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Abraham Lincoln called the United States “the last best hope of Earth.” In this podcast, we ask whether that claim still holds — and whether it ever did.
Each episode takes a figure, idea, or moment in American political history and asks what it tells us about the country’s understanding of itself, always with an eye to how America looks from the outside in. The Last Best Hope? takes ideas seriously: America as a creed, the arguments of the people who built and remade it, and what America has meant to the rest of the world. We take our subjects from history, not the news — though the present is rarely far away.
Hosted by Adam Smith, Orsborn Professor of American Political History and Director of the Rothermere American Institute at Oxford, The Last Best Hope? brings him into conversation with leading scholars and public figures, including Hillary Clinton, Annette Gordon-Reed, Eric Foner, David Frum, Heather Cox Richardson, Stacy Schiff, Jonathan Freedland, James Morone, Michael Kazin, Kevin Kruse, Julian Zelizer, Bruce Schulman, Ty Seidule, Liz Varon, Eric Rauchway, Phil Tinline, Emily Bazelon, Richard Carwardine, Rachel Shelden, Richard Blackett, Devin Fergus, and Dan Jackson.
“Adam Smith is one of the UK’s foremost historians of America, and communicates his expertise with zest, wit and unforced passion. The Last Best Hope? brings him together with fellow scholars to provide a unique insight we can’t do without.” — Phil Tinline, BBC radio documentary-maker and author
“The Last Best Hope is an absolutely brilliant podcast. Thoughtful, clever, engaging and accessible, Adam Smith always gets the best out of his guests, and I’ve learned an enormous amount from every episode. I love it.” — Dominic Sandbrook, historian and co-host of The Rest is History
“The must-listen US podcast.” — Nick Bryant, former BBC Correspondent in New York
Produced by the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford. rai.ox.ac.uk/home
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Why Presidents Lose Midterms
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American Political Parties Explained
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New Series
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The Battle over the 250th Anniversary
In the bicentennial summer of 1976, the United States staged what was, by some measures, the largest single celebration in the country’s history. Tall ships in New York harbor. Fireworks over the Mall. Specially-minted bicentennial quarters
Why America Doesn't Love Soccer (Except When It Does)
Is there anything more distinctively American than its sports culture? In a previous episode of this podcast, we discussed the tragic decline and partial revival of American cricket. As the 2026 World Cup kicks off in the US Adam asks why a
1776 and the break up of the United States
The rebels who tried to break up the United States in the 1860s thought of themselves as the rightful heirs to the spirit of 1776. The South Carolina Declaration of the Causes of Secession took the Declaration of Independence as its templat
The idea of America in British politics
For 250 years, the idea of America and the fact of American power have unsettled British politics. Is America of us, or apart from us? Rival or special friend? In the British political imagination, America has provoked envy, resentment, con
Why the Declaration of Independence said what it did, Episode 2
To its principal author, Thomas Jefferson, it was “an expression of the American mind”; to the English philosopher Jeremy Bentham, it was "absurd and visionary". The Declaration of Independence, written 250 years ago, is so layered in myth,
Why the Declaration of Independence said what it did, Episode 1
To its principal author, Thomas Jefferson, it was “an expression of the American mind”; to the English philosopher Jeremy Bentham, it was "absurd and visionary". The Declaration of Independence, written 250 years ago, is so layered in myth,
Can federalism save American liberalism?
For much of the twentieth century, progressives in America wanted to expand the Federal Government. They created regulation, bureaucracy, and agencies capable of managing a complex industrial society. And often state governments were the ob
Hillary Rodham Clinton on how America can save itself
Hillary Rodham Clinton has been at the centre of American public life for thirty years. She has exercised more power from more senior positions than any other woman in American history. Clinton has just co-edited a new book Inside the Situa
Why the Gettysburg Address Matters, Part 2
It is one of the most famous speeches in the English language and one of the most consequential. In this special two-part documentary, we explore Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address – why he gave it, what it meant, and its impact at the ti
Why the Gettysburg Address Matters, Part 1
It is one of the most famous speeches in the English language and one of the most consequential. In this special two-part documentary, we explore Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address – why he gave it, what it meant, and its impact at the ti
How Will History Judge Joe Biden?
A year on, what does Trump’s comeback say about Biden’s understanding of the country he led? Was his vision of America already obsolete — a relic of the bipartisan consensus forged in the 1950s when young Joe was coming of age? In this epis
The Myth of the Frontier
If America is the last, best hope of earth, one reason is the frontier. The frontier has been imagined as the place—or perhaps the process—through which the American character is forged—rugged individualism, the possibility of acquiring lan
Trump’s Second Term Foreign Policy in Historical Context
Beneath the chaos of Donald Trump’s second term foreign policy—the bluster, bravado, back-handers and backdowns—is there something else going on? Has the United States reached a turning point in its relationship to the rest of the world? Th
Journalism and Democracy: Lessons from Walter Lippmann
A hundred years ago, Walter Lippmann, one of the great analysts of democratic life, wrote that the present crisis of western democracy is a crisis in journalism. Press barons, Lippmann feared, were so powerful that government based on the c
Election 2024: What just happened?
In this special episode of The Last Best Hope, we bring you a recording of a live event at the Rothermere American Institute in Oxford on Thursday, November 7. Adam Smith and guests discussed why the election turned out the way it did. The
The Age of Polarization Election Special Part 4: 2016
The US is in an Age of Polarization. From the 1930s to the 1980s, voter allegiances were more fluid, and presidents sometimes won massive landslides (think Reagan in 1984 or Nixon in 1972). But for the last thirty years, a huge gulf between
God and Trump: Evangelicals and Politics in today's America
When the media talks about the evangelical vote today, what or to whom are they referring? Who are the people who self-identify in this way? Should we understand them as a group defined by their faith, their style of worship, by distinctive
The Age of Polarization Election Special Part 3: 2008
AGE OF POLARIZATION ELECTION SPECIAL PART 3: 2008 The US is in an Age of Polarization. From the 1930s to the 1980s, voter allegiances were more fluid, and presidents sometimes won massive landslides (think Reagan in 1984 or Nixon in 1972).
The Age of Polarization Election Special Part 2: 2000
AGE OF POLARIZATION ELECTION SPECIAL (PART 2) The US is in an Age of Polarization. From the 1930s to the 1980s, voter allegiances were more fluid and presidents sometimes won huge landslides (think Reagan in 1984 or Nixon in 1972). But for
Eugene V. Debs and America as the last, best hope for socialism?
Eugene V. Debs is a reminder of the possibility of a different kind of American politics. Five times the Socialist Party's candidate for president in the first two decades of the twentieth century, Debs argued that the promise of America --
The Age of Polarization Election Special Part 1: 1992
ELECTION SPECIAL (PART 1) The US is in an Age of Polarization. From the 1930s to the 1980s, voter allegiances were more fluid and presidents sometimes won huge landslides (think Reagan in 1984 or Nixon in 1972). But for the last thirty year
Dark Money: Can billionaires buy elections in America?
Wealthy Americans have always found ways of spending money on political campaigns in the presumed expectation of a return on their investment. But in 2010, the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision ruled that legislation that restricted
Rigged! Anxiety about election integrity in America
For as long as there have been elections, there have been those who’ve refused to trust them. But anxiety about elections has peaked at particular moments in American history – in the run-up the Civil War, in the late nineteenth century, in
Presidents and the Press
In 1787, the year of the Constitutional Convention, Thomas Jefferson wrote that if he had to choose between “a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter”. Easy for
The Black Founders, America and the Claim of Equality
At the heart of the "promise" of the American Revolution and the new republic's claim to be the last, best hope of earth, is the assertion in the Declaration of Independence that "all men are created equal". How did Black Americans react to
Morning Again in America: The 1984 Election forty years on.
Forty years ago, a twinkly-eyed incumbent president ran for re-election despite concerns about his age. He did so by running a campaign steeped in the idea that America was the last, best hope of earth. Ronald Reagan was no Joe Biden, and n
The strange death and curious rebirth of American cricket
Cricket was once the most popular summer game in the United States – the first ever international match was played not, as you might expect between England and one of its colonies, but between Canada and the United States, in 1844. The firs
