Alternative Tracks: The Constitution of American Industrial Order, 1865-1917

The Johns Hopkins Series in Constitutional Thought

by Gerald Berk

A novel interpretation of industrialization and political development in the United States, focusing on the critical case of railroads. Winner of the J. David Greenstone Prize from the American Political Science Association Alternative Tracks provides a novel interpretation of industrialization and political development in the United States. Focusing on the critical case of railroads, Gerald Berk shows that alternative forms of economic organization and governmental regulation existed in the late nineteenth century. Constitutional choices, not technological imperatives or economic interests, determined the outcome in the twentieth a centralized industry regulated according to liberal principles of redistribution. Alternative Tracks reveals a nineteenth-century rival to this political economy―an equally efficient and more democratic system of regional railroads regulated according to republican principles.

Genres: History

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Gerald Berk is professor emeritus of political science at the University of Oregon.