Fighting Bob La Follette

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The Righteous Reformer

Nancy C. Unger

A comprehensive biography that weaves the triumph and the tragedy of the public and private lives of one of Wisconsin's most famous and influential political figures.

416 pages, 6 x 9.25, 39 b&w photos
Paperback: $32.95 | ISBN: 978-0-87020-426-5
Publication Date: 8/11/2008

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Description

With his fiery, inspirational speeches, tireless championing of workers, and passionate support for grassroots organizations, Robert “Fighting Bob” La Follette is an almost mythical figure in politics. As a US representative, Wisconsin governor, and US senator, La Follette left enduring and significant political legacies: the direct election of senators, child labor laws, women’s suffrage, workers’ compensation, and creation of the Department of Labor and the Federal Trade Commission. In this comprehensive biography, historian Nancy C. Unger examines the private life of the public figure—from the death of his father when La Follette was eight months old, to his college years at the University of Wisconsin, where he met his feminist wife, Belle Case, to the illnesses that left him unable to work for months. What's revealed is the man himself: hot-tempered, insecure, overworked, and self-righteous, but also principled, passionate, and courageous.

Through the personal letters, diaries, and documents of the La Follette family, Unger digs deep to understand this public and occasionally larger-than-life figure. Thoroughly researched and documented, Fighting Bob La Follette: The Righteous Reformer is a testament to the unconventional man who personified the progressive movement of the twentieth century and who dared to speak out and act against overwhelming odds to reverse the corrupt stream of American politics.

Author Bio

Nancy C. Unger

Nancy C. Unger is an American historian and author whose work explores the Progressive Era, women’s environmental history, and key figures in US reform movements. She is Professor Emerita in history at Santa Clara University. She has published widely on figures and movements that shaped twentieth-century America, including the books Beyond Nature's Housekeepers: American Women in Environmental History and Belle La Follette: Progressive Era Reformer.

Unger’s voice remains subdued and objective throughout the book, but La Follette . . . leaps from its pages.

The New York Times

“The ideas of La Follette and his fellow progressives are our best hope for countering the reactionary and destructive forces that threaten to dissolve this fragile experiment in self-government which has so much to offer and has so far yet to go.”

—Bill Moyers, former PBS host and author of Moyers on Democracy

“In our time of mediocre and timid political leadership, it is good to have a book that reminds us of the unique political courage of Bob La Follette.”

—Howard Zinn, Professor Emeritus, Boston University, and author of A People’s History of the United States: 1492 to Present

“Nancy Unger has produced a fascinating, insightful, and persuasive portrait of Wisconsin’s ‘Little Giant.’ She . . . penetrates into his mind and character.”

—John Milton Cooper Jr., professor of history at the University Wisconsin –Madison and author of The Warrior and the Priest: Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt