The direction that constitutional practice has taken in the past hundred years shows that the Framers’ conception of republican government has passed and the era of populist democracy has arrived. The underlying transformation of the unwritten constitution renders efforts to return to the Framers’ original intent problematic. Much has been written in the past century [...]
The dangers associated with the imperial presidency are compounded by an awareness that, while new and more expansive theories of executive authority are seriously advanced, the office is not attracting individuals of high moral and intellectual character. The Philadelphia Constitution may be dead, but the basic problems which troubled the Framers—e.g., preserving the rule of [...]
To the People of the State of New York: Having previously exposed the unfailing dangers of Faction, the more pernicious and enticing danger of Efficiency may be revealed. Indeed, Efficiency, properly ordered as a servant, aids humanity in frugality. An efficient farmer may feed more people; an efficient merchant may employ more people; an efficient [...]
James Madison wrote in “The Federalist” that the Constitution puts the states to the test: The stronger federal government will inaugurate a kind of competition in good government, breaking the states’ monopolies. Having founded republican regimes in America, regimes animated by respect for the laws of Nature and of Nature’s God as enunciated in their [...]
Americans transcribed the Edenic myth and heralded the supremacy of the New World over the Old. Yet, many could not suppress the fear that they were already losing their sense of purity, innocence, and power, and would in time come face to face with the disappointments of history, the sorrows of the human condition, and [...]
Forrest McDonald demonstrated that the historian above all must be a pragmatist who looks at the reality of the past as it was, who gets his hands dirty by putting in long hours of research, who makes sense of vast quantities of data, and who then communicates what he has found in an understandable and [...]
In The Federalist, Publius writes of “new” and “improved” “principles” of the “science of politics,” and he urges his countrymen to abandon the classical teachings concerning the possibilities of republican government over an extensive territory… Conservatives—American and otherwise—have always held The Federalist in extremely high regard. Virtually all would agree with Clinton Rossiter that it stands with the Declaration [...]
During her first century, America’s foreign policy closely guarded her place as a holy land, set apart from the wicked Old World. The purpose of foreign policy was to keep the corrupt outer world from shaping our nation. Who are we, we Americans? Are we champions of liberty, both civil and religious, both at home [...]
What made James Madison unique among his generation and has subsequently made his legacy invaluable was his commitment to the “sacred fire of liberty” and his steadfast refusal to abandon either his republican commitment to popular participation or his liberal commitments to justice and the protection of individual rights. Scholarship on the political thought and [...]
The war between France and Great Britain was the first major crisis faced by the country under the new Constitution. It was a test that the Washington Administration helped the nation pass with flying colors. The following essay is an examination of the Washington administration’s handling of the first major foreign policy crisis facing the [...]
For some time now, our political rhetoric has increasingly moved toward an opposition between classes, causing tension—indeed a kind of warfare—between what Aristotle called the few rich and the many poor. Our founders worked hard to bridge this gap… Today’s offering in our Timeless Essay series affords readers the opportunity to join Virginia Arbery as [...]
Americans transcribed the Edenic myth and heralded the supremacy of the New World over the Old. Yet, many could not suppress the fear that they were already losing their sense of purity, innocence, and power, and would in time come face to face with the disappointments of history, the sorrows of the human condition, and [...]
Only with a conservatism anchored in the presumptions and principles of the Founders, in their understanding of constitutionalism and in the proper functions of each of the branches, are we prepared to do battle with the children of the Enlightenment… The most notable change in the American Republic over the last forty years has been [...]
To revive American constitutionalism would require not more people who talk about “justice,” “the common good,” and “the best regime,” but people who are able to shoulder concrete responsibilities, so that the reconstruction of society could begin where it matters most, in the personal lives of the citizens… Discriminating observers recognize that political practice in [...]