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Dr. Stewart Winger

Associate Professor
History
Office
SCH Schroeder Hall 307C
Office Hours
Office. Hours: TTH 2:30-3:30 pm and by appointment, including Zoom. 309-212-9724
  • About
  • Education
  • Awards & Honors
  • Research

Biography

Dr. Winger received his B.A. from the University of Chicago in 1985. After study at the Free University of Berlin, he received his M.A. in 1993 and his Ph.D. in 1998 from Chicago. Before coming to ISU in 2006, he taught at Purdue University Calumet, The American University in Cairo, and Lawrence Technological University.

Current Courses

135.001History Of The United States To 1865

135.002History Of The United States To 1865

499.007Independent Research For The Master's Thesis

414.001Seminar: Civil War And Reconstruction

412.001Seminar: Topics In 19th Century United States History

291.002Undergraduate Teaching Experience In History

200.001Doing History: An Introduction

200.004Doing History: An Introduction

499.004Independent Research For The Master's Thesis

499.005Independent Research For The Master's Thesis

400.004Independent Study

309.001Selected Topics In United States History

Teaching Interests & Areas

Dr. Winger offers courses in Civil War and Reconstruction, American Religious History, U.S. Legal and Constitutional History, Global Fundamentalisms, and U.S. Economic History. He has helped lead a multi-faculty Global Religions course that began in 2019.

Research Interests & Areas

Dr. Winger is currently co-editing a volume on ex parte Milligan, a landmark civil liberties case that arose out of the Civil War and that has recently assumed new importance in controversies surrounding the conduct of the "War on Terror."

He is also writing a book titled The Fostering Care of Government: Abraham Lincoln and Internal Improvements. By reworking Lincoln's legislative record especially, the book seeks to restore Lincoln's economic program to a central position in Lincoln interpretation neglected since Gabor Boritt's Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream.

Ph D

The University of Chicago
Chicago, IL

MA History of Culture

The University of Chicago
Chicago, IL

BA Fundamentals: Issues and Texts

The University of Chicago
Chicago, IL

Influential and Inspirational Faculty Member

ISU History-Social Science Education Program
2023

Influential and Inspirational Faculty Member

ISU History-Social Science Education Program
2020

Influential and Inspirational Faculty Member

ISU History-Social Sciences Education Program
2019

Influential and Inspirational History Faculty Member

History-Social Sciences Education Program
2018

Influential and Inspirational History Faculty Member

History-Social Sciences Education Program
2018

College Outstanding Teacher Award

College of Arts and Sciences
2015

Red Tassel Mortar Board Teaching Award

Illinois State University Red Tassel Chapter of Mortar Board.
2015

Influential and Inspirational History Faculty Member

History - Social Sciences Education Program
2014

Influential and Inspirational History Faculty Member

History - Social Sciences Education Program
2014

Influential & Inspirational History Faculty Member

History-Social Science Education Program
2013

Book Review

Stewart Winger, "A Commercial Republic Roundtable: Entry 3 from Stewart Winger" Reviewed A Commercial Republic: America’s Enduring Debate Over Democratic Capitalism by Mike O'Connor, Society for U.S. Intellectual History, June 19, 2018.
Winger, S., & Krannawitter, T. Vindicating Lincoln: Defending the Politics of our Greatest President. Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 31.1 (2010): 51-59.
Winger, S., & Eyal, Y. The Young America Movement and the Transformation of the Democratic Party, 1828–1861. The American Historical Review 113 (2008): 834-35.

Book, Edited

Winger, S., & White, J. Ex Parte Milligan Reconsidered: Race and Civil Liberties from the Lincoln Administration to the War on Terror. University Press of Kansas (2020)
Winger, S. Introduction: Ex Parte Milligan Reconsidered: Race and Civil Liberties from the Lincoln Administration to the War on Terror. Ex Parte Milligan Reconsidered: Race and Civil Liberties from the Lincoln Administration to the War on Terror. University Press of Kansas (2020)
Winger, S. The Least Naive Position: The Lincoln Administration and International Law in American Wars on Terror. Ex Parte Milligan Reconsidered: Race and Civil Liberties from the Lincoln Administration to the War on Terror. University Press of Kansas (2020)

Journal Article

Winger, S., Doorn, E., & O'Sullivan, P. Testing our Standards – Testing our Teaching: Our General Education vs. the A.P. Exams. Progressive Measures 9.2 (2015): 10-16.
Winger, S. High Priests of Nature: The Origins Illinois State Normal ‘University’ in the Antebellum Lyceum. Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 101.2 (2008): 127-62.
Winger, S. Lincoln’s Alma Mater: The Lyceum and the Making of a Self-Made Man. Lincoln Lore (2008): 41-48.

Newspaper, Article

Winger, S. Abraham Lincoln supported a wealth tax. Here’s why. The principles behind the American Revolution justifed such a tax. Kathryn Cramer Brownell (EDs). Washington Post (2022)

Presentations

Declaring the Revolutionary Republic. U.S. Intellectual History Conference 2023. Society for U.S. Intellectual History. (2023)
Lincoln, the Wealth Tax, and American Revolutionary Republicanism. Midwest Civil War Study Group Symposium. Civil War Study Group of the Midwest. (2023)
Presidential Power in Wartime: the Lincoln Administration View. The Constitution in Wartime VMI Constitution Day Discussion. Virginia Military Institute. (2023)
The Problem with Textbooks. 2023 History and Social Science Symposium: Conflict and Harmony: Toward a Global Future. Illinois State University History and Social Science Education Program. (2023)
Of Internal Improvements, Monetary Expansion, Wealth Taxes, and other Tools of Class Warfare in Lincoln's Illinois. Midwestern History Conference 2021. Midwestern History Association. (2021)
Slavery, Race, and Democratic Activism in Antebellum Illinois. 2021 OAH Annual Meeting. Organization of American Historians. (2021)
What I Learned about the Modern World from Teaching Comparative Global Fundamentalisms, or . . . Leonardo on a Notebook. International Studies Seminar. ISU, Office of International Studies and Programs. (2019)
The Role of Government in Lincoln's America: Lincoln's Internal Improvement Politics Reconsidered. 2018 Conference on Illinois History. Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. (2018)
Roundtable: Christopher Phillip's The Rivers Ran Backward: The Civil War and the Remaking of the American Middle Border. 2017 Ohio Academy of History Annual Meeting and Conference. Ohio Academy of History. (2017)
"The Fostering Hand of Government: the startling absence of limited government thinking in Lincoln's world. ISU History Department Faculty Research Seminar. ISU History Department. (2017)

Grants & Contracts

College of Arts and Sciences Interdisciplinary Initiative Grant -- World Religions. ISU College of Arts and Sciences. Illinois State University. (2019)
International Seminar Series: Fostering World Religious Literacy. International Studies and Programs. Illinois State University. (2019)
Pressing Questions in Religion. College of Arts and Sciences. Illinois State University. (2017)
Ex Parte Milligan Conference Funding. David Davis Mansiion Foundatiion. Local. (2015)
NEH Fellowhip. National Endowment for the Humanities. Federal. (2013)