Adams, Wilson, and the American Res Publica

This chapter considers the final stage of the Ciceronian tradition: the American founding. Insofar as the American founding is influenced by John Locke, it is indirectly indebted to Cicero. However, John Adams and James Wilson recognize the profoundly Ciceronian character of American liberal republicanism. Both argue that the prevailing understandings of natural law, justice, liberty, and what it means to be a republic derive from Cicero’s formulation. Moreover, Adams and Wilson see the American experiment as proving Cicero right, that a republic tethered to natural law could be realized. They also see the American Founding as contributing its own innovation to this tradition: written constitutionalism. The self-conscious writing of a regime’s constitution enables the principles of a natural law republic to be fixed and formalized in a way that Cicero’s original formulation did not provide for.

Epilogue

This final chapter briefly examines the fate of the Ciceronian tradition after the American founding. Philosophic movements arose to challenge the doctrines of natural law that formed one of the pillars of the tradition. At almost the same time, scholarly appreciation of Roman thought declined in favor of the Greeks. Yet, the impact of the tradition remains as salient as ever, forming the foundation of many contemporary institutions and values. The tension between voluntarist notions of legitimacy and moral objectivism continues to animate current discourse around liberal democracy. This chapter thus also considers the ways in which a better understanding of Cicero’s legacy might help us to make progress in those debates.

In the eyes of all mankind: Interests and independence in Vattelian statehood

Emer de Vattel’s argument that states should be understood as free and independent bodies operating as moral persons in the international sphere is credited with launching a doctrine of sovereignty that hardened national borders against external interference or obligation. It also helped launch one of the world’s first modern states through its influence on the American founding. Vattel’s theory rests upon the critical role of judgment, specifically, the judgment of interests. That doctrine requires that states must always think for themselves, but not only about themselves. Offering some justification for international action, even in the midst of disagreement or war, is what separates civilized from villainous nations for Vattel, and this grounds interests in the communicative habits of an international community. Because the judgment of interests incorporates a communicative element, Vattelian internationalism cannot become exclusively self-regarding, and state interests cannot be entirely contained within national borders. Instead, Vattel’s distinctive combination of independence and interests is set within a global community that makes the fate of outsiders the business of every state.

Introduction

This opening section introduces the argument of the entire work, namely, that the American clergy who supported political resistance to the British did so in continuity with their own theological tradition. It also surveys a number of different approaches to interpreting the American Revolution. The influence of Bernard Bailyn’s Neo-Whig school of interpretation upon recent scholarship has significantly shaped how the American clergy’s arguments for resistance have been understood. Mark Noll, especially, has influenced how a number of historians have viewed the American clergy’s thought of this period, namely, as co-opted by secular philosophies and radical political views. The nature of political resistance doctrine sheds light on the role that Christianity played in the American founding.