The Federalist Papers: Reading Group Notes
Timbro CL Reading Group, December-January 2023–24
The Federalist (a.k.a., The Federalist Papers)
Useful videos: Keystone History.
Good conversation with James Ceaser, about Madison as Founder.
“BENIGN NEGLECT”
Royally-appointed governor + governor’s council.
Locally elected colonial assembly, local govt
1756–1763: Seven Years War
1760 — October: George III becomes king.
1761 — February: Writs of Assistance challenged in Massachusetts. December: Ban on colonial land grants.
1764– April: The Parliament of Great Britain passes the Sugar Act and the Currency Act.
1765 — March: Stamp Act is passed. May: Quartering Act is passed. August: Riots in Boston. October: Stamp Act Congress held in New York City.
1766 — March: The Declaratory Act is passed, repealing the Stamp Act.
1767 — June: Townshend Acts passed.
1768 — February: Massachusetts sends circular letter to the other colonial assemblies. March: Second nonimportation agreement is reached. June: Bostonians riot when HMS Romney seizes the Liberty. September: A convention of Massachusetts towns is held.
1769 — February: Parliament passes resolve calling for harsher treatment of the American colonists.
1770 — March: The Boston Massacre. April: The Townshend duties are repealed on all goods except tea.
1772 –October: Committee of correspondence established in Boston.
1773 — December: The Boston Tea Party.
1774 — October: First Continental Congress meets in Philadelphia.
1775 — March–April: Parliament passes the Restraining Acts. April: Battles of Lexington and Concord. Second Continental Congress meets in Philadelphia. August: Proclamation of Rebellion.
1776 — January: Publication of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. April: American ports opened to all nations. May: Continental Congress authorizes the drafting of new state constitutions. July 4: Adoption of the Declaration of Independence.
1776–81 — American War of Independence.
1776–1784 — STATE CONSTITUTIONS — four before the Declaration. (1780 Massachusetts: The oldest written constitution in force today.)
1781 — March: Articles of Confederation
1783 — September: Britain signs the Treaty of Paris, recognizing American independence.
1786–1787 — Shay’s Rebellion (in Massachusetts)
1781–1787 –Slogans of ’76 smack into the reality of governing! — From Locke to Hume!
1786–1787 — resolutions, a meeting in Annapolis, then a planned convention in Philadelphia to revise The Articles
1787–88: PHILADELPHIA, THE CONSTITUTION, THE FEDERALIST (85 essays)
· 14 May 1787: Delegates begin arriving in Philadelphia.
· 17 Sept 1787: Language of the Constitution adopted by the Convention.
27 Oct 1787: The Federalist №1 appears. №85 appears in late May 1788. Published in four NY newspapers at irregular intervals and some were reprinted in VA and New England.
o Alexander Hamilton (1755 or 1755–1804) wrote 51 (60%)
o James Madison (1751–1836) wrote 29 (34%)
o John Jay (1745–1829) wrote 5 (6%)
Notable FEDERALISTS: Hamilton, Madison, Jay, George Washington, James Wilson, John Adams, Rufus King, John Marshall, Timothy Pickering, and Charles Pinckney.
Notable ANTI-FEDERALISTS:
- Patrick Henry, Virginia
- Samuel Adams, Massachusetts
- Joshua Atherton, New Hampshire
- George Mason, Virginia
- Richard Henry Lee, Virginia
- Robert Yates, New York
- James Monroe, Virginia
- Amos Singletary, Massachusetts
- John Hancock, Massachusetts
- Mercy Otis Warren, Massachusetts
- James Warren, Massachusetts
- George Clinton, New York
- Melancton Smith, New York
- James Winthrop, Massachusetts
- Luther Martin, Maryland
- Samuel Bryan, Pennsylvania
(John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were in Europe.)
Ratifications: Delaware 7 Dec 1787, Pennsylvania 12 Dec 1787, New Jersey 18 Dec 1787, Georgia 2 Jan 1788, Connecticut 9 Jan 1788, Massachusetts 6 Feb 1788, Maryland 28 April 1788, New Hampshire 21 June 1788 (the vote: 57 to 46) — MAKING NINE.
Virginia 25 June 1788 (the vote: 89 to 79), New York 26 July 1788 (the vote: 30 to 27), North Carolina 21 Nov 1789, Rhode Island 29 May 1790 (the vote: 34 to 32), Vermont (14th state) 10 Jan 1791.
1789 — Bill of Rights (Amendments I through X) drafted and proposed by First Congress, ratified 15 Dec 1791.
1789–1797 — George Washington, 1st President of the United States
George Will, The Conservative Sensibility (2019):
“Progressivism represents the overthrow of the Founders’ classical liberalism” (xxv).
The Constitution: ENUMERATED POWERS.
Will quotes Randy Barnett: The Constitution is “the law that governs those who govern us” (157). The Constitution ~ The Crown (the “dignified part,” James Ceaser). “The Founders.”
“My conviction is that, properly understood, conservatism is the Madisonian persuasion. And my melancholy belief is that Woodrow Wilson was the most important single figure in the largely successful campaign to convince the nation that the Madisonian persuasion is an anachronism” (xvi).
For Will: “conservatism” = “classical liberalism.” He distinguishes between “European conservatism” and “American conservatism”: In America, conservatism is about conserving Madisonian classical liberalism.
“Broadly speaking, there are conservative and progressive conceptions of human nature, conservative and progressive assumptions about how history unfolds, and conservative and progressive expectations about how the world works” (xxx).
“My effort is to explain three things: the Founders’ philosophy, the philosophy that the progressives formulated explicitly as a refutation of the Founders, and the superiority of the former” (xxiii).