What makes America, America? Is its role in the world unique, or is it just another country? Is there anything to the idea of American exceptionalism? What role does the U.S. Constitution play in answering these questions? The genesis of the American Tea Party is rooted in a growing angst over these questions, and this book suggests that the movement is defined by unified answers to them.

In recent decades, the notion of American exceptionalism has become politically incorrect. Critics assert that America should embrace the larger global community and stop being so standoffish. They characterize those who advocate exceptionalism as jingoistic, xenophobic, myopic, and hell bent on imperialism. The antiexceptionalists denounce the U.S. military interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan, decry attempts to protect American borders as racist, and condemn the founding fathers as irrelevant and backward thinking.