"The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America"

by Jeffrey Rosen, President & CEO of the National Constitution Center

The Pursuit of Happiness book cover

About the Book

In The Pursuit of Happiness, How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America, National Constitution Center president and CEO Jeffrey Rosen offers a fascinating examination of what “the pursuit of happiness” meant to our nation’s Founders and how that famous phrase defined their lives and became the foundation of our democracy.

The Declaration of Independence identified “the pursuit of happiness” as one of our unalienable rights, along with life and liberty. Rosen profiles six of the most influential founders—Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton—to show what pursuing happiness meant in their lives.

By reading the classical Greek and Roman moral philosophers who inspired the Founders, Rosen shows us how they understood the pursuit of happiness as a quest for being good, not feeling good—the pursuit of lifelong virtue, not short-term pleasure. Among those virtues were the habits of industry, temperance, moderation, and sincerity, which the Founders viewed as part of a daily struggle for self-improvement, character development, and calm self-mastery. They believed that political self-government required personal self-government.

For all six Founders, the pursuit of virtue was incompatible with enslavement of African Americans, although the Virginians betrayed their own principles. The Pursuit of Happiness is more than an elucidation of the Declaration’s famous phrase; it is a revelatory journey into the minds of the Founders, and a deep, rich, and fresh understanding of the foundation of our democracy.

About Jeffrey Rosen
About Jeffrey Rosen

Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center where he is host of the weekly podcast, We the People. He is also a professor of law at the George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor of The Atlantic.

Rosen’s other books include the New York Times bestseller Conversations with RBG: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Life, Love, Liberty, and Law, as well as biographies of Louis Brandeis and William Howard Taft.

The Pursuit of Happiness: A Book Launch and Conversation with Jeffrey Rosen and Jeffrey Goldberg

Interviews and Event Recordings

Outlet/Event Headline   Date          
The Chautauquan Daily Jeffrey Rosen encourages commitment to self-mastery, reason in lecture on philosophies underlying U.S. founding documents AUG 22
Newport This Week The Responsibility and Duty of Voters AUG 15
The Aspen Institute The Question of Happiness JUNE 26
The Cato Institute The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America MAY 30
This American President with Richard Lim Who Were the Founding Fathers' Heroes? with Jeffrey Rosen MAY 21
The Political Orphanage with Andrew Heaton Cicero and the Founding Fathers MAY 08
New Orleans Book Festival panel with Ken Burns and Heather Cox Richardson The Founding Document: Historical Perspectives on Modern Constitutional Challenges MAR 16
Narrative Species KSQD podcast Jeffrey Rosen The Pursuit of Happiness MAR 14
National Archives Jeffrey Rosen and Dr. Colleen Shogan discuss what “the pursuit of happiness” meant to six of the most influential founders—Franklin, Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, and Hamilton. APR 24
That Said with Michael Zeldin A Conversation with Jeffrey Rosen, Author, 'The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America' MAR 27
Letters and Politics with Mitch Jeserich The Pursuit of Happiness, The Founders, and America Today MAR 21
Jeff Rosen book talk at AEI (aired on C-SPAN) Jeffrey Rosen Discusses the Constitution and the Pursuit of Happiness MAR 18
New Orleans Book Festival panel with Ken Burns and Heather Cox Richardson The Founding Document: Historical Perspectives on Modern Constitutional Challenges MAR 16
Narrative Species KSQD podcast Jeffrey Rosen The Pursuit of Happiness MAR 14
JFK Library Forum The Pursuit of Happiness MAR 13
Converging Dialogues Podcast Virtues and the Founding Fathers: A Dialogue with Jeffrey Rosen MAR 13
History Camp Discussions The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America MAR 11
The Panpsycast Philosophy Podcast Episode 127, 'The Pursuit of Happiness' with Jeffrey Rosen (Part II - Further Analysis and Discussion) MAR 10
Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College Jeffrey Rosen — The Pursuit of Happiness MAR 05
Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, Grand Valley State University 2024 Progressive Conservative Summit FEB 29
Templeton Ideas Podcast What the Founders of America Can Teach About Happiness, Q&A with Jeffrey Rosen, President of the National Constitution Center FEB 29
The Panpsycast Philosophy Podcast Episode 127, 'The Pursuit of Happiness' with Jeffrey Rosen (Part I - The Founding Fathers) FEB 25
The Dish with Andrew Sullivan Jeffrey Rosen On Virtue And Learning FEB 23
Commonwealth Club The Pursuit of Happiness: Jeffrey Rosen, President and CEO of the National Constitution Center FEB 22
Michael Smerconish The Pursuit of Happiness by Jeffrey Rosen - Interview with Michael Smerconish FEB 22
John Henry Newman Lectures at La Salle University The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Founders & Defined America FEB 20
WHYY If it makes you happy: Constitution Center CEO's book pursues American happiness FEB 19
Keen On Should Americans pursue virtue or happiness? FEB 14
WAMU's 1A Jeffrey Rosen on 'the pursuit of happiness' FEB 13
The Realignment Hosted by Marshall Kosloff and Saagar Enjeti Jeffrey Rosen: How the Founders Can Inspire the Next Generation of Leaders FEB 13
Leonard Lopate at Large Interview with Jeffrey Rosen FEB 06
The Gist with Mike Pesca The Insurrection And Trump's Election FEB 06
The Road to Now with Bob Crawford The Pursuit of Happiness with Jeffrey Rosen (295) FEB 05
Arizona PBS Horizon with Ted Simons Author inspired by the Founding Fathers' pursuit of happiness FEB 01
Here's Where It Gets Interesting with Sharon McMahon The Pursuit of Happiness with Jeffrey Rosen JAN 22

Additional Resources

Explore the primary texts that inspired the Founders
Explore the primary texts that inspired the Founders

Selection of frequently cited books on happiness from the founding era:

Visit the Founders' Library for more

Have a book club or reading group?
Have a book club or reading group?

In his twenties, Benjamin Franklin organized a “club of mutual improvement”—called the Junto—where members met weekly to discuss questions of morals, politics, and philosophy.

Download The Pursuit of Happiness discussion guide as a resource to facilitate conversations and dive deeper into the book’s themes, in the spirit of Franklin.

Download discussion guide [PDF]

Early Praise for The Pursuit of Happiness

“A study of the Founding Fathers’ search for self-mastery… In their distinguishing between being good from feeling good, the founders, Rosen hopes, may inspire readers to redefine the meaning of a good life. A thoughtful rendering of America’s history.”
“[A] fast-paced romp through early American political thought… An entertaining window on the American founders’ reading lives."
“Jeffrey Rosen found a ‘gap’ in his education, such as we all have. In filling it he has written a masterpiece of intellectual history about the Founders, renewing, we can hope, our reading of them and what they read. Here is the enriching story of how ‘pursuit of happiness’ never meant pleasure or success, but the self-governing quest, always unachieved, of virtue. This brilliant work is very new about very old ideas that refresh the spirit.”
“To understand who we are, we must begin at the beginning—which is precisely what Jeffrey Rosen does in this remarkable and timely book. By exploring how the American Founders viewed virtue and the fabled (and often misunderstood) ‘pursuit of happiness,’ Rosen offers us a much-needed reminder of the centrality of civic and personal virtue.”
“Using the classical virtues prescribed by Benjamin Franklin as a way of organizing his book, Jeffrey Rosen has put together a remarkable collection of fresh and insightful essays on the Founders. Indeed, his book may be the best and most readable introduction to the ideas of the Founders that we have.”
“A delightful, insightful reminder of a truth obvious to the Founders but forgotten by subsequent generations of Americans: that personal happiness and the health of the republic depend on virtue, which in turn requires regular cultivation. Read this timely book for your own benefit and the good of us all.”
“Jeffrey Rosen’s immensely readable and thoughtful book on America’s founders makes a strong case that a life invested in understanding the past may in fact be a happier one. There are lessons here for preserving our democracy today.”
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