Declarations of Independence: Cross-Examining American Ideology

by Howard Zinn

The acclaimed author of "A People's History of the United States" (more than 200,000 copies sold) presents an honest and piercing look at American political ideology."A shotgun blast of revisionism that aims to shatter all the comfortable myths of American political discourse." "--Los Angeles Times"

Genres: History, Politics, Nonfiction, American History, Philosophy, American, Essays

341 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Howard Zinn was an American historian, playwright, philosopher, socialist intellectual and World War II veteran. He was chair of the history and social sciences department at Spelman College, and a political science professor at Boston University. Zinn wrote more than 20 books, including his best-selling and influential A People's History of the United States in 1980. In 2007, he published a version of it for younger readers, A Young People's History of the United States.

Zinn described himself as "something of an anarchist, something of a socialist. Maybe a democratic socialist." He wrote extensively about the civil rights movement, the anti-war movement and labor history of the United States. His memoir, You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train (Beacon Press, 1994), was also the title of a 2004 documentary about Zinn's life and work. Zinn died of a heart attack in 2010, at the age of 87.

Reviews

[Lobstergirl · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lovely book. I took 6 pages of notes.

This captures the essence of Zinn:

“Why should we cherish “objectivity”, as if ideas were innocent, as if they don’t serve on interest or another? Surely, we want to be objective if that means telling the truth as we see it, not concealing information that may be embarrassing to our point of view. But we don’t want to be objective if it means pretending that ideas don’t play a part in the social struggles of our time, that we don’t take sides in those struggles.
Indeed, it is impossible to be neutral. In a world already moving in certain directions, where wealth and power are already distributed in certain ways, neutrality means accepting the way things are now. It is a world of clashing interests – war against peace, nationalism against internationalism, equality against greed, and democracy against elitism – and it seems to me both impossible and undesirable to be neutral in those conflicts.”

[JP · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my first foray into personal reading for academic enrichment, and it literally changed my perspective on the world.

This book, like his sweeping People's History - which I have yet to read - is a very compelling, very provocative look at some of the American mythos, but unlike that book, is much more pointed in its arguments. Is Capitalism good? Well, most people in America say "yes". I also say "yes", but not without acknowledging that it can have devastating effects on everyone involved in the system (or, for that matter, excluded from the system). It's a good thing to keep in mind while you listen to blowhards preaching from their soapbox that capitalism made us the best country in the world and that anyone who doesn't like pure, free-market capitalism doesn't like freedom. If you think capitalism is the be-all, end-all, I recommend this book.

Is it ever justified to go to war? Well... I thought so. It's hard to think, as a 19 year old boy (which I was when I read this book), that WWII, the fight against the true "Axis of Evil" might not have been necessary. It was hard for Zinn, too. Howard Zinn was a bombadier in WWII, dropping bombs out of airplanes for the forces of democracy; or so he thought. Zinn's powerful realization that war is never just; that people never deserve to be slaughtered like they were in the total war that was WWII; that the picture of peace as weak is a form of control... He shares that powerful realization through this book. If you grew up thinking that the "free world" needed us, and that we acted justly in WWII, I recommend this book.

Zinn is a communist, and he makes no point in denying that. What he DOES deny is that he ever loved the USSR. He points out the inconsistencies and perversions to which communism has been subjected over the course of the 20th century. If you've ever thought that communism is synonymous with the PRC or the USSR, I recommend this book.

Zinn tackles our founding myths. He looks at how the government was crafted by the white man, for the white man. The first amendment makes sense until you start to unpack some of the context in which it was established. Some of this will be a review for Americans who have grown up with modern US history curricula focusing on slavery and the constitutional limitations of blacks, but some will be surprised to learn about the red-lining and continued discrimination which still plagues our "post-racial" society. If you think we're a force for freedom and democracy in the world, I recommend this book.

I haven't read it in a while, and reviewing this book now has brought back some memories that I hadn't clearly remembered before. I'm gonna have to sit down and re-read it again.

Entertainment: 1 Star
Education: 1 Star
Thesis: 1 Star
Readability: 1 Star
Inspiration: 1 Star

[Rocky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Damngus. What a banger. A very critical and insightful look at American Ideology. One of those books that makes you realize you didn’t learn anything in high school history class. From the atomic bomb, to untold labor struggles, to the myth of 1st amendment. Even has a sprinkling of pro-anarchist sentiment which I love to see. I feel like it was convoluted at spots, and some of the examples were brought up and dismissed too quickly for them to have any lasting impact. So not 5/5. But very close.

[Andrew Marr · Rating 4 out of 5]

A clearly written, trenchant & disturbing analysis about how the "freedoms" of US citizens (not to speak of the citizens of other countries) actually work out, or don't work out, except sporadically and unpredictably. This is a call for all of us to take responsibility for our lives and for our country. As a religious person, I see the thoughts of this book leading to deeper issues. First of all, the discipline of genuine peacefulness in witnessing to the truth. Much of this book shows how difficult it is for people in power to willingly grant freedom to other people if it requires any hint of self-sacrifice for the sake of others. All of us have to examine ourselves very deeply about this.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some thoughts from America's pre-eminent revisionist. I admire his conviction, despite the fact he's a communist.

[Twilight O. ☭ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Friedrich Nietzsche famously proclaimed that we ought to philosophize with hammers; Howard Zinn wrote history with one.

By philosophizing with a hammer, Nietzsche intended to test society's idols, to see which were sound and which were hollow. In Nietzsche's hands, the hammer is a musical instrument. In the hands of Zinn, the hammer is a sledge, used to break up the shoddy ideological foundation on which society bases itself. In truth, the essay collection is a form perhaps more fitting to Zinn's ambitions and practice than the history textbook. A People's History worked towards a comprehensive retelling of American history while this book takes aim at its central mythological pillars. As a result, the effect of each book is rather different. A People's History often feels like an exercise in moralizing, Declarations of Independence is fierce.

I don't mean to set this up as a hipster alternative to the more famous text, although I'll admit I have fun in framing things that way. They're different books with different aims and the World is better off with both of them in it. My only point is that I know plenty of people who've read a People's History and loaded up on facts to guilt trip people with, but Declarations of Independence prepares the reader to take those facts and put them to good use. They work rather well as companion pieces, it's simply that I think that Declarations of Independence is the more crucial half.

To be blunt, A People's History makes you feel good. Sure, it makes you feel bad about American history, but it feels incredible for you having read it. You feel as though you've stumbled onto hidden truth, which in a way you have. Armed with this information, however, it's very easy to simply get up on a moral high horse, especially if you're well-meaning but well-to-do middle-class white kid like so many of Zinn's readers are. Declarations of Independence, however, can't be read as anything but a call to action. More than just a call to action, it's a destruction of every possible ideological tenant that might hinder that call to action.

There are, of course, oversights and weaknesses, not to mention places where I simply disagree. The book was written in the early 90's and it shows. Zinn talks very little about queer issues and trans people don't appear whatsoever. I personally take issue with Zinn's democratic socialist outlook; I'm a radical through and through. Zinn's calls to action are powerful but not informed by a clear theory of revolutionary subjectivity, a predictable result of his democratic socialism. There are other things I could mention to, but... I'm not going to. Declarations of Independence makes to pretenses to being the final word on any of the subjects it tackles. Rather, it intends to be the starting place. No other book I've read so effectively targets and dismantles the various justifications for why the world is the way it is today, and if that's not a justification for putting it on your bookshelf I don't know what is.

[R. Allain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Imagine someone launches a rigorous study distilling the contents of an average American education in civics and history. Scary, no? Once at a talk by author-historian Howard Zinn, he alluded to this very issue frankly stating, "The American people aren't bad, they're misinformed." As such, books like his Declarations of Independence are vital anecdotes to the milquetoast fare served up in most history classes. One of Zinn's essential points here, I recall, is his insight, "What one thinks matters because actions follow one's thinking." And certainly recent national history is replete with ghastly examples of the ongoing human toll of flawed thinking - such as the murder of George Floyd, forced family separations at the U.S.-Mexican border and the insurrection at the nation's Capitol on January 6th, 2021. Overall, Zinn's genius is his use of clear, even understated language to pierce the general fog surrounding our history - and thus demonstrating how it often falls well short of our espoused ideals. The book embodies how Franz Kafka once described the sign of good writing - "an axe to the frozen sea within us." In example after example, Zinn shows how standard ideological filters sanitize the "real deal" in American life - whether in the courtroom, in our treatment of people of color and the poor and on foreign policy and domestic budgets and dissent. In the end, the author's sustained broadside suggests how we can better grasp come our historic situation and understand how the System perpetuates itself by dominating our thinking - leaving so many perplexed and even discouraged on vital issues impacting their own lives. As he puts it, "If the government can control our thinking, it won't need tanks in the street to do so." In closing, for anyone intent on making a difference - and forging a more liveable future, this book should prove a sturdy guide, a citizen or activist's awareness blueprint.

[Victor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zinn was one of my heroes in college. I admired his ideas and writing style. So, when I heard he would be speaking in the auditorium of a local middle school in Berkeley, California, I immediately bought tickets.

The old professor and World War II veteran, however, had an off-night. Standing at the podium, Zinn looked frail and gaunt and lost. He hadn’t prepared a lecture, and had no idea why he was there. Trying to save face, Zinn joked that sometimes he had to read the lecture circuit’s event poster to know what he was supposed to talk about. The audience chuckled, and that’s the most we got for our money. Zinn had nothing to say. No rousing testimony. No inspiring address. He just stood there, fumbling with words, groping for topics, and hem-hawing incoherently between long stretches of silence. Then the audience let him have it; they jeered him and shouted, “Speak!” It was terribly embarrassing.

Perhaps the era was to blame; after all, it was the mid 90s: Clinton was president, and the nation was enjoying relative peace and prosperity. There wasn’t much to speak out against except perhaps the grating grunge Seattle sound and the hedonistic porno rap music of the time. Zinn was never known to be an engaging speaker though he usually had consequential things to say. But that night was probably his lowest point, and I realized that Zinn was better in print.

Although People’s History of the United States is a classic, I prefer his collection of essays, Declarations of Independence. In it, Zinn examines the political beliefs that shape America’s domestic and foreign policy and which have often contributed to social injustices (might makes right, there are just and unjust wars, obey the law or suffer the consequences, America must be the policeman of the world, nuclear weapons are a deterrent, etc.) It’s an engaging analysis. However, Zinn fails to make the distinction between Natural Law and political law and doesn’t clarify the relationship between the latter and state corruption, which is the true source of oppression. Moreover, he promotes democracy as the solution.

But our country is a republic—not a democracy. This is by design; for, pure democracy is as much a threat to liberty as tyranny. That might sound odd, but the peculiarity of that statement indicates how far we have strayed from our founding principles. The Founding Fathers opposed democracy and chose to build a nation based on Natural Rights because this was the surest way to secure liberty. Americans in 18th, 19th, or early 20th century understood this clearly, but few do so today. Zinn seems unaware of this shift in our political ideology, and writes as though democracy has always been America’s political foundation.

Still, Zinn makes some compelling arguments in other areas. His essay, “Violence and Human Nature”, succeeds beautifully in proving that man is not inherently wicked—that his seeming propensity for violence is attributable to social and economic circumstances than to genetics. Like a judo master, Zinn uses modern science’s own research to support his claims and emphasizes that “Genetics, psychology, anthropology, and zoology—in none of these fields is there evidence of a human instinct for the kind of aggressive violence that characterizes war.”

Published almost 30 years ago, most of the ideas in Declarations of Independence hold up well though Zinn’s uber liberal and socialist tendencies do not.

[Kitap · Rating 5 out of 5]

Revisionist historian Howard Zinn, most well known for his monumental People’s History of the United States, here turns his crystal-clear lens of historical criticism to the cherished myths of American politics. After first defining “American ideology” as “a dominant pattern of ideas” in whose company belong such notions as “democracy,” “national security,” “free press,” etc., Zinn proceeds to examine each of these tenets in more detail.

His methods are historical, in that he looks to the past for concrete examples of American political activity that can support or invalidate the self-accolades of the American body politic. His goal is political, however, in that he reveals American political ideology to be at its best, simply hollow rhetoric, and at the worst, pernicious double-speak. He argues persuasively that the democratic republic whose birth certificate (the Declaration of Independence) includes a clause supporting its own execution has been replaced by a national power which does everything (and anything) in order “to maintain the state.”

Professor Zinn makes powerful arguments and reveals an abundance of historical data to challenge many cherished American institutions. “Free speech” is examined in the light of various political machinations including the Sedition Act of 1798 and the Espionage Act (under whose provisions Eugene V. Debs was imprisoned for opposing WWI). Not even the sacred cow of World War II (the “Good War”) is safe from Zinn’s cleaver, which reduces it to a very satisfying porterhouse of political power-mongering and governmental greed, as he argues against the very notion of a “just war.”

Provocative and compassionate and very, very necessary in today’s world of sound-bite media where political analysis is replaced with marketing surveys and the content of discussion has given way to meaningless aphorisms of received wisdom and grunts of derision. The Wizard does not want us to look behind the curtain, and here Howard Zinn stands smiling, with the pull-cord in his hands.

[Philip Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good book. I used it for my research paper on the American Class System. It is a good resource for reviewing the original intentions of the founding forefathers. Regardless of some racist points of view, their onsite has allowed us to evolve and become a free nation. Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness is evolving. It is evolving because of the power given to the people. The government has always needed to be reminded of what these documents originally meant. The beauty is the foresight that the rights will need to be changed, that amendments will need to be ratified and perfected. One of the rights I want to change in my lifetime, is that education should be free for all people and equal in quality for all races and all socio economic classes.

[Carmen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book. Well thought out arguments, easy to follow, with clarifications and details, and lots of personal accounts. He writes about how the promises in the declaration of independence have been kept and not kept and also how enforcement has changed over time. The only real downfall is that this book was written 20 years ago. Would love to hear what he thinks now.

[Aren LeBrun · Rating 3 out of 5]

Classic Zinn material. If you’re familiar with A People’s History, there’s nothing much new to see here. Some of the chapters have been published in other anthologies, such as Howard Zinn: On War, which I found more useful than this. But for newcomers it’s a valuable entry into his more essential work.

[Jeremy S · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book wasn't bad. The only thing was it seemed to take me forever to read it because the words were small and it kind of took me all over the place. The book bashes the government a lot so yeah that's sweet.

[Unsavvyscott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Howard Zinn challenges misconceptions of Americas independence as well as mystification and glamorization of Americas founding fathers. Zinn mixes History with Philosophy and then sprinkles some critical thinking on the top.

[Kendra Munroe · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a very interesting book. It is kind of depressing actually seeing what kind of coruption goes on in the US government. Extremely well writen though. The chapter on Economics was not my forte, but I really enjoyed the rest of it.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite Zinn. I taught from this book for 3 years and my students really responded to it.

[Iver · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of his greatest books by far.

[Kim]

A great book to question the things that we are taught as Americans to believe without question. A recipe book for how to start the change that is necessary for a true democracy.

[Mila]

Very enlightening and somewhat depressing.

[Kirsten · Rating 3 out of 5]

Refreshing in some parts, obvious in others, and some of it I just patently disagree with.

[Shannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Zinn is always an amazing read. What I learned more from the book was information about the man -- what inspired , what shamed him, what moved him to become a historian.

[James Chin]

cool dude

[Karen]

This book was banned in Arizona.

[Thomas Simard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zinn asks questions that need to be asked and provides history that needs to be considered.

[Chris]

FALSE

[Ron Janssen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most important books I have ever read

[sologdin · Rating 2 out of 5]

fairly standard lefty critique of US ideological apparati. committed, reasoned, &c.

[Donald Romaniello · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this work much better than his more famous, A People's History of the U.S.

[Alice Mott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Necessary for an understanding of United States history; a fresh/different point of view.