America's Constitutional Soul

by Harvey C. Mansfield Jr.

Overview

In America's Constitutional Soul, one of America's leading political theorists and most penetrating thinkers on the Constitution describes what's wrong with American politics today—and what political scientists can do about it. Beginning with a chronical of the Reagan elections, Mansfield shows how our politics reveals its nature by the way it pictures the Constitution. He takes aim at the haunted "realism" of contemporary political scientists, contrasting it with the real-world successes of those early practitioners of the art who actually helped define a whole new form of government—and with it such concepts as federalism, a strong exective, and judicial review.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780801846342
Publisher:	Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date:	03/01/1993
Series:	The Johns Hopkins Series in Constitutional Thought
Edition description:	Revised ed.
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.57(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., is Frank C. Thompson Professor of Government at Harvard University. His many books include Statemanship and Party Government, The Spirit of Liberalism, and Taming the Prince.

Editorial Reviews

Harvey C. Mansfield displays his formidable intellectualism and classical scholarship in support of the proposition that the American constitution possesses a formal truth drawn from its foundations and exerted through its development . . . In what is a provocatively trenchant book, Mansfield takes relish in propelling his readers down the rats' maze of liberal arguments supporting a conservative outlook. Herein lies the real soul of American politics.
—Political Studies

Provides 'food for thought' for both 'left' and 'right,' and in particular for the American citizens about whom this book is concerned.
—Bradley A. Kletscher, Constitutional Commentary

From the Publisher

Provides 'food for thought' for both 'left' and 'right,' and in particular for the American citizens about whom this book is concerned.

Constitutional Commentary - Bradley A. Kletscher

Harvey C. Mansfield displays his formidable intellectualism and classical scholarship in support of the proposition that the American constitution possesses a formal truth drawn from its foundations and exerted through its development . . . In what is a provocatively trenchant book, Mansfield takes relish in propelling his readers down the rats' maze of liberal arguments supporting a conservative outlook. Herein lies the real soul of American politics.

Political Studies

Mansfield (government, Harvard U.) focuses on the elections of 1980, 1982, and 1984, analyzing the themes and tactics of Ronald Reagan and the conservative movement to reveal what's wrong with American politics today. Individual essays, several of them published here for the first time, discuss such topics as social science, religion, the separation of powers, the media, and the political significance of forms and formalities. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews