The Founding Fathers v. the People: Paradoxes of American Democracy - Hardcover

King, Anthony

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0674045734 ISBN 13: 9780674045736

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2012

Synopsis

As pundits and politicians remind us at every election cycle or turn of the television dial, the United States sees itself as the world’s greatest democracy. But what citizens might also hear, if they knew how to listen, is the grinding of two tectonic plates on which this democracy was established. In the venerable tradition of keen foreign observers of American politics, Anthony King exposes the political paradoxes in our system that we may well be too close to see―founding principles of our great democracy that are distinctly undemocratic.

In an extended essay eloquent in its plainspoken good sense, King begins, on the one hand, with the founding fathers who emphasized moderation, deliberation, checks and balances, and the separation of powers―a system in which “the people” were allowed to play only a limited role. On the other hand were radical democrats who insisted that the people, and only the people, should rule. The result was a political system tangled up in conflicts that persist to this day: unelected and unaccountable Supreme Court justices who exercise enormous personal power; severe restrictions on the kind of person the people can elect as president; popular referendums at the state and local level but none at the federal level, not even to ratify amendments to the Constitution.

In King’s provocative analysis, we see how these puzzles play out in the turmoil of our nation’s public life and political culture―and we glimpse, perhaps, a new way to address them.

About this title

About the Author:

Anthony King is Professor of Government at the University of Essex and a Fellow of the British Academy.

Review:

A fresh, interesting, wide-ranging interpretation of U.S. politics and political history. (David R. Mayhew, Yale University)

Following in the distinguished tradition of foreigners who have helped Americans think about how they govern themselves, Tony King has produced a beautifully crafted and deliciously thought-provoking extended essay on the many puzzles of American politics emanating from the tensions between constitutionalism and democracy. In his signature empirical and nonjudgmental fashion, King identifies paradoxes and raises questions that are certain to provoke discussion and debate on this side of the Atlantic. (Thomas E. Mann, The Brookings Institution)

About this edition

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0674045734
• ISBN 13: 9780674045736
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256