Good-bye, Machiavelli

by Bernard W. Wishy

From the formation of the first American colony at Jamestown in 1607 through the Reagan "revolution" and beyond, Americans have struggled with two opposing dreams: unlimited growth and escape from big government. Bernard Wishy here provides the first comprehensive study of how we have alternately pursued, won, lost, debated, and reclaimed those dreams during almost four centuries of American life. Rich in deep historical and political insight and refreshingly nonpartisan, Good-bye, Machiavelli traces the distinctly American tension between government growth - in tandem with economic, demographic, and geographic expansion - and our contradictory distrust of such activity as hostile to free enterprise and the Jeffersonian ideal of minimal government.