John S. Haller Jr. – författare

The life and work of a religious humanist thinkerSometimes called America’s fourth religion, religious humanism emerged in the Midwest as a product of Enlightenment rationality, the Social Gospel, and the philosophy of pragmatism. John S. Haller Jr. examines religious humanism’s first fifty years alongside Edwin H. Wilson’s pivotal role in the American Humanist Association (AHA).Started by a group of Unitarian faculty and students, religious humanism applied the rituals of the theocentric universe of Judeo-Christianity to the non-theistic, anthropocentric universe of agnostics, altruists, humanitarians, and meliorists. Their beliefs found expression in the AHA, founded in 1941 with Wilson as the secretary and editor of its magazine. Wilson’s actions in these and other roles weighed heavily on the organization’s reputation, influence, successes, and failures. At the same time, his multifaceted work reflected the relationship between power and the possibilities inherent in the pluralistic and democratic heritage he pursued.Rigorous and astute, Religion After the Gods reveals how the tensions between individual aspirations and bureaucratic constraints culminated in hopeful humanist practices.

The life and work of a religious humanist thinkerSometimes called America’s fourth religion, religious humanism emerged in the Midwest as a product of Enlightenment rationality, the Social Gospel, and the philosophy of pragmatism. John S. Haller Jr. examines religious humanism’s first fifty years alongside Edwin H. Wilson’s pivotal role in the American Humanist Association (AHA).Started by a group of Unitarian faculty and students, religious humanism applied the rituals of the theocentric universe of Judeo-Christianity to the non-theistic, anthropocentric universe of agnostics, altruists, humanitarians, and meliorists. Their beliefs found expression in the AHA, founded in 1941 with Wilson as the secretary and editor of its magazine. Wilson’s actions in these and other roles weighed heavily on the organization’s reputation, influence, successes, and failures. At the same time, his multifaceted work reflected the relationship between power and the possibilities inherent in the pluralistic and democratic heritage he pursued.Rigorous and astute, Religion After the Gods reveals how the tensions between individual aspirations and bureaucratic constraints culminated in hopeful humanist practices.

Between 1836 and 1911, thirteen physio-medical colleges opened, and then closed, their doors. These authentic American schools, founded on a philosophy of so-called Physio-Medicalism, substituted botanical medicines for allopathy's mineral drugs and promoted the belief that the human body has an inherent "vital force" that can be used to heal. In Kindly Medicine, John Haller offers the first complete history of this high-brow branch of botanical medicine. Physio-Medicalist, along with Thomsonians, Homeopathys, Hydropaths, and Eclectics, represented the earliest wave of medical sectarianism in nineteenth-century America. United in their opposition to the harsh regimens of allopathy, or regular medicine, these sects had their beginnings in the era of Jacksonian democracy and individualism when every man yearned to become his own legislator, minister, and even his own physician. The Physio-Medicals demanded equal rights with regular practitioners to jobs in the army, navy and public institutions and equal representation on the new state licensing and regulatory boards. As the nineteenth century drew to a close, they saw their influence waning as they could no longer match allopathy's increasing hold on science and on the public's trust. In this history of the movement, John Haller recounts the events that led to the establishment of Physio-Medicalism and traces the circumstances that brought its slow descent into obscurity.

Aimed at scholars and general readers alike, this book offers the first biography of Michael A. Musmmano, a Pittsburgh native, who found national and international fame in his storied roles as lawyer, judge, and author of sixteen books, two of which became Hollywood movies. Born to Italian immigrants, Musmanno began working as a coal loader when he was a teenager, and he later earned a law degree from Georgetown University. Over the course of his colorful career, Musmanno became best known for serving as appellate attorney in the Sacco-Vanzetti trial; presiding over the Einsatzgruppen trial at Nuremberg; and issuing over 500 impassioned dissents as a justice on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. John Haller’s lively biography highlights the historical and political significance of these achievements, while also illuminating the range and influence of Musmanno’s other professional accomplishments. At the same time, Haller’s book also looks beneath this public persona. It uncovers striking and sometimes troubling details about Musmanno’s private life, including his relationship with a young child who would eventually become his fiancée for a brief time. In telling the story of Musmanno, Haller transforms extensive archival research into an engaging narrative. His book not only charts Musmanno’s indelible political influence, but also portrays a human a figure riven with ambiguity, complexity, and contradiction.