A new interpretation of the rise of the "rule of the people" in
England and America, by the distinguished revolutionary historian
Morgan (American History/Yale), author of The Genius of George
Washington (1981) and a dozen others. One of Morgan's strengths as
a historian is his ability to recognize the seeds of a trend in an
ironic counter-trend. In the past, for instance, he has argued that
the juxtaposition of slavery and the idea of freedom was actually
logical, for by curtailing the growth of a discontented white
laboring class, slavery nourished white representative government.
Similarly, here Morgan argues that the old concept of the divine
right of kings was in fact the seedbed of popular control of
government. In some trenchantly argued essays, the author
elaborates on this theme. For example, the adversaries of King
Charles I used the "divine right" concept to oust his most
egregious advisors, reasoning that since the king was divine and
could not be corrupted, it was their duty to save him from bad
counsellors. From there, the "slippery slope" ultimately led to a
weakened king, a ruling Parliament, and what Morgan calls the
"fiction" of popular control in America. The author claims that the
shared belief in this "fiction" binds our country - even though
what really happened in 1787 was that the Founding Fathers
"invented" the idea of an American people and "imposed" a
government on them. Although Morgan's final argument is a bit
strained - the "people," after all, had to vote to ratify their new
government - this is, overall, a well-constructed historical
argument. (Kirkus Reviews)
The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America
"The best explanation that I have seen for our distinctive combination of faith, hope and naiveté concerning the governmental process." —Michael Kamman, Washington Post
This book makes the provocative case here that America has remained politically stable because the Founding Fathers invented the idea of the American people and used it to impose a government on the new nation. His landmark analysis shows how the notion of popular sovereignty—the unexpected offspring of an older, equally fictional notion, the "divine right of kings"—has worked in our history and remains a political force today.
"Edmund S. Morgan . . . [is] a man with a rare gift for telling the story of the past simply and elegantly without sacrificing its abundant complexity. . . . The story he tells is of enormous interest and importance." —Pauline Meier, New York Times Book Review
"[A] provocative new study. . . . In a series of brilliant chapters, [Morgan] probes the myths that sustained eighteenth-century American notions of liberty." —Keith Thomas, New York Review of Books
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