As the United States marks its semiquincentennial in 2026, renowned historian Marc Stein looks back at the politics of another landmark celebration during a time of striking similarities and surprising differences: the US bicentennial in 1976.
In the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate, the bicentennial sparked an extraordinary national conversation about the country's past, present, and future. As patriots, planners, profiteers, and protesters argued about how to commemorate the national birthday, they collectively reimagined the promises and perils of democracy during a transformational decade.
From award-winning historian Marc Stein, Bicentennial: A Revolutionary History of the 1970s is an original, illuminating, and insightful study of that era. While focusing on festivities and fights in the nation's birthplace, Philadelphia, the book also explores the many proposed and abandoned celebrations that percolated up around the country, situating the bicentennial in local and national contexts. It tells a broadly democratic story of both the "official" bicentennial and counter-bicentennial activism, offering revolutionary perspectives on national politics, social movements, and popular culture. From the queer courtship of US President Richard Nixon and Philadelphia Mayor Frank Rizzo to parades and protests with millions of participants, and from a deadly outbreak of Legionnaires' disease in Philadelphia's most prestigious hotel to the establishment of groundbreaking African American, ethnic, and Jewish museums, the bicentennial reveals a kaleidoscope of American peculiarities, problems, and possibilities.
The lasting influence of 1976 on one of the nation's great urban centers and the United States as a whole is undeniable. As the nation—once again enmeshed in political and social upheaval—celebrates its two-hundred-fiftieth birthday in 2026, there is no better time to look back at its two-hundredth and marvel at what has changed, and what has not.
Table of Contents:
Abbreviations
Introduction
1. The Queer Courtship of Richard Nixon and Frank Rizzo
2. The Rise and Fall of Five Bicentennial Plans
3. The “Do-It-Yourself” Bicentennial
4. Ford to Bicentennial City: Drop Dead
5. “We Are the Bicentennial”
6. “Freedom’s Way—U.S.A.”
7. Philadelphia Renaissance
8. Happy Birthday, USA
9. Let Freedom Ring
Conclusion
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
About the Author :
Marc Stein is the Jamie and Phyllis Pasker Professor of US History and Constitutional Law at San Francisco State University. He is the 2026–27 president of the Organization of American Historians and director of the OutHistory website. His previous books include City of Sisterly and Brotherly Loves, Sexual Injustice, Rethinking the Gay and Lesbian Movement, The Stonewall Riots, and Queer Public History.
Review :
“Drawing on extensive research, this engaging book promises to be the definitive account of how the bicentennial celebrations were planned, enacted, and protested both in Philadelphia and at large. Stein does a superb job of weaving together the national and the local stories and of bringing to life the activism and agency of African Americans, LGBTQ+ Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and women—groups that often found themselves at odds with, ambivalent about, or organizing radical alternatives to the officially sanctioned events and commemorations. With themes that resonate with our current political moment, Bicentennial is an original, insightful, and important contribution.”
“This ambitious book is so needed—at a moment when the cultural and political divides Stein details offer both lessons from the past and key strategies for navigating our ever-changing national landscape as we approach the semiquincentennial. In Stein’s eloquent hands, the 1970s become not a period of fragmentation and loss (though there is some), of siloing of activists, but rather a decade that bore witness to broad coalitions that included, for the first time, LGBTQ+ individuals/groups and their goals and the emergence of what today we would term ‘intersectional’ approaches. He has crafted here a history of city planning and urban development alongside a meticulously detailed and persuasive analysis of the ways in which local, state, and national politics and politicians framed the bicentennial. It is a richly layered, powerful book.”
