Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-8bhkd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T12:33:29.881Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Relative Influence of European Writers on Late Eighteenth-Century American Political Thought

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

Donald S. Lutz
Donald S. Lutz*
Affiliation:
University of Houston
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Drawing upon a comprehensive list of political writings by Americans published between 1760 and 1805, the study uses a citation count drawn from these 916 items as a surrogate measure of the relative influence of European writers upon American political thought during the era. Contrary to the general tendencies in the recent literature, the results here indicate that there was no one European writer, or one tradition of writers, that dominated American political thought. There is evidence for moving beyond the Whig-Enlightenment dichotomy as the basis for textual analysis, and for expanding the set of individual European authors considered to have had an important effect on American thinking. Montesquieu, Blackstone, and Hume are most in need of upgrading in this regard. The patterns of influence apparently varied over the time period from 1760 to 1805, and future research on the relative influence of European thinkers must be more sensitive to this possibility.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 78 , Issue 1 , March 1984 , pp. 189 - 197
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1984

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adair, D. “That politics may be reduced to a science”: David Hume, James Madison, and the tenth Federalist. Huntington Library Quarterly, 1965–1957, 20, 343–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Appleby, J.What is still American in the political philosophy of Thomas Jefferson? William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Ser., 1982, 39, 287–309.Google Scholar
Bailyn, B.(Ed.). Pamphlets of the American Revolution, 1750-1776. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1965.Google Scholar
Bailyn, B.The ideological origins of the American Revolution. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1967.Google Scholar
Becker, C.The Declaration of Independence: a study in the history of ideas. New York: Vintage, 1922.Google Scholar
Colbourn, H. T.The lamp of experience. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1965.Google Scholar
Devine, F. E.Absolute democracy or indefeasible right: Hobbes versus Locke. The Journal of Politics, 1975, 37, 736–765.Google Scholar
Elkins, S., & McKitrick, E.The founding fathers: young men of the revolution. Political science Quarterly, 1961, 82, 38–57.Google Scholar
Hamowy, R.Jefferson and the Scottish enlightenment: a critique of Garry Wills' Inventing America: Jefferson's Declaration of Independence. William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Ser., 1979, 36, 503–523.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Handlin, O., & Handlin, M.James Burgh and American revolutionary theory. Massachusetts Historical Society, Proceedings, 1961, 73, 38–57.Google Scholar
Hartz, L.The liberal tradition in America. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich, 1955.Google Scholar
Hyneman, C. S., & Lutz, D. S. (Eds.). American political writing during the funding era, 1760-1805. Indianapolis: Liberty Press, 1983.Google Scholar
Levy, L.Legacy of suppression: freedom of speech and press in early American history. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1960.Google Scholar
Lundberg, D., & May, H. F.The enlightened reader in America. American Quarterly, 1976, 28 (special issue), 262–293.Google Scholar
Lutz, D. S.From covenant to constitution in American political thought. Publius: The Journal of Federalism, 1980, 10, 101–133.Google Scholar
Main, J. T.The Antifederalists. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1961.Google Scholar
Miller, P.From the covenant to the revival. In Smith, J. W. & Jamison, A. L. (Eds.), Religion in American life. Vol. 1: The shaping of American religion. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1961.Google Scholar
Morgan, R. J.Madison's theory of representation in the tenth Federalist. The Journal of Politics, 1974, 36, 852–885.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Myers, M. Jr.A source for eighteenth-century Harvard master's questions. William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Ser., 1981, 38, 261–267.Google Scholar
Pocock, J. G. A.Machiavelli, Harrington, and English political ideologies in the eighteenth century. William and Mary Quarterly, 3d Ser., 1965, 22, 549–583.Google Scholar
Pocock, J. G. A.The Machiavellian moment. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1975.Google Scholar
Pocock, J. G. A.The Machiavellian moment revisited: a study in history and ideology. Journal of World History, 1981, 53, 49–72.Google Scholar
Robbins, C.Algernon Sidney's Discourses concerning government: textbook of revolution. William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Ser., 1947, 4, 267–296.Google Scholar
Robbins, C.The eighteenth century commonwealthman. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1959.Google Scholar
Rossiter, C.Seedtime of the republic. New York, 1953.Google Scholar
Schmitt, G. J., & Webking, R. H.Revolutionaries, Antifederalists, and Federalists: comments on Gordon Wood's understanding of the American founding. The Political Science Reviewer, 1979, 9, 195–229.Google Scholar
Shalhope, R. E.Toward a republican synthesis: the emergence of an understanding of republicanism in American historiography. William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Ser., 1972, 29, 49–80.Google Scholar
Shalhope, R. E.Republicanism and early American historiography. William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Ser., 1982, 39, 334–356.Google Scholar
Shipton, C. K., and Mooney, J. E. (Eds.). National index of American imprints through 1800: the short-title Evans (2 vols.). Barre, Mass.: American Antiquarian Society and Barre Publishers, 1969.Google Scholar
Spurlin, P. M.Montesquieu in America, 1760-1801. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1940.Google Scholar
Storing, H. J.The “other” Federalist Papers. The Political Science Reviewer, 1976, 6, 215–247.Google Scholar
Storing, H. J., with Dry, M.The complete Anti-Federalist. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981.Google Scholar
Wills, G.Inventing America: Jefferson's Declaration of Independence. Garden City, N.J.: Doubleday, 1978.Google Scholar
Wood, G. S.The creation of the American republic, 1776-1787. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1969.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.