hostos hello i am matthew continetti editor of the washington free beacon. you can follow me on twitter. today we are going to discuss "to make men free" a history of the republican party. my guest is professor heather cox richardson boston college. welcome professor. >> guest: thanks for having me. >> host: how long have you been teaching at boston college? >> guest: this is my fourth year in boston college but i've been a teacher since 1987. american history 19th century primarily politics and economics are pretty much anything they want to throw at me. >> host: was the most unusual course you have caught? >> guest: comic books. we have a history of comic books so we put on a comic book expedition. a beautiful job. >> host: is their second book? >> guest: no. >> host: why a book about the republican party? >> guest: i studied primarily 19th century politics and economics in if he do that you must understand the republican party but then i also teach in american history so moving into the 20th century the republican party seemed a no-brainer. >> host: went

[applause] [inaudible conversations] up next on booktv, "after words" with guest host matthew continetti editor of the washington free begin. this week's heather cox richardson and her new book "to make men free" a history of the republican party. in it she discusses the once republican belief articulated by lincoln that government is supposed to promote economic opportunity for all. she explores the parties repeated abandonment of that principle in the 20th century and its return to its roots after every economic collapse. this program is about an hour. >> host: hello i am heather cox richardson editor of the washington free begin and you can follow me on twitter at continetti. today we are going to discuss "to make men free" a history of the republican party. my guest is professor heather cox richardson, boston college. welcome professor. >> guest: thanks for. >> guest: thanks for having me. >> host: how long have you been teaching at boston college? >> guest: this is my fourth year at boston college but i've been teaching since 1987. >> host: what class did you teach? >> guest: politi

i am matthew continetti and this is "after words." thank you for joining us. >> that was "after words" booktv's signature program in which authors of the latest nonfiction books are interviewed by journalists, public policymakers and others familiar with their material. "after words" airs every weekend on booktv at 10:00 p.m. on saturday, 12:09 p.m. on sunday and 12:00 a.m. on monday. and you can also watch is "after words" on line. go to booktv.org go to booktv.org and click on "after words" and click on "after words" in the booktv series and topics list on the upper right side of the page. .. secretary henry kissinger a vital presence in international and national politics since the 1950s named one of the foreign policy magazine's top 100 global thinkers doctor kissinger served as the 56th secretary of state under president nixon and ford and as the national security adviser

i am matthew continetti and this is sublime. this is "after words." >> the copernicus -- copernicus copernicus complex is one of the aspects of what i think is one of the biggest questions we as a species can ask him something we ask nonscientific rape. the book is really about the scientific question of whether or not we are alone in the universe and the copernicus complex refers to complex in a way we feel about ourselves and a complex that we carry around with us that on the one hand from copernicus we learned that we are not central and we are not special in any way and that idea has propagated through the centuries and has driven the core of the idea that has become known as mediocrity. there's nothing special or interesting about it in any way. >> this is a complex we carry around with us. >> the complex is that our instinct tends to make us feel special and all of us as humans unless we are extremely downbeat and tend to wake up in the morning and think of the world revolves around us great rationally of course we know it