In this new view of the greatest historian of the nineteenth century, historian Wills showcases Henry Adams's little-known but seminal study of the early United States and elicits from it fresh insights on the paradoxes that roil America to this day. Adams drew on his own southern fixation, extensive foreign travel, political service in Lincoln's White House, and much more to invent the study of history as we know it. His chronicle established new standards for employing archival sources, firsthand reportage, eyewitness accounts, and other techniques that have become the essence of modern history. Adams's innovations went beyond the technical; he posited an ironic view of the legacy of Jefferson and Madison: they strove to shield the young country from "foreign entanglements," a standing army, a central bank, and a federal bureaucracy, among other hallmarks of "big government"--yet by the end of their tenures they had permanently entrenched all of these things in American society. This is the "American paradox" that defines us today.--From publisher description.