Indivisible?: the story of the second American civil war : a novel

In the early years of the twenty-first century, the empire of the United States of America commanded a preeminent position among the nations of the world and a disproportionate share of the planet’s resources. It stood mighty and alone, the sole superpower to which other nations deferred. While rapidly developing countries were bursting onto the horizon, none was as yet so economically vibrant and militarily powerful. None commanded the respect nor consumed the raw materials of the planet so voraciously. With an ambivalent eye, Americans beheld their good fortune and their great responsibility. There were those who believed the country should rise to its natural stature and police and tame the world, using it, much as the Romans did, to luxuriate in their power and wealth. There were others, however, who saw continuing world domination as a path toward bankruptcy and moral and economic ruin. The histories of previous empires weighed heavily on the educated classes.Other fissures in policy began to make themselves felt: those who yearned for a return to what they believed to be a simpler time when faith and family governed the social lives of all citizens; these were pitted against those who saw the potential in human ability to solve problems and move forward. Some respected a governmental role in basic services, such as health care, while others thought the less government, the better. In short, there were those who looked to government for a solution, and there were those who saw government itself as the problem. This tension, of course, was not new in American politics. But these tensions taken together began to stretch the iron bonds of unity that had been put in place after the Civil War of 1861–1865 and had held the country together ever since that time.This is the story of how those bonds broke. Powerful but divergent interests come together in the turbulent political climate of the US. They converge for a common purpose: to fragment the Union that was won so bitterly 150 years ago. In-the-woods libertarians who resented any governmental influence in their lives joined with religious conservatives who felt that modernity had just crossed too many lines. There were wounded men who could not stop themselves from blaming the government, and there were unprincipled opportunists who did not care what they did so long as they got paid. And there were those whose vocation had become self-aggrandizement, who shared the shallow morals of that group. Behind it all was money. In this era of American civilization, it was possible to amass eye-popping amounts of capital, and those who had it used it to amass even more. Opposing them are men and women who are neither rich nor powerful. There are responsible politicians who understand their charge to preserve the Union. There are responsible public servants who take their job as a public trust. And there are the outliers, patriots who use their sometimes-legal skills to preserve the USA in ways that trusted public officials cannot. Can war be avoided? Can the Union survive?