The La Follettes of Wisconsin: Love and Politics in Progressive America

Description

Dynastic political families have been an American tradition since the birth of the Republic. Indeed, a good part of our entire political history could be written simply by setting out the family stories of the Adamses, Roosevelts, Longs, and Kennedys. To that illustrious list must be added the La Follettes of Wisconsin, and they are brought vividly to life as never before in this collective biography by veteran journalist Bernard Weisberger. Magnetic, theatrical, intensely loved and passionately denounced, Robert Marion "Fighting Bob" La Follette was the rebel knight of the Progressive vanguard and a family patriarch in the larger-than-life tradition of Joe Kennedy. As governor of Wisconsin (1901–1906) and U.S. Senator (1906–1925) he battled uncompromisingly for his vision of democracy—an idealistic mixture of informed citizenry and enlightened public servants combining to produce a utopian egalitarianism. By contrast, the private man, often isolated and...