More Perfect Unions

The American fixation with marriage, so prevalent in today's debates over marriage for same-sex couples, owes much of its intensity to a small group of reformers who introduced Americans to marriage counseling in the 1930s. Today, millions of couples seek help to save their marriages each year. Over the intervening decades, marriage counseling has powerfully promoted the idea that successful marriages are essential to both individuals' and the nation's well-being. Rebecca Davis reveals how couples and counselors transformed the ideal of the perfect marriage as they debated sexuality, childcare, mobility, wage earning, and autonomy, exposing both the fissures and aspirations of American society. From the economic dislocations of the Great Depression, to more recent debates over government-funded "Healthy Marriage" programs, counselors have responded to the shifting needs and goals of American couples. Tensions among personal fulfillment, career aims, religious identity, and socioeconomic status have coursed through the history of marriage and explain why the stakes in the institution are so fraught for the couples involved and for the communities to which they belong. Americans care deeply about marriages—their own and other people's—because they have made enormous investments of time, money, and emotion to improve their own relationships and because they believe that their personal decisions about whom to marry or whether to divorce extend far beyond themselves. This intriguing book tells the uniquely American story of a culture gripped with the hope that, with enough effort and the right guidance, more perfect marital unions are within our reach.

Explores the legal, economic, military and other considerations for splitting the United States into six new nations via constitutional amendment in a series of quick, easy to read briefs.

A shattering tale of corruption and homicide featuring Seattle detective J.P. Beaumont. A shocking photo screamed from the front pages of the tabloids—the last moments of a life captured for all the world to see. The look of sheer terror eternally frozen on the face of the doomed woman indicated that her fatal fall from an upper story of an unfinished Seattle skyscraper was no desperate suicide—and that look will forever haunt Homicide Detective J.P. Beaumont. But his hunt for answers and justice is leading to more death, and to dark and terrible secrets scrupulously guarded by men of steel behind the locked doors of a powerful union that extracts its dues payments in blood.

Paul F. Clark believes union leaders should take advantage of the valuable discoveries made in behavioral science to make their organizations more effective and, in Building More Effective Unions, he offers an accessible and straightforward account of how they can do so. The second edition provides an updated discussion of important lessons behavioral science holds for labor organizations. It also provides new examples of how unions and their leaders have benefited from putting the principles outlined in the first edition into practice.

Race, from the beginning and more than any other element, has shaped America's institutions, its economics, politics, laws, social structures, and political attitudes. Congressman Jackson considers race to be the focal point of America through the language of the economy because "the economy is the hearing aid through which Americans hear all political dialogue." In this thought provoking work, Jackson provides ample documentation and insightful analysis of the inextricable link between race and economics. More important Jackson proposes a radical economic strategy and program of new human rights that would build A More Perfect Union for all Americans and put them in a better position to come to grips with this enduring American legacy.