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Eagleton
Digital Archive of American Politics
Introduction
This
Web site is sponsored by the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers
University to highlight significant political events in American
history. A special interest of the Institute is the interaction
of politics and policy, and how public officials, candidates, the
media and others have influenced our changing perceptions of the
role of government in our society.
Origins
of American Political Thought
Plato:
The Republic
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The argument of the Republic deals with the central issues
of political philosophy: what ought to be a person's relationship
to society and which forms of government and social existence
are most likely to produce justice and the ideal state? As
suggested in the dialogue by Socrates, the first care of the
rulers is to be education providing only for an improved religion
and morality, and more simplicity in music and gymnastic,
a manlier strain of poetry, and greater harmony of the individual
and the State. We are thus led on to the conception of a higher
State, in which "no man calls anything his own,"
and in which there is neither "marrying nor giving in
marriage," and "kings are philosophers" and
"philosophers are kings;" and there is another and
higher education, intellectual as well as moral and religious,
of science as well as of art, and not of youth only but of
the whole of life. Such a State is hardly to be realized in
this world and would quickly degenerate. To the perfect ideal
succeeds the government of the soldier and the lover of honor,
this again declining into democracy, and democracy into tyranny,
in an imaginary but regular order having not much resemblance
to the actual facts.
Source:
Institute
for Learning Technologies Columbia University
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Magna
Carta 1215
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"...No
Freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or be disseised of
his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed,
or exiled, or any otherwise destroyed; nor will we pass upon
him, nor condemn him, but by lawful Judgment of his Peers,
or by the Law of the Land..."
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In 1215,
King John of England agreed to the demands of his barons and
bound himself and his "heirs, for ever" to protect
the rights and liberties of "all freemen of our kingdom".
With Magna Carta, King John placed himself and England's future
sovereigns under the rule of law.
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Source: National
Archives and Records Administration |
The
Prince, Nicolo
Machiavelli
In his classic treatise, The Prince, Nicolo Machiavelli
(1469-1527) was the first philosopher to deal with the practical
problems a monarch faces in staying in power, rather than more
abstract issues explaining the foundation of political authority.
Machiavelli argues, for example, that the ruler should know
how to be deceitful when it suits his purpose, but should attempt
to avoid disclosure of his deceptions to his subjects.
Source:
Institute
for Learning Technologies Columbia University
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Letter
of Christopher Columbus to Luis De Sant Angel Announcing His Discovery
Source:
USHistory.org
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explored for three days, and found countless small communities
and people, without number, but with no kind of government,
so they returned..... |
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I know you will be rejoiced at the glorious success that our
Lord has given me in my voyage, I write this to tell you how
in thirty-three days I sailed to the Indies with the fleet that
the illustrious King and Queen, our Sovereigns, gave me, where
I discovered a great many islands, inhabited by numberless people;
and of all I have taken possession for their Highnesses by proclamation
and display of the Royal Standard without opposition. To the
first island I discovered I gave the name of San Salvador, in
commemoration of His Divine Majesty, who has wonderfully granted
all this. The Indians call it Guanaham. The second I named the
Island of Santa Maria de Concepcion; the third, Fernandina;
the fourth, Isabella; the fifth, Juana; and thus to each one
I gave a new name. When I came to Juana, I followed the coast
of that isle toward the west, and found it so extensive that
I thought it might be the mainland, the province of Cathay;
and as I found no towns nor villages on the sea-coast, except
a few small settlements, where it was impossible to speak to
the people, because they fled at once, I continued the said
route, thinking I could not fail to see some great cities or
towns; and finding at the end of many leagues that nothing new
appeared, and that the coast led northward, contrary to my wish,
because the winter had already set in, I decided to make for
the south, and as the wind also was against my proceeding, I
determined not to wait there longer, and turned back to a certain
harbor whence I sent two men to find out whether there was any
king or large city. They explored for three days, and found
countless small communities and people, without number, but
with no kind of government, so they returned..... |
The
Mayflower Compact of 1620
...solemnly
and mutually in the presence of God and one of another, covenant
and combine ourselves together into a civill body politick,
for our better ordering and preservation....
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In
the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the
loyal subjects of our dread Sovereigne Lord, King James, by
the grace of God, of Great Britaine, France and Ireland king,
defender of the faith, etc. having undertaken, for the glory
of God, and advancement of the Christian faith, and honour
of our king and country, a voyage to plant the first colony
in the Northerne parts of Virginia, doe by these presents
solemnly and mutually in the presence of God and one of another,
covenant and combine ourselves together into a civill body
politick, for our better ordering and preservation, and furtherance
of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enacte, constitute,
and frame such just and equall laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions
and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meete
and convenient for the generall good of the Colonie unto which
we promise all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof
we have hereunder subscribed our names at Cape-Codd the 11.
of November, in the year of the raigne of our sovereigne lord,
King James, of England, France and Ireland, the eighteenth,
and of Scotland the fiftie-fourth. Anno Dom. 1620.
Source:
The National Center for Public Policy Research
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John
Locke and the Social Contract
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Shortly
after the English Revolution of 1688 brought William of Orange
and Mary to the throne, Oxford philosopher John Locke's Two
Treatises of Civil Government
were published. Locke's theory of natural law and natural
rights distinguishes between legitimate and illegitimate civil
governments, and supports the legitimacy of revolt against
tyrannical governments. His writings had significant influence
on the American colonial leaders later arguing for independence
from the British Crown.
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Colonial
Charters
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In
addition to the agreements among themselves entered into by
settlers on how they would govern their settlements illustrated
by The Mayflower Compact, the various
charters
issued by those receiving grants of land from the Crown establishing
colonial governments later evolved as key sources for the
legal and political arguments leading to the Revolution. Sometimes
issued to encourage settlers to take the risks of moving to
the New World, these documents often included guarantees of
such rights and liberties as due process of law, taxation
only by vote of representatives and religious freedom. When
the Royal government and parliament later sought to assert
more direct control of the colonies, these charters and related
guarantees would frequently be cited by the colonists to support
their position that these commitments had been broken.
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The
Fundamental Constitutions for the Province of East New Jersey
in America, 1683
....Nor
shall any law be made or enacted to have force in the Province,
which any ways touches upon the goods or liberties of any
in it, but what thus passeth in the great Council; and whoever
shall levy, collect or pay any money or goods without a
law thus passed, shall be held a publick enemy to the Province,
and a betrayer of the publick liberty thereof: also the
quorum of this great Council shall be half of the Proprietors,
or their proxies, and half of the freemen at least; and
in determination, the proportionable assent of both Proprietors
and freemen must agree, viz. two parts of whatever number
of freemen, and one half of whatever number of Proprietors
are present....
Source:
The
Avalon Project at Yale Law School
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Resources
The
Avalon Project at Yale Law School
Political
Philosophy/Political Theory >>
University
of British Columbia Library
American
Political Thought on the Web
Foundations
of Political Theory >>
American
Political Science Association
Political
Philosophers in the World >> Italiano
per la Filosofia,
Department of Political Science, University of Pisa
PoliticalThought.com
Project
Gutenberg
The
Keele Guide to Political Thought and Ideology on the Internet
>> School of
Politics, International Relations and the Environment, Keele
University, United Kingdom
Nations,
States & Politics >>
scholiast.org, Peter Ravn Rasmussen
The
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy >> Professor
James Fieser, University of Tennessee at Martin
Educational
Tools
American
Political Thought, Syllabus, Politics 321 >>Professor
Jennifer Hochschild, Princeton University
Teaching
Materials on the History of Political Thought>> Professor
R.J. Kilcullem Macquarie University
(Australia)
US
Political Thought, Syllabus, Political Science 308 >>
J. Boland, University
of Oregon
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Colonial Government and the Crown
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