The Sacred Fire of Liberty: Republicanism, Liberalism, and the Law

by Mortimer N. Sellers

Overview

Republicanism, liberalism, and the rule of law have a long and tangled common history in the development of Western institutions. All three claim to secure "liberty" for citizens or subjects of the state, without always agreeing about what this should mean in practice. Mortimer Sellers' The Sacred Fire of Liberty places the concept of "liberty" into the context of its political origins, and explains the structures and vocabulary of liberty that still dominate contemporary legal and political debate. Contrary to the common opposition of liberal and republican traditions as rival conceptions of political legitimacy, Sellers demonstrates the close links between the two, their common roots in developing Western conceptions of liberty, and their eventual divergence over structures of government following the French revolution.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780814781098
Publisher:	New York University Press
Publication date:	11/01/1998
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Mortimer Sellers is Director of the Center for International and Comparative Law and Professor of Law at the University of Baltimore School of Law. He is author of American Republicanism: Roman Ideology in the United States Constitution, also available from NYU Press.

Editorial Reviews

Places the concept of liberty into the context of its political origins and explains the structures and vocabulary of liberty that still dominate contemporary legal and political debate. Sellers (international and comparative law, U. of Baltimore Law School) demonstrates the close links between liberal and republican traditions, their common roots in developing Western conceptions of liberty, and their eventual divergence over structures of government following the French revolution. His aim is to reestablish the original republican principle that there can be no justice without citizenship, no liberty without law. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Booknews

Sellers' project...of reintroducing the common good into liberalism, of reconnecting "liberty" to notions of a community, seems worthy and promising. But it will need to be done in a more detailed and nuanced way than in this book for it to be persuasive. Moreover, such an effort requires that one explicitly acknowledge and confront the illiberal, exclusionary, inegalitarian strands of republican thought.
— Law and Politics Book Review

Mark Kessler