In 2001, Anthony Hopkins celebrated his newly acquired American citizenship by taking a 3,000-mile road trip across the Midwest. It wasn't his first cross-country voyage. He'd taken many such excursions in the past, motivated in large part by the insights they provided into the American soul. "I think it's wonderful meeting people who run America, people doing things that will never be recognized," he remarked in 1998. "I get awards for things but there are millions and millions of people who do things and just get on with their lives. I think it puts everything in perspective."
Today, the American soul is sick. A few of its many afflictions include tribalism, loneliness, institutional dysfunction, and widespread public distrust. There's a pervasive atmosphere of unease in modern life—a sense that the United States is stumbling toward complete internal collapse. But though it's widely acknowledged that something is wrong, persuasive answers to the question of how we can revive the American spirit and continue striding toward a more perfect union are difficult to discern amid the noise of partisanship. Perhaps, then, we should seek answers in a more tranquil environment. Maybe we should turn to the open road.
On September 11, 2020, Bloomberg Opinion columnist Francis S. Barry put that idea to the test. As the COVID-19 pandemic upended reality and deepened our crisis of polarization, he and his wife Laurel decided to drive an RV across the Lincoln Highway, America's oldest transcontinental route. They sought not only escape, but enlightenment.
Barry had first conceived of the trip in 2016, when Donald Trump's presidential campaign inflamed established tensions between Democrats and Republicans and casual discussion of a new Civil War became commonplace in the media. He embarked on the journey in the hope that by speaking to Americans from all walks of life, observing the nation's spectacular geography, and reconnecting with its history, he might understand how American democracy has proven so resilient, and what can be done to maintain it in troubled times.
Barry's new book, Back Roads and Better Angels: A Journey Into the Heart of American Democracy, presents a detailed account of this adventure. It's a dense, ambitious travelogue that's as vast and multifaceted as the road it follows. Barry, a self-declared "lifelong Democrat" who worked in Michael Bloomberg's mayoral cabinet before becoming a journalist, sought to craft an "evenhanded" work for "open-minded" readers. In that regard, he has succeeded admirably.
The book treats progressive and conservative ideas with equal respect and, where appropriate, ridicule. Though principally a work of political analysis, it examines neglected facets of our history ranging from the invention of the automobile to George Washington's rejection of anti-Semitism. Beyond that, it delves into many of American culture's most peculiarly fascinating features. Barry's America is one of towering Bass Pro Shops, elephant-themed museums that exist to sell peanuts, and colossal pizza parlors. It's a land equally defined by the grand poetry of Katharine Lee Bates, the raw blues of Robert Johnson, and the wholesome television of Mr. Rogers.
A road trip of this scale demands good company, and Barry's wry sense of humor grants levity to the journey. "With all its moving parts, electrical intricacies, plumbing contraptions, and technical complexities, the Winnebago is like a god I do not understand and do not want to anger," he writes about his vehicle as the adventure begins. Predictably, that god is seldom pleased with him, and His punishments often involve plumbing malfunctions.
The "North Star" guiding Barry's voyage is the highway's namesake: Abraham Lincoln. The Great Emancipator bore the weight of a devastating war to renew America's constitutional order. Through his commitment to principle and exceptional grasp of human nature, he held the nation together while propelling it toward the full amplitude of its founding. In his speeches, he employed language of unity and refrained from vilifying the Confederacy, instead referring to Americans exclusively as "we" or "us." Lincoln, Barry writes, recognized "shades of gray, and the need for red and blue to bleed together." He understood that "politics is rarely a good-versus-evil morality play," and this conviction "is sorely missing from political dialogue today."
Throughout the book, Barry uses Lincoln's wisdom to argue for a new approach to politics that can preserve American unity and stem the tide of negative polarization. He brands this sensibility "patriotic pragmatism" and clearly defines its tenets:
A patriotic pragmatist is not so righteous as to reject compromise, not so modern as to damn all historical figures, not so defensive as to whitewash terrible wrongs, not so reckless as to tolerate political violence, not so feverish as to conflate party with deity, and not so blind as to fail to see through another's eyes.
As Barry drives through towns and cities, he interviews Americans of almost every conceivable background and profession. Politicians, activists, and religious scholars are quoted at length alongside chefs, farmers, and bowling alley managers. Nearly all of them seem to align with the patriotic pragmatist mindset, and to share Barry's concern that rabid partisanship could fracture America profoundly if left unattended.
In one memorable instance, Barry speaks to Peter Carmichael, director of the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College. Carmichael celebrates how America has come to recognize "that the legacy of slavery and emancipation is certainly felt today," but he fears "that the finger wagging, the pessimism, the self-righteousness in looking at the past is bleeding into a way of seeing the world around us." Barbershop owner Matthew Schuring is more optimistic: "We're a lot closer together than what anybody realizes. It's just certain issues people feel strongly on, but we probably agree on more than we disagree."
But though these conversations are initially compelling, they become tiresome as the book progresses. Spanning more than 500 pages, Back Roads and Better Angels seeks to be exhaustive in diagnosing our democratic woes, but it's ultimately just exhausting.
Too many of Barry's interviews are indistinguishable in tone and lead to the same conclusions. His interview subjects usually provide some variation of a common theme: that nuance must be restored in political life, that the American project can only be completed through compromise and cooperation, and that the essence of America is the "aspiration for a better tomorrow." These are salient points, but they are repeated constantly to benumbing effect.
Although Back Roads and Better Angels captures America's beauty, it gives equal attention to the ugliness that taints its history. Barry passes through squalid housing projects, decaying Indian reservations, and towns that once witnessed lynchings and Ku Klux Klan rallies. His interviews address such contentious topics as the ethics of removing Confederate statues, the decline of Congress, and the rise of cancel culture. But Barry's pragmatic approach largely fails to identify solutions to the political challenges that assert themselves throughout his adventure.
Is institutional racism a real and enduring fact of American life? What will it take to repair rural communities? How can we reconcile the promise of the Declaration of Independence with America's complicated history of slavery, segregation, and Native American genocide? Barry provides no conclusive answers to these questions, yet they pervade the book inescapably. Political pragmatism aims to renew our republic by fostering bipartisan dialogue and stronger connections between Americans across tribal lines. But this will not be possible unless we find common ground on the issues responsible for America's most intense divisions.
Back Roads and Better Angels does offer an occasional suggestion for reducing partisanship. In Nebraska, Barry meets then-state senator Adam Morfeld, who tells him about the state's nonpartisan voting system. Elections in the state are open to all voters regardless of party affiliation, and all candidates are on the same ballot. Morfeld argues that structuring elections around voters rather than parties "builds incentives for you to reach across party lines and talk to everybody in your district and build a coalition. Whereas in a partisan primary, there's no incentive—you only dial Democrats or Republicans." The model is intriguing, although Barry leaves the potential challenges and advantages of applying it across the country unmentioned.
Barry himself argues that reviving our democracy must first begin with reviving our education system. For Americans to become civically engaged, he writes, they "need greater leadership from the institutions most responsible for the formation of our shared faith: public schools. Students across the country once read and studied Washington's prophetic farewell address. Why not start there?" By looking to America's founding documents and making "the study of civic faith more integrated into school and college curricula," we could "form a firewall against those who fan the flames of insurrection and vigilantism, bigotry and fear."
It's a fine idea, but unfortunately, Barry waits until the book's conclusion to introduce it, and even then he explores it in minimal depth. Civic faith in institutions such as universities, churches, and media organizations can only be restored "if citizens in each area step forward to lead and participate," he continues, as if there's anything new or insightful about telling Americans that change must begin with them.
With less redundant detail and more perceptive analysis, Back Roads and Better Angels could have been both an essential document of contemporary America and an indispensable roadmap for overcoming our current malaise. As it stands, it's occasionally fascinating, with amusing descriptions and edifying historical discursions scattered throughout, but ultimately unsatisfying. On the book's final page, Barry urges his readers to follow Lincoln's example and strive toward "a new birth of freedom." "The unfinished work, as ever, awaits," he proclaims with perceptible excitement. Unfortunately, he has failed to provide the tools to accomplish it.
Back Roads and Better Angels: A Journey into the Heart of American Democracy
by Francis S. Barry
Steerforth, 560 pp., $35
Guy Denton is a writer based in Washington, D.C., and the cohost of The Wrong Stuff podcast with Matt Lewis.