The Founding Fathers
A Reform Caucus in Action
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3533709 |
|---|---|
| Authors | John P Roche (Brandeis University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1961 |
| Volume | 55 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 799-816 |
| Publication date | 1961-12-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | American Political Science Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0003-0554 • E-ISSN: 1537-5943 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/1952528 |
| OpenAlex | W4244614726 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 10 |
| References cited | 15 |
Over the last century and a half, the work of the Constitutional Convention and the motives of the Founding Fathers have been analyzed under a number of different ideological auspices. To one generation of historians, the hand of God was moving in the assembly; under a later dispensation, the dialectic (at various levels of philosophical sophistication) replaced the Deity: "relationships of production" moved into the niche previously reserved for Love of Country. Thus in counterpoint to the Zeitgeist, the Framers have undergone miraculous metamorphoses: at one time acclaimed as liberals and bold social engineers, today they appear in the guise of sound Burkean conservatives, men who in our time would subscribe to Fortune, look to Walter Lippmann for political theory, and chuckle patronizingly at the antics of Barry Goldwater. The implicit assumption is that if James Madison were among us, he would be President of the Ford Foundation, while Alexander Hamilton would chair the Committee for Economic Development.The "Fathers" have thus been admitted to our best circles; the revolutionary ferocity which confiscated all Tory property in reach and populated New Brunswick with outlaws has been converted by the "Miltown School" of American historians into a benign dedication to "consensus" and "prescriptive rights." The Daughters of the American Revolution have, through the ministrations of Professors Boorstin, Hartz, and Rossiter, at last found ancestors worthy of their descendants. It is not my purpose here to argue that the "Fathers" were, in fact, radical revolutionaries; that proposition has been brilliantly demonstrated by Robert R. Palmer in his Age of the Democratic Revolution
Convention · Dialectic · Ideology · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Theology · Writ · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Classics · History · Law · Philosophy
“One Difficulty…of a Serious Nature”
Constitutionalist Political Science
A Constitution for Our Generation
Federalism and the Electoral College
Legislative Underrepresentation and Executive Dominance
Federalism and the European Union
Philadelphia reconsidered
The American Polity
Mapping Dimensions of Conflict at the Federal Convention of 1787
Why Americans Hate Politics and Politicians
The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III
James Madison
The Counter-Revolution in Pennsylvania 1776-1790
American Suffrage from Property to Democracy, 1760-1860
Rhode Island Politics and the American Revolution 1760-1776
Alexander Hamilton
The Origins of the Separation of Powers in America
The Federalist
The Founding Fathers
The Tenth Federalist Revisited
Men of Little Faith
John Locke and the Doctrine of Majority-Rule
| Unique citing works | 10 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,25 |
| Citation span | 1986 - 2025 (40) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 10 |