The presidents and the people: five leaders who threatened democracy and the citizens who fought to defend it

Section I: The right to dissent: the journalists who demanded it. John Adams versus Cooper, Bache, and Duane : a president's attempt to shut down the opposition

Thomas Jefferson and the Editors' Campaign : the recovery begins

James Madison and Hanson : protecting speech during war

Section II: Legal personhood: Frederick Douglass and the promise of "We the people." James Buchanan versus Frederick Douglass : a fake neutrality

Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass : the transformation of a president

Andrew Johnson versus Frederick Douglass : a new threat in the midst of recovery

Ulysses Grant and the Douglass constituency : securing the right to vote amid violence

Section III: Equal protection: the long march against second-class citizenship. Woodrow Wilson versus Trotter and Wells : nationalizing white supremacy

Harry Truman and Sadie Alexander : to secure these rights once more

Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Martin Luther King Jr. : the road to recovery

Section IV: The rule of law: the battle for presidential accountability. Richard Nixon versus Daniel Ellsberg and Grand Jury One : criminality in the Oval Office

Coda: Our current crisis.