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Gordon S. Wood
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Power and Liberty: Constitutionalism in the American Revolution

by Gordon S. Wood (Author)
4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 334 ratings
Editors' pick Best History
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New York Times bestseller and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Gordon S. Wood elucidates the debates over the founding documents of the United States.

The half century extending from the imperial crisis between Britain and its colonies in the 1760s to the early decades of the new republic of the United States was the greatest and most creative era of constitutionalism in American history, and perhaps in the world. During these decades, Americans explored and debated all aspects of politics and constitutionalism--the nature of power, liberty, representation, rights, the division of authority between different spheres of government, sovereignty, judicial authority, and written constitutions. The results of these issues produced institutions that have lasted for over two centuries.

In this new book, eminent historian Gordon S. Wood distills a lifetime of work on constitutional innovations during the Revolutionary era. In concise form, he illuminates critical events in the nation's founding, ranging from the imperial debate that led to the Declaration of Independence to the revolutionary state constitution making in 1776 and the creation of the Federal Constitution in 1787. Among other topics, he discusses slavery and constitutionalism, the emergence of the judiciary as one of the major tripartite institutions of government, the demarcation between public and private, and the formation of states' rights.

Here is an immensely readable synthesis of the key era in the making of the history of the United States, presenting timely insights on the Constitution and the nation's foundational legal and political documents.
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  1. ISBN-10
    0197546919
  2. ISBN-13
    978-0197546918
  3. Publisher
    Oxford University Press
  4. Publication date
    September 1, 2021
  5. Language
    English
  6. Dimensions
    8.3 x 1.1 x 5.5 inches
  7. Print length
    240 pages
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"This book distills the core insights of a long career into a single small volume that grabs the reader's interest from the first page and never lets go." -- Jessica T. Mathews, Foreign Affairs

"With characteristic insight, sobriety, and wisdom, Gordon Wood had given us much to consider in this thoughtful study of how the framers of the American Republic imperfectly but determinedly set us on a journey toward a more perfect Union. Wood's scholarship always repays our careful attention, and this incisive new book joins the large company of his invaluable contributions to understanding America's complexities and contradictions." -- Jon Meacham, author of The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels

"No one has done more to teach us about the origins of American constitutionalism than Gordon S. Wood. Now, at a moment when we are trembling over the strength of our constitutional system, Wood gives us a deft shorthand account of how it all began. For anyone who wants to understand what made American constitutionalism such a vital political experiment, this is the place to start." -- Jack Rakove, author of Beyond Belief, Beyond Conscience: The Radical Significance of the Free Exercise of Religion

"Gordon Wood's Power and Liberty conveniently encapsulates more than a half-century of scholarship by the leading historian of American constitutionalism during the founding era and the early republic." -- William E. Nelson, author of E Pluribus Unum: How the Common Law Helped Unify and Liberate Colonial America, 1607-1776

"Gordon Wood has packed a lifetime of learning into this splendid little volume. In his capable hands, our founding charters, grown stale from familiarity, regain their freshness and allure as revolutionary documents that redefined our politics. Wood has an uncanny ability to project himself into the past and to report on his findings as if he had been a personal witness to those distant events." -- Ron Chernow, author of Alexander Hamilton

"Masterful... No historian knows more about the founding years of the U.S. than Wood. In his latest, he once again demonstrates his characteristic clarity... A fresh, lucid distillation of Wood's vast learning about the origins of American government."
--Kirkus, Starred Review

"The book has an elegiac quality along with his customary clarity." --The New York Times

"No living historian has done more to illuminate the origins of our constitutional heritage in the Revolutionary era."--National Review

"Many historians view Wood as the greatest living scholar of the American Revolution. This book distills the core insights of a long career into a single smallvolume that grabs the reader's interest from the first page and never lets go."--Foreign Affairs

"This wonderful collection of essays offers many delights for the specialist and
non-specialist alike...to borrow an admiring line from one of Wood's own reviews, 'There is no other historian in the country who could have written this book.'" --The New Criterion

About the Author

Gordon S. Wood is the Alva O. Way University Professor and Professor of History Emeritus at Brown University. He is the author of many books, including The Creation of the American Republic, 1776-1787, which won the Bancroft Prize and the John H. Dunning Prize of the American Historical Association; The Radicalism of the American Revolution, which won the Pulitzer Prize for History and the Ralph Waldo Emerson Prize; The American Revolution: A History; The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin; Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different, which was a New York Times bestseller; Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789-1815 (OUP, 2009), which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and winner of the American History Book Prize from the New-York Historical Society; and Friends Divided: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. He is a regular reviewer for the New York Review of Books.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Oxford University Press (September 1, 2021)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 240 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0197546919
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0197546918
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 13.3 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.3 x 1.1 x 5.5 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 334 ratings

About the author

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Gordon S. Wood

Gordon S. Wood

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Gordon S. Wood is Alva O. Way Professor of History Emeritus at Brown University. His books include the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Radicalism of the American Revolution, the Bancroft Prize-winning The Creation of the American Republic, 1776-1787, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, and The Purpose of the Past: Reflections on the Uses of History. He writes frequently for The New York Review of Books and The New Republic.

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Top reviews from the United States

Ronald H. Clark
5.0 out of 5 stars A fresh look by a master historian at the Revolution and early national period
Reviewed in the United States on October 11, 2021
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While much has been written about the Revolution and the early national government, the author here is one of the most distinguished students of the period, with many books to his credit. I think it is fair to say that during his career, the author has read it all, written it all, and taught generations of university students. This book struck me as a senior expert going back over familiar ground in search of some new insights. And insights he does discover.

The first two chapters are familiar analyses of the imperial debates between Americans and Brits about the colonies' position in the Empire. One point the author makes strikingly is that the Americans were not hot heads arguing for immediate independence. In fact, it was not until the Declaration that the Americans' position had hardened into independence. The author rightly devotes a chapter to the state constitution making following the Declaration. Things start to get interesting when he discusses the crisis of the 1780"s, when the state legislatures began to pose serious risks to a centralized government' under pressure from debtors and other classes. While he takes a pot-shot at one of my favorite books on this period, John Fiske's "Critical Period of American History," (1888) for being too pessimistic, in the end he largely agrees with Fiske.

An important chapter is on the drafting of the Constitution. One insight is that he ascribes Madison's famous clash of interests argument to justify a large republic back to David Hume. But the real payoff for me is found in the last several chapters. He writes a chapter on "slavery and constitutionalism" that is close to a masterpiece. He traces the history of slavery, how opponents began to put restrictions on the practice, how support for abolition even in the upper south came very close to ending the practice in the 1780's, while keeping any right to own another person out of the constitution. This chapter is matched by a superb history of the emergence of the judiciary as an independent force, thank largely to Hamilton.

But the most remarkable chapter is on the demarcation of public from private. The Revolution ended private individuals and families from exercising what we would call governmental powers. The emergence of corporations and corporate charters placed private property off limits to governmental control. No longer could government control religious entities.Only the courts could resolve such disputes--another reason why the judiciary emerged during this period. This is a chapter every serious student of American history should embrace and read. Once again a great historian demonstrates why he has been so revered.
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William J. Bahr
5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing! Dressed to the very high nines!
Reviewed in the United States on September 8, 2021
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This very well-written, well-documented, and well-reasoned book puts brilliant Constitutional garb on the frame the framers put together. With deep analysis, the author develops unique, innovative (at least to me, a reader of many books about Early America) theories that explain how the Constitution (our written rules of fundamental law) came to be. In doing so, he reconstructs and puts in a new light the ostensibly real and often surprising reasons, rationale, and sequence of actions and reactions that led to the United States Constitution. In particular, one learns how, to offset the modern “middling” men and their unenlightened ways that were bringing “excessive democracy” (anarchy) to the states under the Articles of Confederation, Madison and a few others helped strategize calling up the Constitutional Convention to set things aright (especially the power structure), and for Marshall to later interpret the results the way he did.

I can’t speak highly enough about this book. Nary a page, if not a paragraph, went by without my highlighting something on my Kindle version. If I had anything to suggest, it would be for the author in his next edition to add a quick summary at the end, as one can get the feeling of being left hanging just a bit. As well, while I found no errors of fact (something unusual for most books I read), I encountered (just to be extra picky on something this perfect) only two easily corrected typos (missing "t" on p.146 and missing "s" on 168).

Bottom line, the above very minor issues aside, I’m so glad I "well-ordered" this liberty book! Powerful, it is…and very highly recommended!

Of possible interest:  George Washington’s Liberty Key: Mount Vernon’s Bastille Key – the Mystery and Magic of Its Body, Mind, and Soul , a best-seller at Mount Vernon. “Character is Key for Liberty!” and
 Strategy Pure and Simple: Essential Moves for Winning in Competition and Cooperation
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Top reviews from other countries

Henrik Joenck Larsen
5.0 out of 5 stars Good quality speedy delivery
Reviewed in Germany on January 19, 2022
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Book in excellent quality, at a nice price
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TIMOTHY J LYNCH
5.0 out of 5 stars Compelling. Brilliant. Relevant.
Reviewed in Australia on November 13, 2021
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Best short introduction to the ideas underpinning the American experiment.
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