From vaccinations to elections to policing, political common ground in America seems to be harder to find than ever. The split is born out in data too – a month before the 2020 election, according to Pew research, roughly 9 in 10 Republicans, and the same number of Democrats, worried that a victory by the other would lead to “lasting harm” to the United States.
“Our crisis today is the clash between the nation’s traditional vision of itself – the American Dream – and the hard, discordant realities it lives with,” wrote Jerry Mason and Adolph Suehsdorf, the editors of the publication America in Crisis. Although their statement rings true today, America in Crisis, a Magnum Photos project, was published in 1969. Inspired by the radical political shifts in the late 1960s, the ground-breaking group initiative aimed to assess the state of the nation, examining key events in the lead-up to Nixon’s 1968 inauguration. The project had a wide scope – section titles included The Streak of Violence, The Deep Roots of Poverty and The Battle for Equality.
