New Releases by Joseph P. Lash

Using the Roosevelt-Churchill correspondence, British War Cabinet and Foreign Office files and Roosevelt Map Room papers, Joseph P. Lash takes a fresh look at men and events in the critical months between the outbreak of World War II in September 1939 and Pearl Harbor. He brings out the similarities and contrasts between Roosevelt and Churchill, where they were great or flawed, how each sought to manipulate the other but always in the framework of common purposes, most importantly their understanding of the importance of sea power and of the necessity of Anglo-American naval supremacy. “[Joseph Lash] has written an excellent account, full of shrewd personal and political insights and based on a real command of the sources and an ability to organize his material into a continuously interesting narrative. Much of the story is familiar, but Mr. Lash has added some telling new details from the archives at Hyde Park and in the British Public Record Office...” — The New York Times “[A] rich account of a remarkable collaboration during the pre-Pearl Harbor years of WW II... Throughout Lash examines with candor and admiration how FDR manipulated Congress, the bureaucracy, and public opinion, working with Churchill on the phrasing and timing of steps toward American entry into the war.” — Kirkus “Joseph Lash has once again demonstrated his gift for blending diligent historical research with the human drama of an extraordinary relationship. His chronicle of Roosevelt and Churchill is absorbing and exciting; it will also be an invaluable document for any future exploration of the struggle for democratic survival in this century.” — James A. Wechsler, Editorial Page Editor, New York Post “A splendid work — incisive in its analysis, compelling in its narrative, sensitive in its judgments. It is quite worthy of its protagonists — and what more can one possibly say?” — Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. “[A] perceptive, well organized and well-written exploration both of his two main characters and of a large supporting cast... The book is... a pleasure [...] to read.” — History “The publication of Lash’s book is an important event in the historiography of World War II... Lash has accomplished an impressive historical synthesis.” — Reviews in American History “There is much to praise in this volume, a book which undoubtedly will be widely read... Lash is a first-rate writer and researcher.” — Political Science Quarterly “[A] fascinating book.” — The Virginia Quarterly Review “The major strands of this story have long been familiar, but the author adds many revealing and colorful details... he writes superbly.” — Foreign Affairs “This is a beautifully written book which captures the spirit of the two leaders and is well worth the time spent reading it. Lash offers some thoughtful insights into the personalities of both Churchill and Roosevelt as well as some perceptive comments on their relationship. His picture is clear; Roosevelt and Churchill, for all of their faults, were the great men which the times demanded.” — The American Historical Review

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Joseph Lash’s last work is an account of the men and women who helped Roosevelt pull the country out of the Great Depression. When FDR took office in 1933, he set into motion the promise he made when he was first nominated: the New Deal, also called the Roosevelt Revolution, charged the energies and imaginations of some of the most brilliant minds in the country. Lash draws heavily on the private and unpublished papers of Thomas Corcoran and Benjamin Cohen, the two most influential brain trusters of the time, whose policies invigorated the nation and who, independently and together, were driven to promote the social and economic transformations of the thirties. “This ‘new look at the New Deal,’ as the book is subtitled,... [is] a history of New Deal legislation, from the banking bill that recast the Federal Reserve System, on through the Public Utility Holding Company Act, the Wagner Labor Relations Act, the Social Security Bill and the creation of the alphabetocracy that, as Mr. Lash believes, helped to shift control of the American economy from Wall Street to Washington... a dual biography of two young New Deal lawyers, Benjamin V. Cohen and Thomas G. Corcoran... a roster of New Deal players — Adolph A. Berle, William O. Douglas, Marriner Eccles, Jerome Frank, Leon Henderson, Alger Hiss, Harry Hopkins, Harold Ickes, Hugh S. Johnson, James Landis, Max Lowenthal, Isador Lubin, Raymond Moley, Frances Perkins, Joseph Rauh, Samuel I. Rosenman and Rexford G. Tugwell [and] Harvard Law professor (and later Supreme Court Justice) Felix Frankfurter... the ideological struggle that went on between people like Tugwell, who wanted to plan the economy, and those like Frankfurter and Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis, who wanted to break up the trusts and restore freedom to the marketplace. Dealers and Dreamers will be valuable to any reader with certain specific questions about the New Deal in mind.” — Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, New York Times “Dealers and Dreamers is a fascinating, informative book, indispensable for students of the Roosevelt presidency.” — Arthur Schlesinger Jr., The New York Review of Books “The story of how our present-day institutions were created... [Lash’s] excellent exploitation of the papers of both Cohen and Corcoran, plus judicious use of interviews, makes this a valuable work.” — Warren F. Kimball, Los Angeles Times “Joseph P. Lash’s last book is a fitting capstone to a noble career. Dealers and Dreamers is a vivid evocation of an era and a fascinating portrait, written with the skill of a master, of some of the most wonderfully engaging figures of a glorious age in American history. But more than that, it is — like all of Joe Lash’s books, and like Joe Lash’s life itself — a work of the most rare sincerity and integrity. What shines forth from every page — as it shines forth from Mr. Lash’s life — is his unshakable determination to be truthful, honest and scrupulously fair. Joe has always been the standard of integrity to which I tried to hold fast, and this book is a final, triumphant example of the fact that he held that standard high to the last.” — Robert Caro “I found Dealers and Dreamers a veritable treasure trove of historical information about Roosevelt’s Washington. For that reason alone it is an important book.” — Thomas Fleming “Dealers and Dreamers not only reports the achievements and operations of the New Deal, but also the spirit of the participants, a spirit which I think was very much like that which must have existed among the persons who drafted the U.S. Constitution and put it in force — in each case, reflecting the excitement and satisfaction of participating in a successful revolution, not against government but for government.” — Eugene McCarthy “By the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Eleanor and Franklin, this is a fresh and admiring look at the original ‘brain trusters’ (Raymond Moley, Rexford Tugwell, Adolf Berle) and others crucial to the legislated social transformation presided over by Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Depression years. Among the ‘others’ Lash pays particular attention to are Thomas G. Corcoran, ‘the unofficial whip of the New Deal,’ and Benjamin V. Cohen, principal draftsman of several ground-breaking bills sent to Congress. The author describes Cohen as the intellectual coordinator of the New Deal and the keeper of its conscience. Working from Corcoran and Cohen’s private papers, he sheds light on the significance of the Securities Exchange Act, FDR’s court-packing attempt, the 1936 presidential campaign, the effect of the New Deal on black Americans and other issues throughout the decade before Pearl Harbor.” — Publishers Weekly “Lash focuses on two talented technocrats — Benjamin V. Cohen and Thomas C. Corcoran, protégés of Felix Frankfurter, then a professor at Harvard Law School. Though neither had held high office, both played important, frequently pivotal, roles in drafting and ensuring passage of vital New Deal measures like the Securities Exchange Act of 1934... Pragmatists as well as idealists, Cohen and Corcoran viewed politics as the art of the possible. With revolution a decided possibility, they opted for trial-and-error reform as the best means to the end of preserving any vestige of a free-enterprise, constitutional system.” — Kirkus Reviews “Lash has written an absorbing narrative that captures the spirit of those yeasty times when a heady generation of young intellectuals was ready to roll up its sleeves to rescue America.” — R. Frank Saunders, Jr., The Georgia Historical Quarterly “Dealers and Dreamers conveys an unmistakable sense that there was something special about the experience of the generation of lawyers who entered public service in the 1930’s.” — G. Edward White, Harvard Law Review

The #1 New York Times Bestseller—Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award In his extraordinary biography of the major political couple of the twentieth century, Joseph P. Lash reconstructs from Eleanor Roosevelt''s personal papers her early life and four-decade marriage to the four-time president who brought America back from the Great Depression and helped to win World War II. The result is an intimate look at the vibrant private and public worlds of two incomparable people.

A New York Times Bestseller "Lash has reached the highest level of the biographer’s art…Astounding." —Wall Street Journal Joseph P. Lash, Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer and National Book Award-winning writer of Eleanor and Franklin, turns to the seventeen years Eleanor Roosevelt lived after FDR''s death in 1945. Already a major figure in her own right, Roosevelt gained new stature with her work at the United Nations and her contributions to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. She continued her activism on behalf of civil rights, as well as her humanitarian work, which led President Harry Truman to call her the First Lady of the World. Lash has created an extraordinary portrait of an extraordinary person.

At the heart of this wonderful biography is the brilliantly portrayed relationship between two great American women whose lives were bound together for all time. "Something fascinating on every page . . . a deeply absorbing portrait of two intertwined lives".--"The New York Times Book Review". Photos.

"ER loved people and, as Joseph Lash says, she rarely let go of any of her friends, even when the passion faded. (The exceptions: Nancy Cook and Marion Dickerman, with whom she had a serious falling-out.) This book is a thorough study of ER''s friendships, with chapters that place the overlapping and sometimes conflicting relationships in ER''s life. Written after her letters to Lorena Hickok were unsealed, the chapter on Hickok is good factually, but colored by a lack of understanding of same-sex love. Still, the book is important to understanding the attractions ER felt, why these were important and influential at the time, and how she dealt with them throughout her life."--Goodreads

A portrait of the former First Lady, along with 125 photographs, recounting her life.

Based on Eleanor Roosevelt''s voluminous correspondence, this new biography focuses on the former first Lady''s emotional life. Part of the character study comes from the recently available letters between Lorena Hickok and Eleanor. Presents the story of Eleanor''s friendships, political work, family relations and close friends, including the author, who inspired or assisted Eleanor in her private and public lives.