a good, short definition of the historian's task (by a preeminent American historian, Annette Gordon-Reed)

In my forthcoming article on the history of Chapter IX (municipal bankruptcy), I go to some length to explain the historical method, and why it is superior to "law and economics" as the way to find and tell that story. 

As I was today rereading Annette Gordon-Reed's short book on Juneteenth, I saw her very pithy encapsulation of all that:

"'change over time' [is] the heart of a historian's work"

Annette Gordon-Reed, On Juneteenth at 120 (W.W. Norton 2021).