In today's discussions of church, state, and the American way of life, the serious real differences that divided the religious settlers of this country are frequently overlooked. This book offers readers a survey of the often uneasy relationship between religion and public policy dating from the colonial period to the present. This thought-provoking study will be of interest to policymakers, lawyers and legal historians, and all those concerned with the future of public policy in the United States.

Federal restrictions on the sale and possession of some firearms were introduced during Prohibition when illegal rumrunners battling for territorial rights commonly used machine guns to destroy the opposition. More sweeping legislation was not passed until 1968, and from that time on the struggle has been between pro- and anti-control forces, with more controls created at state and local levels than at the federal level. However, the mood in Washington has turned, and the question now is how the country can be weaned away from the violence that pervades every aspect of living, from lawlessness to literature, entertainment, and even children's toys. This book traces the history of these gun control measures from the early days to our own violent age.

This is a study of a part of American history that deals not just with gun control as such, but with basic concepts of personal liberty, government responsibility, and the fear of tyranny. All three of these influenced the people who took up arms in the American Revolution and who, for decades afterward, resisted every effort of the central government to substitute a standing army for the armed militia of the states. As the nation grew in size and population, the need for a standing army became apparent, and the nature of the militia changed from that of a purely state organization to an adjunct of the regular army. Still, the view that private individuals were entitled to purchase and keep firearms for their personal use persisted. That this was not a constitutional right was made clear by the Supreme Court in a series of cases beginning as early as 1876.

Federal restrictions on the sale and possession of some firearms were introduced during Prohibition when illegal rumrunners battling for territorial rights commonly used machine guns to destroy the opposition. More sweeping legislation was not passed until 1968, and from that time on the struggle has been between pro- and anti-control forces, with more controls created at state and local levels than at the federal level. However, the mood in Washington has turned, and the question now is how the country can be weaned from the violence that pervades every aspect of living, from lawlessness to literature, entertainment, and even children's toys.

After almost two centuries of on-and-off resistance to white encroachment on Indian lands, a band of Ohio Indians attacked and almost destroyed the army of the infant U.S.A. The battle for the Indian village of Kekionga, unmentioned in any history textbook, stunned President Washington and Congress and provoked both a change in military policy and the first legislative investigation of an executive department under the Constitution. This history of the relations between Native Americans and European settlers, principally during the colonial and revolutionary periods, focuses on the clash of two very different civilizations in the struggle for control of the land. It also sets in world perspective the savagery of the French and Indian Wars, disposing of the myth that brutally inhumane treatment of the enemy was characteristic only of Indian fighting methods. Subsequent to the Indians' supression after Kekionga, government and private indifference to Indian rights and gross mistreatment persisted until the last quarter of the 20th century.