On November 7, 2023, historians Carol Berkin, author of A Sovereign People: The Crises of the 1790s and the Birth of American Nationalism, and H.W. Brands, author of Founding Partisans: Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, Adams, and the Brawling Birth of American Politics, joined Jeffrey Rosen for a conversation on political partisanship and nationalism in early America, and how, despite the founders’ fear of factionalism, deep partisan divisions emerged almost immediately after the Revolution. They discuss the election of 1800, the first hotly contested partisan election in American history, and trace the history of American partisanship to the present day.
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Today’s episode was produced by Tanaya Tauber, Lana Ulrich, and Bill Pollock. It was engineered by Kevin Kilbourne and Bill Pollock. Research was provided by Samson Mostashari, Cooper Smith, and Yara Daraiseh.
Participants
Carol Berkin is Presidential Professor of History, Emerita, of Baruch College & The Graduate Center, CUNY. She has written extensively on the creation of the Constitution and the politics of the early Republic. She is the author of many acclaimed books, including A Brilliant Solution: Inventing the American Constitution, The Bill of Rights: The Struggle to Secure America’s Liberties, and most recently, A Sovereign People: The Crisis of the 1790s and the Birth of American Nationalism. Her book, Jonathan Sewall: Odyssey of an American Loyalist was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.
H. W. Brands holds the Jack S. Blanton Sr. Chair in History at the University of Texas at Austin. He has written more than a dozen biographies and histories, including New York Times bestseller The General vs. the President; Our First Civil War; and most recently, Founding Partisans: Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson, Adams and the Brawling Birth of American Politics. Two of his biographies, The First American and Traitor to His Class, were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize.
Jeffrey Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization devoted to educating the public about the U.S. Constitution. Rosen is also a professor of law at The George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor of The Atlantic.
Additional Resources
- H.W. Brands, Founding Partisans: Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson, Adams and the Brawling Birth of American Politics
- Carol Berkin, A Sovereign People: The Crises of the 1790s and the Birth of American Nationalism
- Genet Affair
- National Constitution Center Founders' Library, The Alien and Sedition Acts
- Virginia Resolutions
Excerpt from Interview: Carol Berkin discusses the Genet affair, highlighting Washington's efforts to assert federal authority over diplomacy amidst challenges to American sovereignty during the 1790s.
Carol Berkin: There was none of that really in Hamilton. The affection for France, I have to say, was Jefferson's neurosis. I mean, he had seen the terror. Gouverneur Maurice said, who had been in France, he said, people's heads were being chopped off right and left. This is not like the American Revolution. This is not a sister revolution to ours. This is an absolute, it's gonna become a tyranny. And of course, Napoleon, it's not gonna be a democracy. Jefferson clung to the idea that the French Revolution was a continuation of the principles of the American Revolution because, rhetoric became in his mind really important, whereas reality, which was absolute raw power and violence, did not seem to move him. Hamilton had a calmer view. He said, it's good for business. It's good for American business if we align ourselves with Britain.
But to go back to your question about Genet, there is a perfect example of the fact of the weakness of the federal government in the early, in the 1790s. Genet comes over as the representative from France before the Jacobins take over. He's coming over from a more moderate group. He's like 26 years old. He's never had any real experience as a diplomat. He's a showman. He arrives in a ship that's flying the French flag and the American flag. And he says, we supported you in the American Revolution. Our blood and your blood was shed together, he doesn't come in quietly.
He does not present his credentials to Washington. A foreign ambassador comes in, today we would expect them to present it. Oh, no, he goes to South Carolina and he starts fundraising to build ships, privateers to fight under the French flag on their side against England. This is an invasion of American sovereignty.
And that's how Washington saw it. He said either there's a sovereign government here, then Genet sets up French courts in New York and in Philadelphia and in Charleston, French courts for when these privateers bring in captured British ships to decide what to do with the ships. What happened to American sovereignty? What happened to American courts? Washington sees very clearly that he has to do something about this because otherwise, South Carolina can have its own foreign policy and Virginia can have its own foreign policy and New York can have its own foreign policy and it will be chaos.
Genet, meanwhile, finally makes his way from South Carolina up to to Philadelphia where the federal government is. And he's greeted as a hero. And he keeps stressing how French blood and English blood have been mingled in this war for liberty, equality, I mean, he just goes on and on and on. And the crowds eat it up. They really do.
He then proceeds to send these really hilarious letters to Washington that are bombastic and filled with visions of the unity of the souls of Americans in the South and tells Washington that he ought to fund the privateers for support France. Washington says, we are neutral. I've just issued a proclamation of neutrality. And Genet won't accept this. He throws a temper tantrum and he says, what are you doing? Do you support the people who oppressed you? And his letters are hysterical. They really are. I just sat and laughed at this flowery language.
Finally, Washington says, Hamilton wants Genet driven out of the country. Hamilton's Washington says, rights to the French government. Finally, he builds a case against Genet. Now the Jacobins have taken over and they want Genet recalled so they can behead him so they can guillotine him. They see him as a traitor.
Then Washington does the loveliest thing. This man has been an aggravation, a thorn in Washington's side, caused so much trouble, caused so much embarrassment. And when Washington learns that the French government is gonna arrest Genet, he grants Genet amnesty and allows him to remain in America. He moves to New York. He marries Governor Clinton's daughter. He becomes a landowner in upstate New York. And you never hear from him politically again. And people ask Washington, why did you do this? And Washington, who I have come to just so admire. Before this book, I thought he was, a secondary character, a figurehead. What a fabulous man he says when he represented the French government, he was a danger. As a private citizen, he is no problem at all.
So this episode with Genet shows you the primary thrust of Washington's administrations which is to establish the legitimacy of the central government over diplomacy. And he tells South Carolina, you can't sign contracts with a foreign power. No, no, no, that's not allowed anymore. My government, the executive is in charge of setting foreign policy like that and he achieves it. What is really quite amazing is that Washington, who is very patient, achieves what he is trying to do which is building the sovereignty and the authority and the legitimacy of that central government.
Genet, I think Genet becomes a federalist in the end. I mean, he's, but as a young man, you can imagine Washington looking at this 26-year-old twerp. What is the Texas, All Hat and No Cattle when it comes to really his bombast and when he's no longer the representative of France, Washington just feels bad for him.
Excerpt for Interview: H.W. Brands discusses how Madison played a pivotal role in crafting the Constitution and Federalist Papers, initially advocating for a strong central government to control factions, but later shifted to supporting the Bill of Rights and aligning with Jefferson's anti-Federalist Republican Party.
H.W. Brands: Madison's a key figure here because he is the driver of the movement to create a new constitution, which is going to replace the articles of Confederation, this very loose central government with a much stronger, more coherent one. And he is of course, one of the writers of the Federalist Papers, along with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay. So really, as much as anybody else, he is the creator of the Constitution. And while he's arguing in favor of ratification of the Constitution, of course, he's gonna argue that a new, stronger central government will be a good thing for American self government. And he does this famously, in Federalist 10, by pointing out that factions will exist in any political entity. And the role for a government or a constitution, whoever's designing the system, is to minimize the deleterious effects of factions, because factions that the term that they would use instead of parties, he at that point was arguing that these are a negative influence on politics.
So how do we corral them? And he says that in an extensive republic, one that goes from South Carolina to Massachusetts, it's easier to keep them under control because no faction will be able to gain a majority or strong influence all across the nation. And maybe a faction could gain control in New York or Virginia or Massachusetts, but it would be offset by other influences elsewhere. So at that point, he's saying very clearly, factions are a bad thing, and this new government will keep them under control. Now, he wins the argument. The Federalists win the argument, the Constitution takes effect. And before too long, he's changing his view because he's coming to realize that, well, in competitive politics, especially in political situations where votes are either yes or no, where you have a binary choice, it's one or the other. It's not a multiple choice test. It's basically a true or false, political expediency requires people, encourages people to form alliances wherever they can.
And so people with different ideas voted in favor of the Constitution just as people with different ideas voted against the Constitution for different reasons. Once we get the government, then all of American politics are based on this. You get 51% of the vote, and you win, you get 49% and you lose. So there's nothing like proportional representation in American politics in those days, which would allow a minority to grow over time. And so, as Madison's views begin to shift from this really strong view in favor of a stronger central government to something more subtle, some of this comes out of the arguments during the ratification process over a Bill of Rights.
So Madison, being the principal author as he saw it, of the Constitution, took the typical author's attitude that every word is perfect. Don't touch a thing to, okay, well, if this is the only way we're gonna get the Constitution passed, well, we have to agree to have a Bill of Rights. Okay, we'll do it, but I'm gonna write the Bill of Rights.
So he does. And the Bill of Rights is added to the Constitution for his 10 Amendments. And in doing this, he begins to realize the depth of suspicion of this new central government. And as he watches Hamilton develop these very strong programs of federal authority, assumption of debt, the creation of a national bank, various other things that are gonna centralize control, then Madison starts to think, well, I don't know, maybe we went too far or at least maybe I don't wanna go as far as Hamilton wants to go with this. And so Madison basically shift sides. He was an arch federalist, but then he eventually becomes Jefferson's principal lieutenant in the anti-Federalists Republican Party in the 1790s.
And this is, it's all about the issues that emerge with the new government, but it's still, it betrays this underlying philosophy. If you are comfortable with a strong central government, you're likely to be a federalist. Now, there are various things that will feed into why you are comfortable with a strong central government. And if you are less comfortable with that, and if you are more comfortable keeping, as Carol said, keeping power close to home with those elected officials that you can keep your eye on, then you're gonna lean toward the Republicans.
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