Michelle Bachman condemned this novel so strongly that I had to pick up a copy at a used book sale. I'm glad I did. This is a well-researched and convincingly told story of the early days of our country, with the founding fathers shown as they must have been. While it does not make them villains, it does make them human, which to some I suppose makes the book far more dangerous.

The book is fairly critical of Jefferson who is described as a "Republican", which is historically accurate but misleading to those like Ms. Bachman. Jefferson's party was sometimes called the Democratic-Republicans, or Republicans for short, but it was in fact the predecessor of today's Democratic party, not the Republican party of today. Of course Jefferson did have ideas that have been embraced by modern Republicans, like state's rights, etc.

The book was written in 1973 and it convinced me that our nation has pretty much always been a divided one.