false 378381 4456623 1400065704 9781400065707 9 <![CDATA[Plain, Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255582950m/4456623.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255582950s/4456623.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4456623.Plain_Honest_Men_The_Making_of_the_American_Constitution 3.88 26 –Robert Morris, delegate from Pennsylvania to the Constitutional Convention

From distinguished historian Richard Beeman comes a dramatic and engrossing account of the men who met in Philadelphia during the summer of 1787 to design a radically new form of government. Plain, Honest Men takes readers behind the scenes and beyond the debate to show how the world’s most enduring constitution was forged through conflict, compromise, and, eventually, fragile consensus.

The delegates met in an atmosphere of crisis, many Americans at that time fearing that a combination of financial distress and civil unrest would doom the young nation’s experiment in liberty. When the delegates began their deliberations in May 1787, they discovered that a small cohort of men, led by James Madison, had prepared an audacious plan–revolutionary in its view of the nature of American government. The success of this bold and brilliant strategy was far from assured, and the ultimate outcome of the delegates’ labors–the creation of a frame of government that would enable America to flourish–was very different from what Madison had envisioned when he launched his grand scheme.

Beeman captures as never before the dynamic of the debate and the characters of the men who labored that summer in Philadelphia, among them James Madison, as brilliant as he was unprepossessing; the mercurial Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, arrogant, combative, but ultimately effective in shaping the language of the completed Constitution; Maryland’s Luther Martin, a pugnacious (and often inebriated) opponent of a strong national government; Roger Sherman, the straightforward Connecticut delegate who helped broker some of the key compromises of the Convention; and General George Washington, whose quiet dignity and forceful presence helped keep under control the clash of egos and words among the delegates.

Virtually all of the issues the delegates debated that summer–the extent of presidential power, the nature of federalism, and, most explosive of all, the role of slavery–have continued to provoke conflict throughout the nation’s history. Plain, Honest Men is a fascinating portrait of another time and place, a bold and unprecedented book about men, both grand and humble, who wrote a document that would live longer than they ever imagined. This is an indispensable work for our own time, in which debate about the Constitution’s meaning still rages.]]> 378381 3.76 29 9 2009 710118 0807841722 9780807841723 0 <![CDATA[Beyond Confederation: Origins of the Constitution and American National Identity]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1177521312m/710118.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1177521312s/710118.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/710118.Beyond_Confederation_Origins_of_the_Constitution_and_American_National_Identity 2.67 3 Beyond Confederation scrutinizes the ideological background of the U.S. Constitution, the rigors of its writing and ratification, and the problems it both faced and provoked immediately after ratification. The essays in this collection question much of the heritage of eighteenth-century constitutional thought and suggest that many of the commonly debated issues have led us away from the truly germane questions. The authors challenge many of the traditional generalizations and the terms and scope of that debate as well.

The contributors raise fresh questions about the Constitution as it enters its third century. What happened in Philadelphia in 1787, and what happened in the state ratifying conventions? Why did the states—barely—ratify the Constitution? What were Americans of the 1789s attempting to achieve? The exploratory conclusions point strongly to an alternative constitutional tradition, some of it unwritten, much of it rooted in state constitutional law; a tradition that not only has redefined the nature and role of the Constitution but also has placed limitations on its efficacy throughout American history.

The authors are Lance Banning, Richard Beeman, Stephen Botein, Richard D. Brown, Richard E. Ellis, Paul Finkelman, Stanley N. Katz, Ralph Lerner, Drew R. McCoy, John M. Murrin, Jack N. Rakove, Janet A. Riesman, and Gordon S. Wood.

]]> 378381 3.76 29 9 1987 6611163 0 <![CDATA[Plain, Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6611163-plain-honest-men 0.0 0 –Robert Morris, delegate from Pennsylvania to the Constitutional Convention

From distinguished historian Richard Beeman comes a dramatic and engrossing account of the men who met in Philadelphia during the summer of 1787 to design a radically new form of government. Plain, Honest Men takes readers behind the scenes and beyond the debate to show how the world’s most enduring constitution was forged through conflict, compromise, and, eventually, fragile consensus.

The delegates met in an atmosphere of crisis, many Americans at that time fearing that a combination of financial distress and civil unrest would doom the young nation’s experiment in liberty. When the delegates began their deliberations in May 1787, they discovered that a small cohort of men, led by James Madison, had prepared an audacious plan–revolutionary in its view of the nature of American government. The success of this bold and brilliant strategy was far from assured, and the ultimate outcome of the delegates’ labors–the creation of a frame of government that would enable America to flourish–was very different from what Madison had envisioned when he launched his grand scheme.

Beeman captures as never before the dynamic of the debate and the characters of the men who labored that summer in Philadelphia, among them James Madison, as brilliant as he was unprepossessing; the mercurial Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, arrogant, combative, but ultimately effective in shaping the language of the completed Constitution; Maryland’s Luther Martin, a pugnacious (and often inebriated) opponent of a strong national government; Roger Sherman, the straightforward Connecticut delegate who helped broker some of the key compromises of the Convention; and General George Washington, whose quiet dignity and forceful presence helped keep under control the clash of egos and words among the delegates.

Virtually all of the issues the delegates debated that summer–the extent of presidential power, the nature of federalism, and, most explosive of all, the role of slavery–have continued to provoke conflict throughout the nation’s history. Plain, Honest Men is a fascinating portrait of another time and place, a bold and unprecedented book about men, both grand and humble, who wrote a document that would live longer than they ever imagined. This is an indispensable work for our own time, in which debate about the Constitution’s meaning still rages.]]> 378381 3.76 29 9 2009 7027867 140010985X 9781400109852 0 <![CDATA[Plain, Honest Men]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256221090m/7027867.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256221090s/7027867.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7027867-plain-honest-men 0.0 0 378381 3.76 29 9 1357326 3.97 138 32 2009 7027868 1400139856 9781400139859 0 <![CDATA[Plain, Honest Men]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256221100m/7027868.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256221100s/7027868.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7027868-plain-honest-men 0.0 0 378381 3.76 29 9 1357326 3.97 138 32 2009