The Age of Federalism

Rating:
Summary: Inside the heads of the founding fathers
Review: A doorstop of a book, "The Age of Federalism" is quite a weighty work of history. It took two historians 25 years to research and write (more than twice as long as it took the Age of Federalism to happen) the 754-page narrative. And since the book doggedly maintains a small circle of subjects-Washington, Madison, Jefferson, Adams, and particularly Hamilton dominate the pages to a degree of obsession-you become quite intimate with the minds of the principals by the end. By around 1798, you can guess what sort of machinations Hamilton or Jefferson will be up to next simply because you've been inside their heads for so long.

"The Age of Federalism" is at its best in the realm of intellectual history, subtly analyzing, for example, the influence of Scottish philosopher David Hume on Alexander Hamilton (as well as the relative lack of influence Adam Smith had on him). With such attention to the minds of the founding fathers, the straightforward narrative of political and diplomatic maneuverings leaves a much more meaningful and intelligible impression on the reader (oh, so that's why Adams signed the Alien and Sedition Acts; ah, that's how Madison rebelled against his own Federalist Papers; huh, that's all there is to the XYZ Affair? and so on). You learn quite a lot from this book, not only about the nation-building efforts of the revolutionary generation, but about the way scholars have debated over them in the centuries thence.

In fact, there's so much to be learned from the book that I'm perplexed at what can only be an intentional omission of American slavery. (Both authors have written at length about slavery elsewhere and so it's hard to understand its disappearing act in these pages, though Elkins's book on slavery has been derided for so long that maybe he decided to just steer clear this time.) Their silence on slavery especially boggles the mind because Elkins & McKitrick try so hard to understand how the founding fathers think. To understand Jefferson and Washington without a visit down to the plantation is a bit like explaining Woody Allen movies without mentioning New York. The founding father mind cannot be understood without a reckoning with slavery. Much more than a singular issue to the likes of Washington and Jefferson, slavery constitutes a key to unlocking their entire intellectual systems: a master key, indeed. But the authors spend more space on Peter the Great's founding of St. Petersburg than they do on the central paradox of American history. Slavery gets three paragraphs of real attention (pp. 142, 151). Three.

You end up with the feeling that Elkins & McKitrick have given you this fascinating and thoughtful look into a world very similar to ours, but an alternate one, nonetheless, where slavery had little to do with our nation's history.

Rating:
Summary: Inside the heads of the founding fathers
Review: A doorstop of a book, "The Age of Federalism" is quite a weighty work of history. It took two historians 25 years to research and write (more than twice as long as it took the Age of Federalism to happen) the 754-page narrative. And since the book doggedly maintains a small circle of subjects-Washington, Madison, Jefferson, Adams, and particularly Hamilton dominate the pages to a degree of obsession-you become quite intimate with the minds of the principals by the end. By around 1798, you can guess what sort of machinations Hamilton or Jefferson will be up to next simply because you've been inside their heads for so long.

"The Age of Federalism" is at its best in the realm of intellectual history, subtly analyzing, for example, the influence of Scottish philosopher David Hume on Alexander Hamilton (as well as the relative lack of influence Adam Smith had on him). With such attention to the minds of the founding fathers, the straightforward narrative of political and diplomatic maneuverings leaves a much more meaningful and intelligible impression on the reader (oh, so that's why Adams signed the Alien and Sedition Acts; ah, that's how Madison rebelled against his own Federalist Papers; huh, that's all there is to the XYZ Affair? and so on). You learn quite a lot from this book, not only about the nation-building efforts of the revolutionary generation, but about the way scholars have debated over them in the centuries thence.

In fact, there's so much to be learned from the book that I'm perplexed at what can only be an intentional omission of American slavery. (Both authors have written at length about slavery elsewhere and so it's hard to understand its disappearing act in these pages, though Elkins's book on slavery has been derided for so long that maybe he decided to just steer clear this time.) Their silence on slavery especially boggles the mind because Elkins & McKitrick try so hard to understand how the founding fathers think. To understand Jefferson and Washington without a visit down to the plantation is a bit like explaining Woody Allen movies without mentioning New York. The founding father mind cannot be understood without a reckoning with slavery. Much more than a singular issue to the likes of Washington and Jefferson, slavery constitutes a key to unlocking their entire intellectual systems: a master key, indeed. But the authors spend more space on Peter the Great's founding of St. Petersburg than they do on the central paradox of American history. Slavery gets three paragraphs of real attention (pp. 142, 151). Three.

You end up with the feeling that Elkins & McKitrick have given you this fascinating and thoughtful look into a world very similar to ours, but an alternate one, nonetheless, where slavery had little to do with our nation's history.

Rating:
Summary: this book has steep criticism and long on-going sentences
Review: As a student of political science, "The Age of Federalism" is of enormous value to me. The groundwork provided in this work will aid readers in numerous areas of analysis. It simply exceeds all expectations.

Rating:
Summary: Wow! McKitrick and Elkins bring the Founders back to life.
Review: The Age of Federalism is a fascinating and in-depth review of the politics, ideas, personalities, controversies, and events that shaped the American nation during the Washington and Adams Administrations. From the character profiles of many key players in the 1790s to the carefully weighed and thoroughly presented analyses of the causes and outcomes of these events, this book shows you not just how our history was interesting, but why it is important to know. I came away hungry to see a similar treatment by McKitrick and Elkins of the years following the 1800 election. McKitrick and Elkins made me care about these events. This story and these compelling personalities held an almost soap opera level hold on my attention. Only it was a soap opera for smart people. It would be easy after reading this book to get into a heated argument over the policies of Hamilton and the methods of opposition to them chosen by Jefferson and Madison. It becomes clear that, had we had different leaders--or had they made different choices--the United States we know today could easily have turned out far differently. This book records the triumph of the great experiment, and the tragedy of the toll the founding exacted. To watch Madison and Hamilton slowly drift from true friends to bitter enemies was as painful as watching again the Zapruder film or the Challenger footage. In the end, the reader can look back and see that, despite the dour portraits our crumpled green currency presents, this was not time of boring dead white men, but an Age of Passion.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best works of history you will ever read
Review: The authors have achieved a triumph with this book, a superb synthesis of the period that brings the reader, as close as possible, to the state of mind of the principal characters and of the times. I received more insight into Jefferson here in three pages than in some other whole biographies, though the authors are perhaps less sympathetic to John Adams than I think he deserves. This book should be read AFTER the reader is familiar with standard biographies of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton et al and with the general history of the time. Then reading this book will give you a depth of insight and understanding into this period that is very satisfying.

Rating:
Summary: Leisurely and Learned Look at the Founding Years
Review: This book is about the fateful decisions and maneuvers our government took in the dozen years after the Constitution was adopted and the new country launched. The predatory European powers were a danger. The states, suddenly demoted to mere parts of a much larger entity, had local interests that sometimes boisterously resisted the new central government. Even the location of the federal capital became a focus for plots and low comedy. Finally, the Constitution left many things unsaid that had to be worked out in these first few years so that the government could run at all.

The spine of the story, though, is the ideological split between James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, the two most brilliant exponents of the new constitution and partners in getting it accepted. They fell out over issues dear to Hamilton and repugnant to Madison: a national bank, funding of the Revolutionary War debts, and the encouraging of manufacturing and commerce. The assuming of the war debt by the new federal government and its funding through the new bank meant that various bonds, notes, and IOU's that had been floating around for years, and trading at about 1 percent of their face value, suddenly became worth something. The subsequent scramble to speculate in all this paper repelled Madison and Jefferson. Hamilton was more sophisticated than these planter-aristocrats in the ways of money, and he viewed the scenes of greed and folly as no more than the means by which the debt would approach to par value and, through the Bank, become an actual resource for the use of capitalists in need of loans.

Madison -- and increasingly, Jefferson -- very self-consciously formed an "interest": the Republicans. They stood for states' rights as against the too-vigorous centralizing tendencies they saw Hamilton encouraging. They stood for the independent farmer as against the "money men" of the cities and their dependent mobs of factory workers. How could the virtue necessary to a true democracy be nurtured in a dark Satanic mill or a counting house?

The interesting thing about this "interest" of theirs was that they dared not call it a "party": that idea was anathema to the age -- Washington himself spoke much against party and faction. But that Republican interest proved to be, in nascent form, the first political party. It was soon opposed by another equally self-concious "interest": the Federalists, whose guiding spirit was Hamilton.

This book traces the rivalry between Federalists and Republicans, parties before the age of political parties. The writing is fine, and charming portraits of the players in this drama, as they come and go, entertain even as they deepen the story. The authors' scholarship is well equal to the task (the book won the Bancroft history prize), and they rather playfully take time here and there to revise certain received ideas about the period, without simply setting up a new dogmatism. They are particularly strong on the diplomatic games that were afoot with France and England, to keep us out of their wars and out of their clutches. But basically it is a portrait of that most interesting time in our country -- its beginning.

Rating:
Summary: The Age of Federalism
Review: This is a very detailed account of American History from 1788-1800 - which is from the ratification of the Constitution to the end of the John Adams administration. Unless you are very interested in this period of American History I would not recommend it. It is not an easy read for someone who has a more general interest in American History.

The authors do an excellent job of organizing and explaining the political events during this critical period of our nation's history. It is called The Age of Federalism because it is during this time that those in favor of a more robust and powerful central (federal) government established the framework for how the constitution would operate in practice. The two most important figures were George Washington and Alexander Hamilton. John Adams could be added to this list only as a result of his becoming the second President of the United States. His truculent personality, lack of executive experience, and inability to foster working relationships with other "Federalists" contributed to Jefferson's ascension to the Presidency 1800 and the end of The Federalist Era.

This was a period of time that saw the informal creation of what were, essentially, political parties. They were not political parties in the modern sense, but two loose factions existed that broke along very fundamental conceptions of how the government should operate. Opposite the Federalists were "the Republicans" led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.

Several key political issues divided these factions. The most important was how much power the federal government should actually have. The Federalists wanted a strong federal government, while Republicans leaned toward a less powerful central government with more authority residing in the states. There were also other divides: Jefferson's idealistic (and unrealistic) conception of the country as yeoman farmers versus the Federalist's desire to foster mercantilism. The Federalist were supposedly pro-British, while the Republicans pro-France - with reactions to the French Revolution playing a key role in factional politics. And to some degree Federalist were seen as desiring a more elitist governing structure with limited participation by the populace in selecting the highest offices coupled with a strong executive branch, versus the supposedly more populist Republicans who desired more power in the more "popular" branches of government - the legislative branch and state governments. The issues of standing armies, taxation, and a national bank, among other issues, all were part of this divisive period.

By the time Jefferson became president the federal government and its foundation were clearly established and its legitimacy secured, which is what made this era so critically important in the nation's history.


Rating:
Summary: Excellent interpretative history of early American.
Review: This is an excellent analysis of the beginnings of our system of government, politics, and foreign policy. Learned but never pedantic, written in a graceful and appropriate style, the authors present an insightful study of the formation of our political system and government. This is not a traditional narrative history and can best be read by someone familiar with at least the outline of this period of American life. It is rather a series of extended essays on crucial topics linked by a common focus on the achievements and shortcomings of the Federalist movement. Important issues covered include the establishment of the legitimacy of the Federal government, the role of Washington, the establishment of the policy of neutrality, our relations with Britain and France, and the beginnings of the party system. The personalities and ideologies of all the key actors are dealt with in concise and penetrating sections whose political, intellectual, and social contexts are formulated carefully. As the authors point out, our modern system of government and politics developed its major recognizable features by the 1830s. This outstanding book is an essential text for understanding how that process began.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent work
Review: This superb book has to be one of the most memorable and thought-provoking works of modern history I have ever read. I bought my copy on a visit to the USA and read it immediately on my return home to New Zealand. I was riveted, not by the narrative so much, as by the sheer intelligence and reflectiveness of the authors. Rather than pile on a mountain of details, the book is constructed around a series of particular developments and problems, each of them analysed in a calm, lucid manner which is history-writing at its best. Best of all, I thought, was the authors' brilliant discussion of the foundation of Washington DC, which they seem to think was a colossal mistake. Had New York or Philadelphia been the capital, they suggest, then America would have possessed a culture of interchange between government, commerce and high culture; separation of the capital from other great centres of American civilization has had major implications for the cultural development of the United States. A provocative thought.