First published 2017
Bernard Bailyn explores how revolutionary Americans understood political power and its dangers. This Pulitzer Prize and Bancroft Prize winner analyzes the ideas that drove the American Revolution through pamphlets, letters, newspapers, and sermons of the era. Bailyn shows how the Founders repeatedly wrestled with questions about power's proper use. They saw power as beneficial when exercised through popular consent but destructive when seized by force for personal gain. The expanded edition covers both the revolutionary period and the constitutional ratification debates, tracing how founding ideals evolved into practical governance. Bailyn's new preface highlights the Founders' central preoccupation with power's potential for both liberation and corruption. This fiftieth anniversary edition reveals the intellectual foundations that shaped American political thought and continue to influence debates about government authority today.
Genres: biography, history, political-science, non-fiction, academic, american-history
Vibes: thought-provoking
Tropes: historical-fiction
Period: 18th-Century, Revolutionary-Era
432 pages · Paperback · Belknap Press: An Imprint of Harvard University Press