A richly detailed story of how religion has influenced American foreign relations, told through the stories of the men and women--from presidents to preachers--who have plotted the country's course in the world. Ever since John Winthrop argued that the Puritans' new home would be "a city upon a hill," Americans' role in the world has been shaped by their belief that God has something special in mind for them. But this is a story that historians have mostly ignored. Now, in the first authoritative work on the subject, Andrew Preston explores the major strains of religious fervor--liberal and conservative, pacifist and militant, internationalist and isolationist--that framed American thinking on international issues from the earliest colonial wars to the twenty-first century, and he arrives at some startling conclusions.--From publisher description.