This book begins: "Most nations don't have to be made. They are there already. They have always been there. No one had to make France of England or Denmark. You might say that history made them. They don't have any "father" or any "birthday". The United States is different. Remember how Lincoln put it in the Gettsyburg Address:'Our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation.' This is just what they did, too".

This book is the story of how the nation was "made" , both people and ideas to form our government. This is one of the books our entire family has a copy of and has read. Commager also wrote books on the Emancipation Proclamation and the Declaration of Independence in this same form.