{"product_id":"john-adams-and-the-spirit-of-liberty-paperback","title":"John Adams and the Spirit of Liberty - Paperback","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: right;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/reportcopyrightinfringement.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eReport copyright infringement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eC. Bradley Thompson\u003c\/b\u003e (Author)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAmerica's finest eighteenth-century student of political science, John Adams is also the least studied of the Revolution's key figures. By the time he became our second president, no American had written more about our government and not even Jefferson or Madison had read as widely about questions of human nature, natural right, political organization, and constitutional construction. Yet this staunch constitutionalist is perceived by many as having become reactionary in his later years and his ideas have been largely disregarded. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn the first major work on Adams's political thought in over thirty years, C. Bradley Thompson takes issue with the notion that Adams's thought is irrelevant to the development of American ideas. Focusing on Adams's major writings, Thompson elucidates and reevaluates his political and constitutional thought by interpreting it within the tradition of political philosophy stretching from Plato to Montesquieu. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThis major revisionist study shows that the distinction Adams drew between \"principles of liberty\" and \"principles of political architecture\" is central to his entire political philosophy. Thompson first chronicles Adams's conceptualization of moral and political liberty during his confrontation with American Loyalists and British imperial officers over the true nature of justice and the British Constitution, illuminating Adams's two most important pre-Revolutionary essays, \"A Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Law\" and \"The Letters of Novanglus.\" He then presents Adams's debate with French philosophers over the best form of government and provides an extended analysis of his \u003ci\u003eDefence of the Constitutions of Government\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eDiscourses on Davila\u003c\/i\u003e to demonstrate his theory of political architecture. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eFrom these pages emerges a new John Adams. In reexamining his political thought, Thompson reconstructs the contours and influences of Adams's mental universe, the ideas he challenged, the problems he considered central to constitution-making, and the methods of his reasoning. Skillfully blending history and political science, Thompson's work shows how the spirit of liberty animated Adams's life and reestablishes this forgotten Revolutionary as an independent and important thinker.\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 360\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 1.07 x 8.64 x 6.42 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e November 16, 1998\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44289401028710,"sku":"9780700611812","price":78.12,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0599\/7255\/0758\/files\/UHNVaTVaV0R5OGxKczlBL0RVaW4ydz09.webp?v=1766749554","url":"https:\/\/infinitylightwa.com\/products\/john-adams-and-the-spirit-of-liberty-paperback","provider":"Infinity Light","version":"1.0","type":"link"}