Hellfire Nation: Saints and Sinners
in American Politics
4:30 p.m.–5:30 p.m
Reception with Refreshments
5:30 p.m.–6:30 p.m.
Lecture and discussion with
Brown Professor James Morone
Cost
$10 For Rocky Mountain Brown Club
Members and Young Alumni (’04–’08)
$15 For Non-Members and Parents
$20 To Attend Event and Become a Member
RSVP
By May 27th by mailing a check
(payable to RMBC) to
RMBC
P.O. Box 6963, Denver, CO 80206
OR by credit card at
https://alumni.brown.edu/alumni/de/events/register_user.aspx?id=347
Questions? Please contact Gwen Burak ’91
at gwynethburak@alumni.brown.edu
or 303-378-9568.
The American Constitution firmly separates church and state. Yet religion lies at
the heart of American politics. How did America become a nation with the soul
of a church? In this talk, Professor Morone shows how religious and moral fervor
ignites our fiercest social conflicts -- and how it moves dreamers to fight for social
justice. Moral crusades inspired abolition, woman suffrage and civil rights even
as they led Americans to hang witches, enslave Africans and ban liquor. Today,
moral arguments touch everything from the Iraq War to the electric campaigns
of Hilary Clinton and Barak Obama. Come learn how fears of sin and dreams of
virtue made (and make) America.
James Morone is Professor of Political Science at Brown University. He grew up in Rio de Janeiro and New York, received his
BA from Middlebury College and his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago. Professor Morone has been on the faculty of Yale
University, The University of Chicago, and the University of Bremen in Germany. The Brown University classes of 1993,
1999, 2001 and 2007 voted him the Hazeltine Citation as the teacher that most inspired them.
Morone’s first book, The Democratic Wish, was named a “notable book of 1991” by the New York Times and won the Political
Science Association’s Kammerer Award for the best book on the United States. His most recent book, Hellfire Nation: the
Politics of Sin in American History, has been featured on C-span, named book of the month by the History News Network,
and was nominated for a Pulitzer prize. Watch for his next book, George Washington’s Regret (Basic Books), which describes
the first president’s advice to future generations -- and what it teaches us today. Jim has written over one hundred essays.
His favorite is “Dumbledore’s Wisdom,” -- a reflection on Harry Potter and its lessons for American education.
Dr. Morone has been president of the New England Political Science Association and the Politics and History section of
Political Science Association. He was distinguished Fulbright lecturer to Japan in 2005, has served on the editorial board of
eight scholarly journals (chairing two of them), and has testified before the US Congress numerous times -- most recently
in May 2006, when he addressed the 45 Democratic Senators about a vision for the future. Morone is the only scholar to
receive two Senior Investigator Awards from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.