Trisha Posey

We the Fallen People

Ethics, Culture & Social Issues

“Tracy McKenzie has managed to do what few historians can—make the seemingly familiar story of American democracy unfamiliar. We the Fallen People leads the reader on a journey to some of the most important events and places that shaped American democracy—the creation of the Constitution, the rise of Jacksonian democracy, and the cultural and political landscape of Tocqueville's Democracy in America. In this passage through the American past, McKenzie demonstrates how many Americans have idolized democracy as an intrinsically positive good, often to their own detriment and the destruction of others. Calling on Americans to replace faith in democracy with a Tocquevillian hope for democracy, McKenzie challenges his readers to hold the same sort of skepticism of human goodness that guided the Founding Fathers. In doing so, he reminds us that the greatest threat to democracy is not a foreign power or domestic political enemy but ourselves.”