Keller, Morton 1929-

PERSONAL:

Born March 1, 1929, in Brooklyn, NY; son of Jacob (a commercial artist) and Anita Keller; married Phyllis Daytz, September 7, 1951; children: Robin, Jonathan. Education: University of Rochester, B.A., 1950; Harvard University, M.A., 1952, Ph.D., 1956. Politics: Democrat.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Cambridge, MA. Office—Department of History, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA.

CAREER:

University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, instructor in history, 1956-58; University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, assistant, then associate professor of history, 1958-63; Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, visiting lecturer in history, 1963-64; Brandeis University, Waltham, MA, professor of history, beginning 1964, became professor emeritus. Military service: U.S. Navy, 1953-56; served in Aleutian Islands; became lieutenant junior grade.

MEMBER:

American Historical Association, Organization of American Historians, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, corresponding fellow of the British Academy.

AWARDS, HONORS:

SSRC Research Award, 1959-60; Spencer Foundation Grant, 1955-98; Littleton-Griswold Prize in American Legal History, 1995; honorary degree from Oxford University, 1980; fellowships from Guggenheim foundation, Charles Warren Center, NEH, and Academy of Arts and Sciences.

WRITINGS:

In Defense of Yesterday: James M. Beck and the Politics of Conservatism, 1861-1936, Coward-McCann (New York, NY), 1958.

The Life Insurance Enterprise, 1885-1910: A Study in the Limits of Corporate Power, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA), 1963.

(Editor) New Deal: What Was It?, Holt, Rinehart & Winston (New York, NY), 1963.

(Editor, with E.L. Godkin) Problems of Modern Democracy, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA), 1966.

(Compiler) Theodore Roosevelt: A Profile, Hill & Wang (New York, NY), 1967.

The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1968.

Affairs of State: Public Life in Late Nineteenth Century America, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA), 1977.

Historical Sources of Urban Personality: Boston, New York, and Philadelphia: An Inaugural Lecture Delivered before the University of Oxford on 3 March 1981, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1982.

Congress, Parties, and Public Policy, foreword by Herman Belz, series editor, American Historical Association (Washington, DC), 1985.

Regulating a New Economy: Public Policy and Economic Change in America, 1900-1933, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA), 1990.

Regulating a New Society: Public Policy and Social Change in America, 1900-1933, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA), 1994.

(Editor, with Donald C. Bacon and Roger H. Davidson) The Encyclopedia of the United States Congress, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1995.

(Editor, with R. Shep Melnick) Taking Stock: American Government in the Twentieth Century, Woodrow Wilson Center Press (Washington, DC), 1999.

Affairs of State: Public Life in Late Nineteenth Century America, Lawbook Exchange (Union, NJ), 2000.

(With Phyllis Keller) Making Harvard Modern: The Rise of America's University, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2001.

America's Three Regimes: A New Political History, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2007.

SIDELIGHTS:

Historian Morton Keller, emeritus professor at Brandeis University, has written or edited more than fifteen books on American political history, focusing specially on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. With Affairs of State: Public Life in Late Nineteenth Century America he launched a series of books on this subject acknowledged for their general excellence. Larry G. Gerber, writing in H-Net: Humanities and Social Science Online, described the series as "magisterial." Journal of Social History critic Edward D. Berkowitz observed that publication of Affairs of State "reinvigorated the field" by "linking political history with the overarching concept of the state." Keller followed this volume with Regulating a New Economy: Public Policy and Economic Change in America, 1900-1933, which considers issues of economic regulation, including trusts, utilities, railroads, tariffs, corporate and labor law, urban housing and zoning, agricultural marketing, taxation, and new industries such as automotives, movies, and radio.

In Regulating a New Society: Public Policy and Social Change in America, 1900-1933, Keller examines the conflicting dynamic between Progressives, who sought to create and impose nationally uniform social policies, and the "powerful counterforces" of traditional values and American pluralism that defeated such aims, according to Gerber. Broad in scope, Regulating a New Society includes discussion of topics such as social welfare and family, religion, education, civil liberties, prohibition, prostitution, immigration, and rights of African Americans, Native Americans, and women. Summarizing the book's thesis, Gerber wrote that "the underlying message of Keller's work is once again the same as in the previous volume: American society is so diverse and the American political system so fragmented that any attempt by an historian to impose on America's past a notion of coherent development is misguided."

Though Berkowitz found Keller's argument persuasive, the critic expressed disappointment that the author's essentially narrative approach does not permit more detailed and probing analysis. Journal of Interdisciplinary History contributor Martin Shefter also noted some areas in which Keller does not provide extensive explanation—notably, the political interests of those who sought to respond to contemporary social challenges through new regulation. Nevertheless, Shefter felt that the book's many strengths easily outweighed this weakness. Regulating a New Society, he concluded, "may well be the most important book on early twentieth-century United States government since Richard Hofstadter's The Age of Reform."

In America's Three Regimes: A New Political History, which New York Times Book Review contributor Fred Siegel called "one of the most engaging and accessible portraits of America's political evolution of recent years," Keller challenges the prevailing view that election cycles predictably realign American politics. These cycles, it is argued, occur every thirty-two to thirty-six years, and shift political dominance from one party to the other. In contrast to this view, however, Keller sees a political timeline that encompasses only three "regimes": the early republican regime, which lasted from the colonial era to the late 1820s; the one-party regime inaugurated with the rise of Jacksonian democracy in 1828, which lasted until 1932; and the populist-bureaucratic regime, which has remained the basic political order in the United States since the New Deal.

Walter Russell Mead, writing in Foreign Affairs, deemed America's Three Regimes "a masterful and fresh account of U.S. politics." Noting the book's many insightful observations "that lie out of the mainstream of political history," U.S. News & World Report contributor Michael Barone called the book "a gem." Stephen Schwartz, writing in The Weekly Standard, concluded that "Keller has produced a valuable, highly readable survey of American political history that answers many of the questions about government and the people that we ask today. This is the epitome of pleasurable reading: It makes you want to go back and reread page after page, not because the text is difficult but because it is filled with genuine insights." And Siegel noted that, despite finding some of Keller's conclusions "strained," he would name America's Three Regimes "the single best book written in recent years on the sweep of American political history."

With his wife, Phyllis Keller, Morton Keller also wrote the well-received Making Harvard Modern: The Rise of America's University.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

AB Bookman's Weekly, August 7, 1995, review of Regulating a New Society: Public Policy and Social Change in America, 1900-1933, p. 415.

American Historical Review, October, 1977, review of Affairs of State: Public Life in Late Nineteenth Century America, p. 1083; June, 1991, Kenneth Fox, review of Regulating a New Economy: Public Policy and Economic Change in America, 1900-1933, p. 978; February, 1996, Judith Ann Trolander, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 243; June, 2001, review of Taking Stock: American Government in the Twentieth Century, p. 1013; December, 2002, John R. Thelin, review of Making Harvard Modern: The Rise of America's University, p. 1578.

Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, July, 1977, review of Affairs of State, p. 174; March, 1992, Athan Theoharis review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 219; September, 1995, Victor B. Howard, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 541.

Booklist, October 1, 2001, Bryce Christensen, review of Making Harvard Modern, p. 271.

Business History, January 1, 1992, Jim Tomlinson, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 220.

Business History Review, December 22, 1991, Ellis W. Hawley, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 978.

Change, July 1, 2003, Harold Orlans, "A Stellar Menagerie."

Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, April, 1968, review of Theodore Roosevelt: A Profile, p. 257; May, 1977, review of Affairs of State, p. 441; January, 1991, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 824; February, 1995, E.M. Tobin, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 997; October, 2000, J.S. Robey, review of Taking Stock, p. 411; April, 2008, review of America's Three Regimes: A New Political History, p. 1400.

Christian Century, May 8, 1968, review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. 622.

Christian Science Monitor, June 13, 1968, review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. 5.

Contemporary Sociology, September, 1991, Mary S. Morgan, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 727.

Economist, January 12, 2008, "Durably Democratic; American History 1," p. 75.

Foreign Affairs, January 1, 2008, Walter Russell Mead, review of America's Three Regimes, p. 184.

History: Review of New Books, September 22, 2007, Edmund D. Potter, review of America's Three Regimes, p. 24.

Journal of American History, September, 1995, Alan Dawley, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 670; June, 2001, Ellis W. Hawley, review of Taking Stock, p. 307; September, 2003, Roger L. Geiger, review of Making Harvard Modern, p. 708.

Journal of College and University Law, October, 2003, Martin Michaelson, review of Making Harvard Modern, p. 215.

Journal of Economic History, September, 1993, Andrew Rutten, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 696.

Journal of Interdisciplinary History, spring, 1992, Barry D. Karl, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 756; September 22, 1996, Martin Shefter, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 350.

Journal of Social History, December 22, 1995, Edward D. Berkowitz, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 462.

Journal of Social Policy, July, 1995, Ann Jeffries, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 463.

Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare, December, 2000, Steven R. Rose, review of Taking Stock, p. 219.

Journal of Southern History, August, 1997, John J. Guthrie, Jr., review of Regulating a New Society, p. 687.

Kirkus Reviews, September, 1, 1967, review of Theodore Roosevelt, p. 1101; January 1, 1977, review of Affairs of State, p. 31; September 1, 2007, review of America's Three Regimes.

Law and History Review, spring, 1993, Arthur F. McEvoy, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 207.

Library Journal, October 15, 1967, review of Theodore Roosevelt, p. 3632; July, 1968, review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. 2644; February 15, 1977, review of Affairs of State, p. 489; September 15, 2001, Susan M. Colowick, review of Making Harvard Modern, p. 91.

Nature, February 21, 2002, Paul Doty, review of Making Harvard Modern, p. 837.

New England Quarterly, September, 1991, Tony Freyer, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 507.

New Republic, January 21, 1919, Robert Reich, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 38.

New York Times, February 11, 1977, review of Affairs of State, p. C25.

New York Times Book Review, May 19, 1968, review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. 7; April 10, 1977, review of Affairs of State, p. 18; November 18, 2007, Fred Siegel, review of America's Three Regimes.

Perspectives on Political Science, summer, 1991, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 172.

Political Science Quarterly, June 22, 2000, Lawrence J.R. Herson, "Progressivism and the New Democracy," p. 294.

Public Interest, March 22, 1995, Hugh Heclo, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 102.

Publishers Weekly, April 29, 1968; review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. 75; December 27 1976, review of Affairs of State, p. 52.

Punch, August 28, 1968, review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. 311.

Reference & Research Book News, June, 1995, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 25.

Review of Public Personnel Administration, summer, 1995, John L. Anderson, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 81.

Reviews in American History, December, 1991, K. Austin Kerr, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 534.

Society, September 1, 1995, Eli Ginzberg, review of Regulating a New Society.

Times Higher Education Supplement, September 27, 2002, Gordon Johnson, review of Making Harvard Modern, p. 29.

University Press Book News, March, 1991, review of Regulating a New Economy, p. 19.

U.S. News & World Report, September 6, 2007, Michael Barone, "Book List: America's Three Regimes."

Virginia Quarterly, autumn, 1968 review of The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast, p. R178; spring, 1995, review of Regulating a New Society, p. 43.

Weekly Standard, January 21, 2008, Stephen Schwartz, "America Divided; a Historian Sees Three Phases in the Life of the Republic."

Wilson Library Bulletin, June, 1995, James Rettig, review of The Encyclopedia of the United States Congress, p. 84.

ONLINE

Brandeis University Web site,http://lts.brandeis.edu/ (July 24, 2008), Keller faculty profile.

H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online,http://www.h-net.org/ (July 24, 2008), Larry G. Gerber, review of Regulating a New Society.