A clear-eyed yet hopeful history of the United States, revisiting the state of the union every fifty years since America's birth

America is the rare country that was founded on an idea, and it was a truly radical idea for its time: the belief that the people of a country could govern themselves.

The Flag Was Still There offers a unique new narrative of the American Experiment. By focusing on five remarkable years-1776, 1826, 1876, 1926, and 1976-and with an eye to America's 250th birthday, David McKean and M. Todd Bennett explore how the United States has sustained its founding idea. Each of these moments found the United States at an inflection point between progress and backlash. The centennial saw a country still struggling to confront the Civil War's legacy, culminating in the betrayal of Reconstruction and the birth of the Jim Crow era. In 1926, virulent nativism was at a peak, and a reascendant Ku Klux Klan marched on Washington. The bicentennial was marked by economic turmoil, post-Watergate political malaise, and the still-fresh wounds of the Vietnam War.

America has yet to fully realize its founding principles. But as The Flag Was Still There reminds us, Americans have always striven to defend, renew, and extend the nation's promise-an idealism that continues to this day.

David McKean is the former US ambassador to Luxembourg and was director of policy planning in the Department of State. The author or coauthor of six previous books, he divides his time between Washington, DC, New Hampshire, and North Carolina.

M. Todd Bennett is a professor of history at East Carolina University. He was formerly a historian at the US Department of State. The author of two previous books, he lives in Washington, DC.