NOTE: The “Contents” section of the site menu lists all articles, divided into six categories (“Bible Notes,” “Philosophers,” “American Politics,” “Nations,” “Manners and Morals,” and “Remembrances”). The articles are arranged in the chronological order of their posting. This Table of Contents lists articles in the “American Politics” section in the order in which they may be read as if they are chapters in a book.
1. What Is a Regime?
2. The American Flag
3. Three English Settlements in North America, Compared
Malcolm Gaskill: Between Two Worlds: How the English Became Americans (2014).
4. Preconditions of the American Founding
5. America’s Declaration of Independence
6. Declaration of Independence: British Rejoinders
Thomas Hutchinson: Strictures Upon the Declaration of Independence of the Congress of Philadelphia; In a Letter to a Noble Lord (1776).
John Lind: An Answer to the Declaration of Independence (1776).
7. Whose Declaration?
Danielle Allen: Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality (2014).
8. Moral and Civic Virtues, the American Way
9. America’s Founding “On Two Wings”
Michael Novak: On Two Wings: Humble Faith and Common Sense at the American Founding (2001).
10. How the American Founders Understood Religious Liberty
Philip Vincent Muñoz: Religious Liberty and the American Founding. (2022).
11. ‘Paleoconservatism’ and the American Founding
Justin B. Litke: Twilight of the Republic: Empire and Exceptionalism in the American Political Tradition (2013).
12. Chastellux in America
François de Beauvoir, Marquis de Chastllux: Chastellux’s Travels in North-America in the Years 1780-81-82. (N.D.).
13. A Feminine History of the American Revolution
Barbara W. Tuchman: The First Salute (1988).
14. The French and American Revolutions Compared
15. Shklar on American Citizenship: A Dialogue with the Declaration
Judith N. Shklar: American Citizenship: The Quest for Inclusion (1991).
16. Who Is an American Citizen?
Edward J. Erler: The U.S. in Crisis: Immigration, the Nation, and the Nation State (2020).
17. Why the American Revolution Really Was One
Ralph Lerner: The Thinking Revolutionary: Principle and Practice in the New Republic (1987).
18. Locke and the American Founders
Thomas L. Pangle: The Spirit of Modern Republicanism (1988).
19. Public Morality, and Public Moralism
Exchange with Thomas Molnar, 1987.
20. Rhetoric and American Statesmanship
Glen Thurow and Jeffrey D. Wallin, eds.: Rhetoric and Statesmanship (1984).
21. The American Founders’ “Rhetorical Identities”
Albert Furtwangler: American Silhouettes: Rhetorical Identities of the Founders (1987).
22. Educating the American Mind: The Founders’ View
23. That Exquisite Headache, the University of Virginia
Alan Taylor: Thomas Jefferson’s Education (2019).
24. Mathematicians in America
David Lindsay Roberts: Republic of Numbers: Unexpected Stories of Mathematical Americans through History (2019).
25. Educating the American Mind: The Progressives’ View
26. The Foreign Policy of the American Founders
27. Imperialism and Regime Change as Instruments of Foreign Policy in the Washington Administration.
Colin G. Calloway: The Indian World of George Washington: The First President, the First Americans, and the Birth of the Nation (2019).
28. American Foreign Policy Since 1890
29. American Foreign Policy Today
30. Terrorism and American Foreign Policy
31. The Question of Slavery in the Founding Period
32. Israel on America’s Mind
Noam Chomsky: the Fatal Triangle: The United States, Israel, and the Palestinians (1984).
Sam B. Girgus: The New Convenant: Jewish Writers and the American Ideal (1984).
Peter Grose: Israel in the Mind of America (1984).
33. Benjamin Franklin as a Way of Life
J. A. Le May, ed.: Benjamin Franklin: Writings (1987).
34. State and Regime: The Articles of Confederation, Pro and Con
William Van Cleve: We Have Not a Government: The Articles of Confederation and the Road to the Constitution (2017).
35. What Does the Constitution Constitute?
36. Republicanism, the American Way
37. Self-Government, the American Way
38. The Founding and Perpetuation of the American Republic
Forrest MacDonald: Novo Ordo Seclorum: The Intellectual Origins of the Constitution (1985).
Walter Berns: In Defense of Liberal Democracy (1984).
39. Philadelphia, 1787: An Introduction
Charles L. Mee, Jr.: The Genius of the People (1987).
40. Marking the Constitution’s Bicentennial
Richard B. Bernstein: Are We to Be a Nation? (1987).
41. Studies of the American Constitution
Robert A. Goldwin and William A. Schambra, eds.: How Democratic Is the Constitution? (1980).
Robert A. Goldwin and William A. Schambra, eds.: How Capitalistic Is the Constitution? (1982).
42. America’s Constitution as Regime
James Ceaser: Designing a Polity: America’s Constitution in Theory and Practice (2011).
43. On Aristotle and America
Leslie G. Rubin: America, Aristotle, and the Politics of a Middle Class. (2018).
44. On Pretending the Constitution Was a Blank Slate
Jeffrey R Stone: “Our Fill-in-the-Blank Constitution.” (2010).
45. On the Preamble to the United States Constitution
45. United States Constitution: A Brief Introduction
47. Civil Society and Local Government
48. The Relation of the Federal Government to the State Governments: What Does Publius Say?
49. Federalism and Democracy in America
Alexis de Tocqueville: Democracy in America. Volume I, Part 1, Chapter 8, subchapter 22: “On the Advantages of the Federal System Generally, and Its Special Utility in America.” Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop translation. (2000).
50. The Idea of Representation and the Problem of Delegation
51. United States Congress: A Brief Introduction
52. United States Constitution: Powers of the House of Representatives
53. United States Constitution: How Senators Are Elected
54. United States Constitution: Some Presidential Powers
55. Executive Authority in the Republican Regime: How the Founders Designed the Presidency
56. The Institutional Framework for Executive Firmness in the United States Constitution
The Federalist #71.
57. Why Have There Been No Military Coups in the United States?
58. United States Constitution: The Republican Guarantee Clause
59. Self-Government, The American Theme
60. Publius on the American Regime and the American State
The Federalist, No. 13.
61. Publius on the Articles of Confederation Regime and State
The Federalist, No. 22.
62. Publius on Federalism and Rebellion
The Federalist, Number 28.
63. Publius on the United States Senate
The Federalist, Nos. 62, 63, 64.
64. Why the Federalists Won
65. How the Constitution Secures Rights
Robert A. Goldwin and William B. Schambra, eds.: How Does the Constitution Secure Rights? (1985).
66. The Right to Effective Citizenship
67. Freedom of Speech vs. Freedom of Expression
Francis Canavan: Freedom of Expression: Purpose as Limit (1984).
68. The First Amendment, Misunderstood
69. Constitutional Limits on Military Action
70. Due Process of Law
71. Macedo v. The Constitution
Stephen Macedo: the New Right v. The Constitution (1987).
72. The United States Constitution Considered with Multifaceted Superficiality
Joshua B. Stein: Commentary on the Constitution from Plato to Rousseau (2011).
73. Defending the American Founding
Robert R. Reilly: America on Trial: A Defense of the Founding (2020).
74. Washington’s Political Thought
W. B. Allen, ed.: George Washington: A Collection (1988).
75. George Washington, Nation-Builder
Edward J. Larson: George Washington, Nationalist (2016).
76. Imperialism and Regime Change
Colin G. Calloway: The Indian World of George Washington (2019).
77. Public Opinion, The American Way
Colleen Sheehan: James Madison and the Spirit of Republican Self-Government (2009).
78. Madison’s New Science of Politics
Colleen Sheehan: The Mind of James Madison: The Legacy of Classical Republicanism. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
79. Adams on Madison
Henry Adams: History of the United States of American during the Administrations of James Madison (1987 edition).
80. Federalism as Nationalism: Beer’s Critique of Madisonian Compact Theory
Samuel H. Beer: The Rediscovery of American Federalism (1993).
81. Aristotle and Hamilton
Michael D. Chan: Aristotle and Hamilton on Commerce and Statesmanship (2006).
82. The Idea of Self-Government in the Political Thought of John Marshall
83. Jefferson’s Political Identity
Alf J. Mapp: Thomas Jefferson: A Strange Case of Mistaken Identity (1987).
84. Jeffersonian Empire
Robert W. Tucker and David C. Hendrickson: Empire of Liberty: The Statecraft of Thomas Jefferson (1990).
85. Monroe’s Understanding of the Sovereignty of the American People
James Monroe: The People the Sovereigns (1987 edition).
86. Formed for a Statesman: John Quincy Adams
James Traub: John Quincy Adams: Militant Spirit (2016).
87. Andrew Jackson: Popular Sovereignty and the United States Constitution
A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents. 22 volumes. New York: Bureau of National Literature, Inc. 1897. Volumes III and IV.
Bradley J. Birzer: In Defense of Andrew Jackson. Washington: Regnery History, 2018.
Marvin Meyers: The Jacksonian Persuasion: Politics and Belief. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1957.
Gerard N. Magliocca: Andrew Jackson and the Constitution: The Rise and Fall of Generational Regimes. Lawrence: The University Press of Kansas, 2007.
88. Jackson’s War Record: The 1828 Presidential Campaign
89. Free, Independent, and Sovereign? The Status of the American States
90. What American Democracy Means for Europe, in the Estimation of Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville: Democracy in America. Volume I, Part II, chapter 9: “Principal Causes Tending to Maintain a Democratic Republic in America.”
91. Dickens in America
Charles Dickens: American Notes (1843).
92. Why Are There Now So Few “Great Senators of the United States”?
Oliver Dyer: Great Senators of the United States of Forty Years Ago (1889).
93. Natural Right and the American Academic
Catherine H. Zuckert: Natural Right and the American Imagination (2012).
94. The Race Issue
Jack Turner, III: Awakening to Race: Individualism and Social Consciousness in America (2012).
95. Emerson: How ‘American’ Was He?
Irving Howe: The American Newness: Culture and Politics in the Age of Emerson (1987).
96. Moby-Dick and the “New America”
97. Moby-Dick: The Adventure Before the Adventure
98. Moby-Dick: The Ship and Its Rulers
99. Moby-Dick: The Nature of Chaos
100. Moby-Dick: Living with Chaos
101. Moby-Dick: Revolution
102. Moby-Dick: Whales and Whale-Hunting
103. Moby-Dick: Isolatoes No More
104. Moby-Dick: Piety and Piracy
105. Moby-Dick: The Business Cycle
106. Moby-Dick: Ivory and Steel
107. Moby-Dick: Storm
108. Moby-Dick: The End of the Yarn
109. Moby-Dick: Concluding Thoughts
110. Charles Olson Considers Melville
111. Melville’s Battle-Pieces
112. The Political Coherence of the American South
113. Keeping a Republic: Lincoln and Tocqueville
114. Lincoln on Self-Government: The Reply to Douglas
115. Lincoln on Culture
Abraham Lincoln: “Address to the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society” (1859).
116. Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address
117. Lincoln’s Address at Gettysburg
118. Revolution at Gettysburg?
Garry Wills: Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America (1992).
119. The Statesmanship of Word and Deed: Abraham Lincoln
Diana Schaub: His Greatest Speeches: How Lincoln Moved the Nation (2021).
120. Lincoln Criticized in the Currently Fashionable Mode
George Kateb: Lincoln’s Political Thought (2015).
121. War is All Hell, Except When It Isn’t
Bernard A. Olsen: Beyond the Tented Field (1993).
122. Amerindians in the Civil War
123. America’s Reconstitution
Forrest A. Nabors: From Oligarchy to Republicanism: The Great Task of Reconstruction (2017).
124. The Plains Sioux and the Empire of Liberty
Jeffrey Ostler: The Plains Sioux and U.S. Colonialism from Lewis and Clark to Wounded Knee (2004).
125. Populism in America
126. The ‘Progressive’ Critique of the Declaration of Independence
127. Goodnow’s Conception of American Liberty
Frank Goodnow: “The American Conception of Liberty” (1916).
128. Executive Overreach
Woodrow Wilson: “Our Elastic Constitution” (1904).
129. The Progressives’ Presidency
130. What Is “The Promise of American Life?”
131. Wilson’s Doubleness: A Commentary on “WW”
John Alvis: WW: A Play in Two Acts
132. Hyphenate Americans and Invisible Men: The “Americanist” Strategies of Wilson and Roosevelt during the Great War
133. Holmes on the “Missouri Question”
134. Taking Their Stand: The Southern Agrarians
Twelve Southerners: I’ll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition (1983 edition).
135. “Gone With the Wind,” Begone
136. New Deal or No Deal: American Economic Policies, 1914-1946
Benjamin M. Anderson: Economics and the Public Welfare: A Financial and Economic History of the United States, 1914-1946 (1979 edition).
137. Washington Politics during World War II
Nancy Beck Young: Why We Fight: Congress and the Politics of World War II (2013).
H. G. Nicholas, ed.: Washington Dispatches 1941-1945: Weekly Reports from the British Embassy (1981).
138. De Gaulle According to Faulkner
William Faulkner: The De Gaulle Story (1984 edition).
139. FDR as Tocquevillian?
Jeffrey A. Becker: Ambition in America: Political Power and the Collapse of Citizenship (2014).
140. United States Constitution: The Carolene Products Case
United States v. Carolene Products 304 U.S. 144 (1938).
141. The Folsoms Return Fire
Burton W. and Anita Folsom: FDR Goes to War (2011).
142. FDR and Stalin
Robert Nisbet: Roosevelt and Stalin (1988).
143. Hoover versus the New Deal
Herbert Hoover: The Crusade Years: 1933-1955 (2013).
144. Herbert Hoover’s Despairing Verve
Herbert Hoover: Freedom Betrayed (2012).
145. The Cold War: Causes and Effects
John Lewis Gaddis: Strategy of Containment (1982).
Melvyn P. Leffler: A Preponderance of Power (1993).
Manning Marable: Race, Reform, and Rebellion (1984).
146. Truman: A Turn to the Right?
David Plotke: Building a Democratic Political Order: Reshaping American Liberalism in the 1930s and 1940s (1996).
147. Dixiecrats: The 1948 Presidential Election
148. Kennan
George F. Kennan: The Kennan Diaries (2014).
149. When the Business of America Was Business: The National Wrestling Alliance
Tim Hornbaker: The National Wrestling Alliance: The Untold Story of the Monopoly That Strangled Pro Wrestling. (2007).
150. Challenge to American Liberalism: Martin Luther King and Malcolm X
151. Urban Studies and the Question of Race
152. The Decline of Voter Turnout in the United States
153. Has Federalism Impeded Tyranny in the United States?
154. Nixon’s Defense of Détente
Richard Nixon: “Hard-headed Détente” (1982).
155. What Does Not Kill Schell’s Argument Makes It Stronger
Jonathan Schell: The Time of Illusion: An Historical and Reflective Account of the Nixon Era (1975).
156. Brzezinski Speaks
157. Kennan’s Second Thoughts
158. Jimmy Carter: Too Little, Too Late
159. Carter, Mondale, and the Politics of Compassion
160. Solzhenitsyn’s Speech at Harvard
161. Tocqueville and American Foreign Policy
162. Geopolitics of the Cold War
Robert Morris: Our Globe Under Siege (1986).
163. What’s Wrong with the American Party System?
Robert A. Goldwin, ed.: Political Parties in the Eighties (1980).
164. Edward M. Kennedy in 1980.
165. Ronald Reagan: A Conservative’s Assessment
George Will: The Morning After: American Successes and Excesses, 1981-1986 (1987).
166. Jeane Kirkpatrick: Political Science as Statecraft
Peter Collier: Political Woman: The Big Little Life of Jeane Kirkpatrick (2012).
167. Moynihan the “American Burke”
Greg Weiner: American Burke: The Uncommon Sense of Daniel Patrick Moynihan (2015).
168. The Perpetuation of Peace
169. Thoughts on the Nuclear ‘Freeze’
170. The Nuclear Arms Moratorium: A Critique
Report to the New Jersey Legislature (1982).
171. Thinking About Nuclear Arms Control
172. Defending Europe: The ‘Neutron Bomb’ Controversy
Sam Cohen: The Truth About the Neutron Bomb (1983).
173. Empty “Mandate”: Union of Concerned Scientists
174. In Defense of American Constitutionalism: The Case Against Initiative and Referendum
Report to the New Jersey Legislature (1986).
175. A Flaccid Defense of Freedom
James Finn and Leonard Sussman, eds.: Today’s Americans: How Free? (1986).
176. Religious Liberty in America, Misunderstood
John M. Swomley: Religious Liberty and the Secular State: The Constitutional Context (1987).
178. American Prisons
Thomas L. Dumm: Democracy and Punishment: Disciplinary Origins of the United States (1987).
179. ‘Postmodern’ Politics in America
William E. Connolly: Politics and Ambiguity (1988).
180. America’s Logocracy
Daniel T. Rodgers: Contested Truth: Keywords in American Politics (1988).
1781 Ideology and Literary Studies: PMLA 1930-1990.
182. Political Science in the Commercial Republic
James W. Ceaser: Liberal Democracy and Political Science (1990).
183. The Thomas Nomination: The Principles Behind the Polemics
184. Clinton Impeached, But Why?
185. Regime Changes in Local Government: Democracy in America?
Everett Kimball: State and Municipal Government in the United States. (1922).
Alexis de Tocqueville: Democracy in America, Volume I, Part 1, chapter 5. Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop translation. (2000).
185. Municipal Planning and Zoning in the United States
Edward M. Bassett: Zoning: The Laws, Administration, and Court Decisions During the First Twenty Years. (1936).
Edward M. Bassett: The Master Plan: With a Discussion of the Theory of Community Land Planning Legislation. (1938).
Edward M. Bassett: Autobiography of Edward M. Bassett. (1939).
186. The City in the Commercial Republic
Stephen L. Elkin: City and Regime in the American Republic. (1987).
187. Property Tax Law and the Passion for Equality
188. Patriotism, a Natural Sentiment That is Also Made
Walter Berns: Making Patriots (2001).
189. ‘Divided Government’ in the United States
190. Self-Government and Its Discontents
Robert K. Faulkner and Susan Shell, eds.: America at Risk: Threats to Liberal Self-Government in an Age of Uncertainty (2009).
191. Aristocracy versus Democracy
Chilton Williamson: After Tocqueville: The Promise and Failure of Democracy (2012).
192. Two-Faced Freedom?
Aziz Rana: The Two Faces of American Freedom (2010).
193. How Not to Understand the ‘Tea Party’ Movement
Harold Meyerson: “When the Tea Party Wants to Go Back, Where Is It To?” (2010).
194. Immigration, Reform, and Executive Orders: Imperfect Together
195. Religion in Democratic Society
Giorgi Areshidze: Democratic Religion from Locke to Obama (2016).
196. Planning an American Islamic Republic
Shamim A. Siddiqi: Methodology of Dawah in American Perspective (1989).
Mohamed Akram al-Adouni: “An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America” (April 1991).
197. Political Partisanship Now
Russell Muirhead: The Promise of Party in a Polarized Age (2014).
198. The Popular Front Reconstituted?
Harvey J. Kaye: The Fight for the Four Freedoms: What Made FDR and the Greatest Generation Great (2016).
199. Trump vs. Clinton: The 2016 Election
200. Election 2016: Where Are We Headed?
201. Education for Democracy
Amy Gutmann: Democratic Education (1994).
202. ‘Multicultural’ Education
James A. Banks: Cultural Diversity in Education: Foundation, Curriculum, and Teaching (2016).
204. The “Constitutional Sheriff” and the Rule of Law
Richard Mack: The County Sheriff: America’s Last Hope (2009).
Richard Mack: Are You a David? America’s Last Hope, Volume II (2014).
205. The Presence of the Old ‘New Left’
Angela Y. Davis: The Meaning of Freedom (2012).
Angela Y. Davis: Freedom Is a Constant Struggle (2016).
Angela Y. Davis, Gina Dent, Erica Meiners, and Beth E. Richie: Abolition. Feminism. Now. (2022).
206. The Primer on ‘Critical Race Theory’
Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic: Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (2017).
207. The Real Anti-Racism
Andre Archie: The Virtue of Color-Blindness (2024).
208. Printouts of Progressivism
209. A Progressive’s Critique of Progressivism
Michael Schellenberger: San Fran-Sicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities (2021).
210. Christopher Caldwell: The Age of Entitlement: America Since the Sixties (2022).
211. America’s Foreign Observers
James L. Nolan, Jr.: What They Saw in America: Alexis de Tocqueville, Max Weber, G. K. Chesterton, and Sayyid Qutb (2017).
212. John Quincy Adams: Guide for Today?
Angelo Codevilla: America’s Rise and Fall Among Nations: Lessons in Statecraft from John Quincy Adams. (2022).
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