Ken Burns presents the history of our federal representative body, lauding its successes and exposes its weaknesses. Covering 200 years of history (the film was released in 1988) and over 12,000 representatives, the surface is barely scraped in a running time of 90 minutes. Focusing on lions such as Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, covering key eras such as Civil Rights and the Women's Suffrage movement, told by then members of Congress, and presented in the Burn's usual, exemplary style (with David McCullough's stalwart narration), "The Congress" is still an excellent though abbreviated history.
