Margaret Thatcher and the free-market revival in Britain

“The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.”

– Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Thatcher was the first woman to become the prime minister of the United Kingdom. She was also the country’s longest-serving prime minister in the twentieth century. But she is known more for her conservative leadership, particularly in her fiscal conservatism and tough foreign policy. Decades’ worth of socialism in Britain came to a halt in Margaret Thatcher’s economic revolution. The socialism would later return with a vengeance, but she did temporarily return Britain to the free-market principles of the Scottish economist Adam Smith. She would briefly fight a war in the Falklands – one of the few sources of friction in her relationship with Ronald Reagan. (The other was Ronald Reagan’s deploying troops to Grenada, which still had Queen Elizabeth the Second as its nominal monarch.) Overall, though, Thatcher’s relationship with Ronald Reagan would be a good one, and is rightly remembered fondly in both nations. The two leaders also helped to turn the tide of the Cold War in the free world’s favor, as the Berlin Wall fell during Margaret Thatcher’s tenure. The year after Thatcher left office, the Soviet Union would collapse entirely in 1991.

Margaret Thatcher

A review of Ken Burns’ “The Roosevelts: An Intimate History”

A miniseries covering Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and Eleanor Roosevelt

Just as the Americans remember Mr. Churchill, so do the British remember Mr. Roosevelt. But when people in Britain hear the name “Roosevelt,” they tend to think of Franklin Roosevelt, the man who led the United States during World War II. Many in Britain don’t even realize that there was another “Roosevelt” president before him. That is, there was Theodore Roosevelt, in the early twentieth century. Theodore Roosevelt is a little more famous in America than he is abroad. Nonetheless, even Americans will hear the word “Roosevelt,” and instead think of his fifth cousin Franklin Roosevelt. There were two famous divisions of the Roosevelt family, of which this documentary makes extensive note. One was the “Oyster Bay Roosevelts,” the branch that produced Theodore Roosevelt. The other was the “Hyde Park Roosevelts,” the branch that produced FDR. But there was another Roosevelt who was one of the bridges between these two branches – although there were other marriages between the branches. That is, there was Eleanor Roosevelt. She was born into the “Oyster Bay Roosevelts” as Theodore Roosevelt’s niece. But she married into the “Hyde Park Roosevelts,” when she married FDR – her own fifth cousin once removed. These are the three principal characters of the story.

A review of PBS’s “Eleanor Roosevelt” movie

“A snub is the effort of a person who feels superior to make someone else feel inferior. To do so, he has to find someone who can be made to feel inferior.”

– Eleanor Roosevelt, at a White House press conference in 1935 – speaking of how a UC-Berkeley professor had refused to host an event where her husband’s Secretary of Labor gave a speech at the school’s Charter Day (often quoted as “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent”)

The longest-serving First Lady in American history …

She is the longest-serving First Lady in American history. Her famous husband was elected to four terms (even if he didn’t complete the last one), so she served for 12 years as First Lady – far longer than anyone else! This film is the longest PBS documentary to focus specifically on her life. She was also one of the three protagonists in Ken Burns’ “The Roosevelts: An Intimate History,” which I have not seen. But there were two other main characters in that series, which were Franklin Roosevelt and Theodore Roosevelt – the latter of whom was much earlier than either Franklin or Eleanor. Thus, to your pain or pleasure, the Ken Burns series focuses on others besides her. By contrast, this PBS documentary focuses entirely on her, and spends two and a half hours on her life story. There’s an advantage to their focusing entirely on one person, even if their coverage is still comparatively short in this regard.

A review of Mary Wollstonecraft’s “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman” (audiobook)

Mary Wollstonecraft was one of the founding feminist philosophers. Her 1792 work “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman” is one of the classic works on women’s rights. It is still quoted today. But during her lifetime, she was known more for her passionate personal relationships than she was for her writing. For example, she had two ill-fated affairs (one of which produced an illegitimate child), before finally marrying the anarchist philosopher William Godwin. But unlike her eventual husband, Mary Wollstonecraft was no anarchist. She was instead an unapologetic feminist, whose works would have a lasting impact on feminist theory.

Mary Wollstonecraft

The Fourteenth Amendment is something of a mixed bag …

It might seem strange to say it today, but the “Bill of Rights” amendments were once understood to apply only to the federal government, rather than to the states as well. This was a particular problem when you consider that the states had (at times) denied these protections to African Americans (and others), even after the abolition of slavery by the Thirteenth Amendment.

First page of the Fourteenth Amendment

A review of Bettany Hughes’ “The Spartans”

“Athens became the seat of politeness and taste, the country of orators and philosophers. The elegance of its buildings equalled that of its language; on every side might be seen marble and canvas, animated by the hands of the most skilful artists. From Athens we derive those astonishing performances, which will serve as models to every corrupt age. The picture of Lacedæmon [a. k. a. “Sparta”] is not so highly coloured. There, the neighbouring nations used to say, ‘men were born virtuous, their native air seeming to inspire them with virtue.’ But its inhabitants have left us nothing but the memory of their heroic actions: monuments that should not count for less in our eyes than the most curious relics of Athenian marble.”

– Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “A Discourse on the Arts and Sciences” (1750), First Part

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, an eighteenth-century admirer of the Spartans

A number of people have praised the Spartans – including Rousseau, Machiavelli, and Hitler …

Many centuries after the Spartans, Jean-Jacques Rousseau once praised their culture in his “Discourse on the Arts and Sciences.” He said that the memory of Sparta's heroic actions “should not count for less in our eyes than the most curious relics of Athenian marble” (as cited above). Niccolò Machiavelli was another philosopher who praised the Spartans. (See the footnote to this blog post for the details of this.) American colonists and French revolutionaries have sometimes been among those who praised the Spartans. In modern times, some liberals have also praised Sparta for what they perceive as its “greater respect” for women’s rights. And, as the presenter of this documentary notes, Adolf Hitler also praised the Spartans, with Nazi Germany using them as a model of sorts – particularly in their use of eugenics. (See the Wikipedia page on “Laconophilia,” or the “love of Sparta,” for some of the details of this.)

Adolf Hitler, a twentieth-century admirer of the Spartans

… while Alexander Hamilton considered Sparta to be “little better than a wellregulated camp”

Ironically, Sparta was admired even by some from its arch-rival Athens, the other great superpower of Ancient Greece. The Spartans actually believed that they were creating a “utopia.” But if anything, it seems to have been closer to the other end of the spectrum – a dystopia. Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers that “Sparta, Athens, Rome, and Carthage were all republics; two of them, Athens and Carthage, of the commercial kind. Yet were they as often engaged in wars, offensive and defensive, as the neighboring monarchies of the same times. Sparta was little better than a wellregulated camp; and Rome was never sated of carnage and conquest.” (Source: Federalist No. 6) Thus, although he recognized Sparta as a “republic,” Hamilton considered Sparta to be “little better than a wellregulated camp” (an accurate summation). This documentary shows that the truth about Sparta is less romantic, and far less flattering, than the description offered by Rousseau. It acknowledges the rights of women in Sparta, even as it repeats tired old myths about how women actually had more rights in Sparta than they did in Athens (although I should acknowledge that they were still second-class citizens in both). But as this documentary notes, Sparta was “no feminist paradise.” It was a hellish dystopia (as mentioned earlier), with no real concept of human rights. It killed those boys that it deemed “weak,” denying them any future chance to redeem themselves for the unforgivable “crime” of weakness.

Jean-Pierre Saint-Ours’s “The Selection of Children in Sparta,” painted 1785

A review of Ken Burns’ “Prohibition” (PBS)

“After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited. The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.”

“This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the Legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.”

– Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution (ratified 1919), later repealed by the Twenty-First Amendment in 1933

At the time that I write this, I have watched more than 20 documentaries by Ken Burns. These include some of his better-known films (like “The Civil War,” “Baseball,” and “Jazz”), and lesser-known films like “Huey Long,” “Frank Lloyd Wright,” “The Dust Bowl,” and “The Shakers: Hands to Work, Hearts to God” (one of his earliest films). I am a big fan of many of them, but my reaction to his series about Prohibition was somewhat more mixed. As storytelling goes, the film definitely works, since it tells everything from the story of the two amendments that are relevant to this story, to the gang violence of infamous mobsters like Al Capone (whose story makes for great television). I am also fascinated by the “Jazz Age” that was going on concurrently with Prohibition, so I thus love the soundtrack for this film. (It includes both period recordings, and original jazz pieces from Wynton Marsalis and his group.) But I also found this film somewhat biased, since it ignores much evidence that Prohibition was actually working at this time. The traditional telling of Prohibition is that it “didn't work,” and that making alcohol illegal also increases the amount of “crime” associated with it. Ken Burns' telling is decidedly in this tradition, and comes across as anti-Prohibition propaganda, which is not always objective in its conclusions.

A review of “Queen Victoria's Empire” (PBS Empires)

“ ♪ Rule, Britannia!
Britannia, rule the waves.
And Britons never, never, never shall be slaves. ♪ ”

– “Rule, Britannia!” (1740), a British patriotic song written decades before Queen Victoria was born

At the height of the British Empire, it was the largest empire in the history of the world. Its geography was so widespread that people often commented that the sun “never set” on its borders. Actually, it is not the only empire in history to be described in this way, but it may still be the most prominent of them. The British Empire actually predates Queen Victoria's reign by some centuries, with its “first empire” going from 1583 to 1783 (the year that they lost America). The “second empire” went from 1783 to 1815, the year that the Napoleonic Wars ended. But a number of historians believe that Britain's “imperial century” was from 1815 to 1914, the year that World War One began. Queen Victoria reigned for more than half of this latter period, as it turns out, and was alive for an even larger share of it – part of which was before she assumed the throne in 1837. Thus, historians sometimes refer to this empire as “Queen Victoria's” empire, and to this era of British history as the “Victorian era.”

A review of PBS's “Catherine the Great”

Warning: This post contains some mature themes in it. Although I have tried to cover them tastefully, there's no way to take them out – they are too prominent in this story.

Catherine the Great

Before I watched this documentary, I had seen parts of the 1995 television movie “Catherine the Great,” starring Catherine Zeta-Jones in the title role. I fast-forwarded through certain bedroom scenes, but this film did have a good dose of politics and intrigue as well. Indeed, this aspect of the story was the part that I most wanted to learn about. This is part of why I wanted to see this other film in the first place, in fact. This PBS documentary (starting Emily Bruni) turned out to be as good as expected, but it also had many surprises for me.

How is Catherine's personal life connected with her political life?

Because of my prior experience with the Catherine Zeta-Jones movie, I was not too surprised to learn that Catherine was somewhat loose in her personal life. But the degree to which her life was a soap opera was something that I did not expect. Indeed, one cannot leave it out of the story, even if politics and intrigue are the primary focus. Her personal life is a part of the political story; and is almost inseparable from it. Thus, a few comments about Catherine's personal life may be warranted here, to help explain why it played such a prominent role in her life. This will also help to shed some light on what kind of film this is.

The future Catherine the Great, in an equestrian portrait

A review of PBS's “The Great War” (American Experience)

“We [the German government] intend to begin on the first of February unrestricted submarine warfare. We shall endeavor in spite of this to keep the United States of America neutral. In the event of this not succeeding, we make Mexico a proposal of alliance on the following basis: make war together, make peace together, generous financial support and an understanding on our part that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.”

– Zimmermann Telegram (1917), one of the events that led to the American entry into World War One

President Woodrow Wilson walked a tightrope during the early years of World War One, trying to steer a middle course between full neutrality and full involvement. Of course, Americans did not declare war on Germany until April 1917, and waited even longer than that to send troops to Europe. But even at the beginning of the war in 1914, most Americans did not want the Germans to win, and some of them actually sold food (and sometimes weapons) to the Allied nations. There was a massive peace movement before America officially got involved, and PBS makes sure to cover it here. But there were also many supporters of getting involved sooner - and this, too, receives some good coverage from PBS. Among the supporters of earlier American involvement was the former president Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt was a major critic of Wilson for his perceived lack of muscle in this struggle - a correct perception. But Wilson was also criticized by the peace movement for supporting aid to Britain and France. Thus, he was having a hard time walking this tightrope within his own party. Unfortunately for Wilson, this balancing act would prove even harder when the Germans sank the RMS Lusitania in 1915.

Sinking of the RMS Lusitania, 7 May 1915

Who can vote in the United States?: The voting rights amendments

" ... that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

- Closing lines of Abraham Lincoln's "Gettysburg Address" (November 19, 1863)

Many Americans have historically been denied the vote in this country ...

Voting rights are one of the most important rights that anyone can have in a free country. They are a right by which many others can be defended, and the essence of popular government in democracies and republics. But voting rights were long restricted in this country to white male citizens who had private property, and who were 21 years of age or older. They could be denied for failure to pay poll taxes, for having ancestors that had been enslaved, or for any number of other things that were used as restrictions on the right to vote.

Frederick Douglass, a notable advocate of African American voting rights

... and the changes in these policies were made somewhat gradually over a period of decades

It took a long time for this situation to be rectified, and the changes brought herein were made somewhat gradually over a period of some decades. Thus, it would seem appropriate to review them now, and show what categories are forbidden to be used as legal grounds for denying people the right to vote. (I should acknowledge that some would classify the Twenty-Third Amendment as a voting rights amendment as well; but since this amendment is more relevant to the electoral college than it is to individual suffrage, I have saved that discussion for another post. I will focus this post instead on the four amendments about voting rights at the individual level.)

Martin Luther King, another notable advocate of African American voting rights

A review of David Starkey's “Elizabeth”

Queen Elizabeth the First

The most powerful queen in English history

Elizabeth the First may well be the most powerful queen in English history, because she held actual political power in a way that most later queens of England did not. Victoria and Elizabeth the Second had their power limited by the British Constitution to a degree that Elizabeth the First did not. All of them had to contend with Parliament, it is true; but the monarchy still had real power in the years that we today call the "Elizabethan Era." This power was all the greater when the state religion was still under royal control. Just years before this, you see, the church had actually been under the control of the Vatican in faraway Rome. But her father's divorce from his Catholic wife had brought him the ire of the Catholic Church, and led to England's conversion to the new Protestant faith - a faith led by the monarch personally during the lifetime of Elizabeth.

King Henry the Eighth, Elizabeth's father

A review of David Starkey's “The Six Wives of Henry VIII”

Warning: This post contains some mature themes in it. Although I have tried to discuss them tastefully, there's no way to take them out of this story - it's Henry the Eighth, after all.

The three things you're not supposed to talk about at a party (and they're all here)

It's been said that there are three things that one should not talk about at a party - sex, politics, and religion. The story of Henry the Eighth is, at once, about all of these things - a story that began as being about marriage and intimacy, but ended up as a story about state religion and world geopolitics. It changed England from a Catholic country to a Protestant country, and had massive repercussions for generations to come.

King Henry the Eighth

A review of PBS's “Dolley Madison” movie

Most women who marry heads-of-state seem forever destined to languish in obscurity. They are usually known by those who study their husbands' lives, but few are ever fortunate enough to escape the shadows of their husbands. They seem relegated to some kind of second-class status in the history books, unfortunately, and the role that they play in the success of their husbands' administrations is too often forgotten by history. Dolley Madison is a fortunate exception to this pattern, and one surmises that if PBS did something about her life without a comparable film about her husband's life, they must consider her pretty important (and rightly so). Their neglect of her husband James Madison strikes one as somewhat strange, I must admit, since he is the Father of the Constitution and a prominent Founding Father. Nonetheless, it is fortunate that they did not treat his wife with the same neglect that they treated him, and there is enough in this film (I think) about both individuals to satisfy fans of either one.

Dolley Madison

A review of PBS's “The Abolitionists”

"No person held to service or labour [a. k. a. "slavery"] in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labour, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labour may be due."

- Article 4, Section 2, Paragraph 3 of the original Constitution  (a. k. a. the "Fugitive Slave Clause"), later superseded by the abolition of slavery by the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865

The meaning of the word "abolitionist" was kept secret from slaves ...

The future abolitionist Frederick Douglass was a young slave boy when he first heard the word "abolitionist." He said it was some time before he found out what the word meant, even though "it was always used in such connections as to make it an interesting word to [him] ... If a slave ran away and succeeded in getting clear, or if a slave killed his master, set fire to a barn, or did any thing very wrong in the mind of a slaveholder, it was spoken of as the fruit of abolition." He did not dare to ask any one about its meaning, he said, because he was "satisfied that it was something that they wanted [him] to know very little about." The dictionary afforded him little or no help, because it said only that it was "the act of abolishing," without mentioning what it was that was to be "abolished." (He was entirely correct that his masters didn't want him to know about it, and would have punished him severely if he had made any inquiries to them about its meaning.)

Frederick Douglass

... because it referred to the abolition of slavery

Thus, it was not until later that he finally discovered the mysterious secret of the word's meaning: "I got one of our city papers," Douglass said later, "containing an account of the number of petitions from the north, praying for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, and of the slave trade between the States." (He was a literate man, it should be noted; in an age when slaves who knew how to read could be punished severely for the "offense" of literacy. He was thus one of a number of slaves who risked their lives just for the knowledge of learning how to read.) "From this time," he said, "I understood the words abolition and abolitionist, and always drew near when that word was spoken, expecting to hear something of importance to myself and [my] fellow-slaves." This early encounter with the abolitionist movement for Frederick Douglass, although brief, would have an enormous effect on his life; giving him the courage to escape from slavery once and for all, even after a first escape attempt had resulted in severe punishment. He also joined the abolitionist movement as one of its most distinguished supporters - contributing much to the cause of black freedom, before and after the Civil War.

A review of PBS’s “Not for Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony”

"Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of Electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State."

- Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution (ratified 1868), Section 2 - a major barrier to the enactment of women's suffrage before the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment, because of the word "male"

I had a sort of request from one of my female readers to do something about women's history. Up until that point, I had thought that women would not like hearing things about women's history coming from a man (such as myself); but considered at that point that women might also dislike the idea of their history being left out - which is not a fair perception for my particular blog, I might suggest (since I have talked about it indirectly, in posts about other things), but one that might be perceived nonetheless on the part of some women, if I didn't actually go out and write something specifically on women's history. Thinking "darned if I do, darned if I don't" (or something along those lines), I thought "What the heck?", and decided to write about women's history after all. (If you don't like the idea of women's history written by a man, then by all means, don't read this; but if you're not bothered by the masculine coverage of feminine history, then you're entirely welcome to read this post.)

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony: The central figures of this documentary

Thus, I set out to write a post about two of the great feminists of the women's suffrage movement, which are Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. These were both depicted in a Ken Burns film called "Not for Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony" (which was later broadcast on PBS). I imagine that Ken Burns and writer Geoffrey C. Ward (both men) also found themselves in the same uncomfortable position that I described for myself, which may have been why they dedicated this film to their daughters, and the other women in their lives. In that same spirit, I set out to give my review of this film; perhaps one that will be read by my future children and other descendants - which will likely include females, who will wonder what I said about their gender's history; and who I cannot let myself disappoint in my coverage here.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton with her two sons, 1848

Susan B. Anthony, 1848

A review of PBS's “Marie Antoinette” movie

"Qu'ils mangent de la brioche." ("Let them eat cakes.")

- The infamous Marie Antoinette line that Marie Antoinette may never have actually said

Other media about Marie Antoinette

Ever since her execution during the French Revolution, Queen Marie Antoinette of France has excited the public imagination. There have been numerous movies about her - including a Hollywood movie from 2006 starring Kirsten Dunst, which I have not seen. These numerous movies may be a measure of how much interest she continues to excite. Generations since then have tried to understand her, and have found that she - like the French Revolution against her - is more complicated than she (at first) appears. It's hard to come up with a simple explanation for why she acted the way she did (and why the public reaction to her was so violent - even bloodthirsty), and I don't pretend to have all the answers here. The documentary that I'm about to review doesn't have all the answers, either; but it does provide a good starting point for understanding Marie Antoinette. It may also be able to provide some useful information about whether the PBS biography movie is a good film for you. It's not for everyone, I should make clear; but for those with an interest in history - and, perhaps, with a strong stomach to go with it - this is a tale that you can learn something from, which tells you a lot about the complicated history of this time.

Francis I - Holy Roman Emperor, King of Germany, and father of Marie Antoinette

A review of “Abraham and Mary Lincoln: A House Divided”

" 'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved; I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other."

- Abraham Lincoln's "House Divided" speech (1858)

I have seen a lot of PBS's presidential biographies, and many of them are compelling indeed. But my personal favorite would have to be this one about Abraham Lincoln. Technically, it is not a biography of Abraham alone, as it is also about his wife Mary. (Witness the title: "Abraham and Mary Lincoln: A House Divided.") But telling the story of either is also to tell the story of the other; and weaving them together as they are woven here, one gets a great view of both of them, especially during Lincoln's presidency.

Abraham Lincoln

Mary Todd Lincoln