The Radical Fund: How a Band of Visionaries and a Million Dollars Upended America
by John Fabian Witt
On This Page
Description
In 1922, a young idealist named Charles Garland rejected a million-dollar inheritance. In a world of shocking wealth disparities, shameless racism, and political repression, Garland opted instead to invest in a future where radical ideas -- like working-class power, free speech, and equality -- might flourish. Over the next two decades, the Garland Fund would nurture a new generation of wildly ambitious progressive projects. The men and women around the Fund were rich and poor, white and show more Black. They cooperated and bickered; they formed rivalries, fell in and out of love, and made mistakes. Yet shared beliefs linked them throughout. They believed that American capitalism was broken. They believed that American democracy (if it had ever existed) stole from those who had the least. And they believed that American institutions needed to be radically remade for the modern age. By the time they spent the last of the Fund's resources, their outsider ideas had become mass movements battling to transform a nation. A luminous testament to the power of visionary organizations and a meditation on the vexed role of money in American life, The Radical Fund is a hopeful book for our anxious, angry age -- an empowering road map for how people with heretical ideas can bring about audacious change. -- show lessTags
Recommendations
Members
- Recently Added By
Lists
2024-2025 Ezra Klein Guest Recommendations
213 works; 6 members
Author Information
6 Works 312 Members
John Fabian Witt is the Duffy Class of 1960 Professor of Law and History at Yale, where he serves as Head of Davenport College. He is author of the Bancroft Prize-winning Lincoln's Code: The Laws of War in American History.
Awards and Honors
Awards
Classifications
- Genres
- History, Nonfiction, General Nonfiction, Biography & Memoir
- DDC/MDS
- 973.0000 — History & geography History of North America United States United States United States United States United States
- LCC
- HN90 .R3 .W58 — Social sciences Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform Social history and conditions. Social problems. By region or country
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 26
- Popularity
- 1,038,332
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 3
- ASINs
- 2
