Customer Reviews

The Age of Reagan: The Fall of the Old Liberal Order: 1964-1980

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Hayward's meticulously researched study of the "Reagan Era", actually starting with 1964 and running through 1989 in the 2nd volume is a beautiful piece of historical work. He points out many little-known events that liberal historians simply choose to leave out (rather than attempt to answer) but shows all the warts as well. Very readable. One only hopes that he intends to keep writing.

A personal disclaimer: I was a Heritage Fellow with Steve Hayward. I therefore know him, and like him. He is a great scholar and it shows in this book.

While I consider myself now a Great Society FDR liberal, I highly recommend this book.

Very simply: This is a book that I cannot put down. And I do not write this as an unabashed foot soldier in the conservative movement: I think the conservative alliance with the religious Right is fraught with philosophical underpinnings that will inevitably doom any principled defense of capitalism and individual liberty. So I am far more comfortable with the kind of conservatism espoused by Barry Goldwater than I am with the conservatism of Ronald Reagan, whom someone whom I admire with considerable reservation, Ayn Rand, despised.

Be that as it may, Hayward's first and majestic volume of his two-volume treatment of one of this nations' greatest presidents is enthralling. It is far more absorbing than the unfinished work that it inevitably invites comparisons with: Arthur Schelesinger, Jr's THE AGE OF ROOSEVELT. And as someone who considers himself a liberal, I can honestly say that Hayward does not write with an eye to covering up conservative embarrasments. I cannot say the same for the Court Historian of Camelot.

Buy this book. Read it. Ponder the long journey that we of our generation have traveled thus far; and, considering this, let us recommit ourselves to taming both the terrible monster of liberalism run amuck, and the far more reprehensible one that is propounded by the Religious Right.

This is one of a two part history of the Reagan era. This is history as it happened and tells the story of this extraordinary President. It almost is wistful to read bc this kind of man is not easily replaced and bc no one like him will or has come along since. I highly recommend these books.

This is an excellent introduction to the Reagan era, starting with the decline of Democratic hegemony during the 1960's and 1970's. The book is well researched and balanced. Although Haywood writes from a conservative perspective, he tries hard to be even handed in discussing the liberal Democrats and moderate Republicans with whom he disagrees.

In accounting for the Democrats' loss of public support during the 1960's and 1970's, Haywood says a lot about the rising crime rates of that era and the Democrats' tendency to take positions that were insenstivie to the public's concerns about violent crime. Surprisingly, he says very little about mandatory school busing. Having lived through that era, I don't think there was any Democratic program that offended the public more that the use of school busing to achieve "racial balance." Most white parents and nearly half the black parents opposed it. Whites especially, saw busing as a threat to their children's education and safety and as the ultimate example of arrogant, overreaching government and an out-of-control federal judiciary. Readers interested in just how ill-founded the program was, and the damage it caused, may want to read Raymond Wolters's book, Race and Education, 1954-2007. Wolters is a specialist in African American history at the University of Delaware.

Overall, I think Hayward's first volume, which deals with Democratic decline and the rise of Reagan, is a better book than Volume II, which deals with the Reagan administration. I will write a separate review for that volume.