Barone, Michael, and Richard E, Cohen. The Almanac of American Politics 2008 (2007) covers all the states and all curtrent politicians with amazing detail. New edition every two years since 1975.
Black, Earl and Merle Black. Divided America: The Ferocious Power Struggle in American Politics (2007)
Cannon, Lou. President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime (2000), online edition
Crane, Michael. The Political Junkie Handbook: The Definitive Reference Books on Politics (2004) covers all the major issues explaining the parties' positions
Donald, David. Lincoln (1999) the best scholarly biography
Ehrman, John, The Eighties: America in the Age of Reagan (2005)
Frank, Thomas. What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America (2005), liberal criticism of GOP
Gould, Lewis. Grand Old Party: A History of the Republicans (2003)
Levy, Peter B. Encyclopedia of the Reagan-Bush Years Greenwood Press, 1996 online edition
Pemberton, William E. Exit with Honor: The Life and Presidency of Ronald Reagan (1998) biography by historian; online edition
Perlstein, Rick. Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus (2002) very well written narrative of politics 1960-64 excerpt and text search
Perlstein, Rick. Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America (2008) very well written narrative of politics 1964-68
Reeves, Richard. President Reagan: The Triumph of Imagination (2005) detailed analysis by historian
Sabato, Larry J., and Howard R. Ernst. Encyclopedia Of American Political Parties And Elections (2006) comprehensive coverage of politics since 1945.
Sabato, Larry J. Divided States of America: The Slash and Burn Politics of the 2004 Presidential Election (2005).
Sabato, Larry J. ed. The Sixth Year Itch: The Rise and Fall of the George W. Bush Presidency (1907), in-depth essays by scholars
Sabato, Larry J. and Bruce Larson. The Party's Just Begun: Shaping Political Parties for America's Future (2001) textbook.
Shafer, Byron E. and Anthony J. Badger, eds. Contesting Democracy: Substance and Structure in American Political History, 1775-2000 (2001), long essays by specialists on each time period
Shafer, Byron and Richard Johnston. The End of Southern Exceptionalism (2006), uses statistical election data & polls to argue GOP growth was primarily a response to economic change
Wilentz, Sean. The Age of Reagan: A History, 1974-2008 (2008), major narrative history
Wooldridge, Adrian and John Micklethwait. The Right Nation: Conservative Power in America sophisticated study by two British journalists (2004).
Chernus, Ira. Monsters to Destroy: The Neoconservative War on Terror and Sin. (Boulder: Paradigm, 2006. 245 pp. isbn 978-1-59451-276-6.)
Gonzales, Manuel G., and Richard Delgado. The Politics of Fear: How Republicans Use Money, Race, and the Media to Win. (Boulder: Paradigm, 2006. 221 pp. isbn 1-59451-242-1.)
Shogan, Robert. Backlash: The Killing of the New Deal (Ivan R. Dee, 2006. 275 pp. isbn 978-1-56663-674-2.)
Toplin, Robert Brent. Radical Conservatism: The Right’s Political Religion. (University Press of Kansas, 2006. 306 pp. isbn 0-7006-1487-7.) excerpt and text search