THE DUTCH
"The People of Holland may be divided into several Classes: The Clowns or Boors (as they call them), who cultivate the Land. The Mariners or Schippers, who supply their Ships and Inland-Boats, The Merchants or Traders, who fill their Towns. The Renteneers, or men that live in all their chief Cities upon the Rents or Interest of Estates formerly ac- quired in the Families. And the Gentle- men and Officers of the Armies."
So wrote Sir William Temple, Brit- ain's ambassador t...
Mario Vargas Llosa was one of several Latin American and Soviet novelists who came to the Wilson Center as visiting scholars during the politically tumultuous decades at the end of the 20th century. In this essay from the WQ’s Spring 1987 issue, Vargas Llosa reflected on freedom’s intimate connection to literary imagination.
and its creators. The Framers themselves took a modest view. Washington wrote: "Experience is the surest standard which to test" a nation's constitution.
WQ SPRING 1987
96
This spring, the nation will begin its major celebrations of the Constitution's bicentennial. A Smithsonian Institution symposium on "Constitutional Roots, Rights, and Responsibilities" in May is but one of many scholarly events that will accompany the fire-works, parades, and speeches across the land....
, dic- tated those closing words of the preface to his notes of the debates at the Constitutional Convention. This was how Madison wanted his countrymen to imagine the Convention. In many ways we have fol- lowed his wishes-and will be asked to do so again during the bicen- tennial celebrations.
Yet, for most of this century, this popular image of the Founding has coexisted with another, less heroic portrait etched by scholars since Charles A. Beard published An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution...
after the Philadel- phia Convention's adjournment, even these seemingly unexception- able words came under attack. Who, demanded Virginia's Patrick Henry, had authorized the Convention to "speak the language of We the People, instead of We the States?" In the Continental Congress, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia thundered against the document's backers, a coalition, he said, "of monarchy men, military men, aristo- crats and drones, whose noise, impudence and zeal exceed all belief."
The...
the legislature that the wheels of its government are stopped; to see it carefully examine the extent of the evil, and patiently wait for two whole years until a remedy was discovered. ..with-out having wrung a tear or a drop of blood from mankind."
As Alexis de Tocqueville marveled in his classic 1835 appraisal of Democ-racy in America (Arden, 1986), there was nothing in the history of nations like the American experiment.
The ancient Greek city-states and Irn-perial Rome had boasted "constitu-tions,"...
RESEARCH REPORTS
Reviews of new research public agencies and private institutions
"Racial Attitudes in America: Trends and Interpretations."
Harvard University Press, 79 Garden St., Cambridge, Mass. 02138. 260 pp. $22.50. Authors: Howard Schuman, Charlotte Steeh, and Lawrence Bobo
The startling images of black teenagers be- ing chased by enraged whites in Little Rock, Ark., were for many younger view- ers of PBSs Eyes on the Prize a first glimpse of what America's blacks endured...