judicial review by Supreme Court
[61] SAMUEL WILLIAMS, The Natural and Civil History of Vermont (Chapters XIII, XIV, and XV), WALPOLE, NEW HAMPSHIRE, 1794
How material circumstances affect culture and politics
[62] [JOHN LELAND] JACK NIPS, The Yankee Spy, BOSTON, 1794
Freedom of religion
[63] PERES [PEREZ] FOBES, An Election Sermon, BOSTON, 1795
Freedom of speech, respect for public officials
[64] JUSTICE [JACOB] RUSH, The Nature and Importance of an Oath—the Charge to a Jury, RUTLAND, VERMONT, 1796
Oaths and political obligation
[65] NATHANAEL EMMONS, A Discourse Delivered on the National Fast, WRENTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS, 1799
Civil disobedience and obedience to constituted authorities
[66] JONATHAN MAXCY, An Oration, PROVIDENCE, 1799
Liberty and equality
[67] ALEXANDER ADDISON, Analysis of the Report of the Committee of the Virginia Assembly, PHILADELPHIA, 1800
Limits to freedom of the press, compact theory of government
[68] JOEL BARLOW, To His Fellow Citizens of the United States. Letter II: On Certain Political Measures Proposed to Their Consideration, PHILADELPHIA, 1801
Federalism
[69] AN IMPARTIAL CITIZEN, A Dissertation Upon the Constitutional Freedom of the Press, BOSTON, 1801
[70] JEREMIAH ATWATER, A Sermon, MIDDLEBURY, VERMONT, 1801
Liberty, republican government, human nature, and virtue
[71] JOHN LELAND, The Connecticut Dissenters’ Strong Box: No. 1, NEW LONDON, CONNECTICUT, 1802
Religious freedom
[72] ZEPHANIAH SWIFT MOORE, An Oration on the Anniversary of the Independence of the United States of America, WORCESTER, MASSACHUSETTS, 1802
Public opinion, virtue, education, and popular government
[73] NOAH WEBSTER, An Oration on the Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, NEW HAVEN, 1802
The underlying principles and design of American government
[74] SAMUEL KENDAL, Religion the Only Sure Basis of Free Government, BOSTON, 1804
Dependence of government upon religious sentiment
[75] JAMES WILSON, On Municipal Law, PHILADELPHIA, 1804
Law, consent, and political obligation
[76] FISHER AMES, The Dangers of American Liberty, BOSTON, 1805
Equality, faction, bigness, corruption, community, virtue
A Selected List of Political Writingsby Americans Between 1760 and 1805
A List of Newspapers Examined
Collections of Writing fromthe Founding Era
Index
The political writing of the founding era is tremendous in volume. The books, pamphlets, and letters to newspapers written in the last quarter of the eighteenth century that would repay careful reading by students and teachers of American political thought would fill a few dozen volumes the size of the two that this comment introduces. And even appraisals of amount and worth take no account of the personal letters printed in the collected writings of men and women who achieved prominence and of the correspondence in manuscript preserved in archives and libraries. At least one collection of essays, The Federalist, has long been a classic of western literature. In the light of such an impressive literature, the appearance of a score, if not a half a hundred, brief essays hitherto unknown except to scholars ought to be high priority reading for political leaders and for those who make analysis and criticism of government a prime concern.
The second volume of this collection closes with the editors’ choice of five-hundred-odd items thought to represent the best analytic and polemic writing put into print in the English colonies that converted into states during the forty-five years following 1760; if printed in the type-size of this collection, they would overflow at least fifteen, and possibly eighteen, volumes the size of these two. The editors are convinced that in compiling a selected list of political writings by Americans between 1760 and 1805, they have rejected an equal amount of wordage that met tests of relevance but seemed to be less satisfying on some test of merit.
It is quite clear that a vast amount of wordage went into print during this era and that only a modest proportion of that wordage is in places where readers can get to it today. With few exceptions, what the compilers of this collection examined and considered for inclusion is confined to items available in major university libraries, the less accessible holdings of a few rare book libraries, and the newspapers of that early period which have been preserved. Catalogs of American imprints cite many items which are not to be found in the libraries that were visited, and it must be supposed that much that is in print has not yet been transferred to microcards and microfilm.
Much more important than speculation about the enormous volume of writing from this era are questions about the tests applied and the judgment invoked by the editors in deciding which item to reprint, which to cite in a selected list of political writings by Americans between 1760 and 1805, and which to exclude in either case for lack of interest or merit or because of present accessibility. How the selections were made is best disclosed by giving a brief account of how the enterprise originated and how it was executed. The probe into the early writing was initiated by the senior editor, and the story will be told in fewest words if related by him in the first person.
Three years before my retirement from teaching I was asked to provide a seminar for selected freshmen. The initial specification was that attention would be restricted to “the founding of the American political system and getting it under way.” I had a fair acquaintance with the books of readings to be found in the university library and I was aware that, whether compiled by a historian or political scientist, those that touched on early experience tended to feature government documents over analytic and argumentative writing. I was totally unprepared, however, for the dearth of expository and polemical essays defining and describing republican government, setting forth its ideals and goals, and offering advice on surest ways of making popular self-government operative in North America. The thought that went into the design of the state constitutions turned out to be a valley of unexplored terrain all but concealed from sight by towering preoccupation with the case for independence from Britain and the strategies for forming a federal union. Students could read in print John Adams’s Thoughts on Government and The Essex Result if I would risk their tearing to shreds a volume of the Works of John Adams and the Handlins’ Popular Sources of Political Authority. It turned out when my syllabus was completed that, save for what was in The Federalist or a less illustrious later publication, A Second Federalist, compiled by Hyneman and Carey, almost everything the students were asked to read was supplied to them in mimeographed copy.
So provoked, I swore a mighty oath that as soon as I could find time for it I would put into print a collection of the best writings of the founding era on the conception and establishment of republican government in America.
Proceeding beyond Indiana University and its Lilly Library I settled down in The Huntington Library. The first thing I learned on arrival in San Marino was that Huntington maintained an up-to-date file of all American imprints in its possession arranged by year of publication and alphabetically by author.