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History News Network

History News Network puts current events into historical perspective. Subscribe to our newsletter for new perspectives on the ways history continues to resonate in the present. Explore our archive of thousands of original op-eds and curated stories from around the web. Join us to learn more about the past, now.

Roundup Top 10!


Gun-rights advocates are right that violent films encourage school shootings. They’re wrong about how.

by Matthew Christopher Hulbert

The problem isn't the violence — it's the celebration of gun culture.


Why Are Conservatives So Obsessed With Gun Rights Anyway?

by John Ehrenreich

Belief in gun rights hasn’t always been a conservative ideology. Psychology helps explain how it took off.


Realistic Ambitions

by Michael Kazin

Can today’s liberals hope to match the achievements of LBJ’s presidency?


The lesson of Rosenstrasse at 75

by Nathan Stoltzfus and Mordecai Paldiel

German wives who protested attacks on their Jewish husbands in 1943 show that even authoritarians like Hitler can be influenced by mass action.


How the devastating 1918 flu pandemic helped advance US women’s rights

by Christine Crudo Blackburn, Gerald W. Parker and Morten Wendelbo

By disproportionately affecting young men, the virus, in combination with World War I, created a shortage of labor – filled by women.


When Emancipation Finally Came, Slave Markets Took on a Redemptive Purpose

by Jonathan W. White

During the Civil War, the jails that held the enslaved imprisoned Confederate soldiers. After, they became rallying points for a newly empowered community.


If this is what conservatism has become, count me out

by Max Boot

Principled conservativism continues to exist, primarily at small journals of opinion, but it is increasingly disconnected from the stuff that thrills the masses.


History Trumps Hyperbole

by Scot Faulkner

The outrage over foreign meddling in America’s political system is justified. Declaring it the worst ever experienced is not.


The NRA Wasn’t Always A Front For Gun Makers

by Neil J. Young

The NRA operated mostly as a sporting club and hunting association for its first 100 years.


Reagan was the Gipper. Trump is the grifter.

by Max Boot

During the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump acolytes claimed that he was the second coming of Ronald Reagan. A perfectly plausible proposition, if you know nothing about Reagan or Trump.