American Political Thought

by Alan Pendleton Grimes

This revised edition, originally published in 1955 by Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, provides a comprehensive record of the most significant political ideas in this country from Massachusetts puritanism to post-World War II conservatism. Its emphasis is on the political concepts which have been articulated in the different political eras in our history. The book relates to three primary value systems: religious pluralism, capitalistic economics, and political-social democracy. It is the effort of statesmen and theorists to achieve compatibility of these differing points of view.

570 pages, Paperback

First published October 20, 1983

Reviews

[Steven Peterson]

This is a good survey of American political thought. It is not elegantly written, but it is quite serviceable. This is a pretty straightforward examination of American political thought and its roots in England (e.g., Protestantism, Puritan thought, English Revolutionary Thought). From there, a chronological sweep--from the Revolutionary era to the Constitution to the Federalists to slavery to Utopian reformers and so on.

The prose does not soar, but this is a good survey of the subject.