A More Perfect Union: Advancing New American Rights or simply A More Perfect Union is non-fiction political analysis written by United States Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. in collaboration with Frank E.Watkins. Watkins is a political theorist, activist and was the press secretary to Jackson at the time. It was released in hardcover format on October 15, 2001 and in paperback format on April 25, 2008. The material for Jackson's book, his third, came from three trips he took in 1997–98 to American Civil War battlefields. Although Watkins is credited, the biographical content of the book is written as a first person narrative as if written solely by Jackson.