National Treasure - by Michael Auslin (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

The inspiring story of the Declaration of Independence--the first to take us from its drafting by Thomas Jefferson to today--charting the many lives of a document that captures the soul of America and has united generations around its defiant ideals, published for the 250th anniversary of America's founding.

Quiet and politically untested, Thomas Jefferson was not the obvious choice to draft a statement of principles explaining why the American colonies were breaking ties with the King of England. His soaring rhetoric would inspire generations of Americans to live up to the founders' dreams. National Treasure is the gripping story of our most revered founding relic, as a physical object and a set of ideals that have made America what it is today.

An award-winning historian, Michael Auslin take us from the boarding house in Philadelphia where Jefferson put quill to paper to the Declaration's covert signing, dissemination in the doldrums of the revolutionary war, and long, harrowing, and ultimately hallowed afterlife. We follow the parchment as it is hauled out of a soon-to-be-burning Washington in 1814 and see it hidden in a dank cellar, posted in classrooms, recited on village greens, printed on handkerchiefs, and used to sell insurance and bundle coal. An inspiration to both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis in the Civil War, it has grown more important for each new generation. While FDR and Churchill celebrated its commitment to freedom from tyranny, the document itself was lowered into a bunker at Fort Knox. After the war, its precious ink fading, it was painstakingly preserved and enshrined.

Through it all, Jefferson's words have inspired implausibly varied causes, from suffragists and civil rights leaders to groups waging war on the US government. As Jefferson had hoped, the principles enshrined in the Declaration became a beacon to the world. But what lessons should we take from it today? Can this statement of ideals in whose name the signers pledged their lives and sacred honor bring a disparate nation together? As we gather to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the founders' bold experiment in democracy, Auslin reminds us that this enduring document was not just a call for freedom and equality but an eloquent statement of the principles that bind us together.

Review Quotes

"Even 250 candles on the nation's birthday cake cannot be as illuminating as Michael Auslin's fascinating story of the making, and still undiminished resonance, of the world's most consequential political document. His mind-opening book closes a question that is currently hotly contested. Is ours a creedal nation? Yes! Auslin supplies the exclamation mark."
--George F. Will, author of American Happiness and Discontents

About the Author

Michael Auslin is the Payson J. Treat Distinguished Research Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Prior to that, he was an associate professor of history at Yale. He wrote National Treasure as a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the Library of Congress's John W. Kluge Center and an American Heritage Partners Fellow at the Society of the Cincinnati's American Revolution Institute. He writes a Substack, The Patowmack Packet, on Washington, DC, past and present, and lives in Virginia.