"Wide Awake": A Civil War lesson for today's political turmoil

Think America is headed for another civil war? You might not after this episode. The war, and Abraham Lincoln’s election, owe a lot to a paramilitary youth movement called the Wide Awakes. It fired up the struggling Republican Party, long before it became “anti-woke”, uniting all kinds of Americans against the corrupt, pro-slavery Democratic Party. Supporters ranged from future Klansmen to free Blacks, all fighting for the same cause. Smithsonian curator Jon Grinspan tells the story in his new book, “Wide Awake: The Forgotten Force that Elected Lincoln and Spurred the Civil War”. It’s astonishing how much Americans don’t know about our history, but this will change your perspective on where the country is headed.

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