become the “last word” on American history (especially given his practices
of ignoring contrary evidence and speculating about people’s motives without grounds). Rather,
Zinn wanted students to put his text into conversation with other, more mainstream history
books, so that his work could balance out the bias in other books. If he were alive today, Zinn
probably wouldn’t appreciate that college students still treat A People’s History like the
unimpeachable truth, rather than as a primer designed to help them learn about American history
and question their biases.
Chapter 11 Quotes:
Meanwhile, the government of the United States was behaving almost exactly as Karl Marx
described a capitalist state: pretending neutrality to maintain order, but serving the interests of
the rich. Not that the rich agreed among themselves; they had disputes over policies. But the
purpose of the state was to settle upper-class disputes peacefully, control lower-class rebellion,
and adopt policies that would further the long-range stability of the system. The arrangement
between Democrats and Republicans to elect Rutherford Hayes in 1877 set the tone. Whether
Democrats or Republicans won, national policy would not change in any important way.
Chapter 23 Quotes:
The great problem would be to work out a way of accomplishing this without a centralized
bureaucracy, using not the incentives of prison and punishment, but those incentives of
cooperation which spring from natural human desires, which in the past have been used by the
state in times of war, but also by social movements that gave hints of how people might behave
in different conditions. Decisions would be made by small groups of people in their workplaces,
their neighborhoods—a network of cooperatives, in communication with one another, a
neighborly socialism avoiding the class hierarchies of capitalism and the harsh dictatorships that
have taken the name "socialist."