Bind Us Apart: How Enlightened Americans Invented Racial Segregation

Why did the Founding Fathers fail to include blacks and Indians in their cherished proposition that "all men are created equal"? The usual answer is racism, but the reality is more complex and unsettling. In Bind Us Apart, historian Nicholas Guyatt argues that, from the Revolution through the Civil War, most white liberals believed in the unity of all human beings. But their philosophy faltered when it came to the practical work of forging a color-blind society. Unable to convince others-an...