Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America [Paperback]

Edmund S. Morgan (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0393306232 | ISBN-13: 978-0393306231 | Publication Date: September 17, 1989

"The best explanation that I have seen for our distinctive combination of faith, hope and naiveté concerning the governmental process." —Michael Kamman, Washington Post

This book makes the provocative case here that America has remained politically stable because the Founding Fathers invented the idea of the American people and used it to impose a government on the new nation. His landmark analysis shows how the notion of popular sovereignty—the unexpected offspring of an older, equally fictional notion, the "divine right of kings"—has worked in our history and remains a political force today.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

For Morgan, popular sovereigntygovernment of, by and for the peopleis a myth. Professor emeritus of history at Yale, he argues, in effect, that representative democracy is a tool to bolster rule by the powerful few over the many; the majority are thus led to believe they control their own destiny. In this quietly subversive rereading of our history, American colonists perfected the fiction of popular rule by involving voters in extravagant electoral campaigns and by insisting that elected representatives derived their power from their constituents. Meanwhile, elitist colonial rulers who owned considerable property pulled strings to get their way. Earlier, in England, members of the House of Commons and reformers challenged another governing fictionthe divine right of kingsand in so doing paved the way for popular sovereignty. Morgan offers a thought-provoking look at how the founding fathers assumed power.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Edmund S. Morgan . . . [is] a man with a rare gift for telling the story of the past simply and elegantly without sacrificing its abundant complexity. . . . The story he tells is of enormous interest and importance. (Pauline Meier - New York Times Book Review )

[A] provocative new study. . . . In a series of brilliant chapters, [Morgan] probes the myths that sustained eighteenth-century American notions of liberty. (Keith Thomas - New York Review of Books )

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company (September 17, 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393306232
• ISBN-13: 978-0393306231
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #243,972 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The People - a convenient fiction, January 5, 2007

By 

J. Grattan "Ideas can move the world" (Lawrenceville, GA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America (Paperback)

This book is a very perceptive examination of a central tenet of both the British and American democracies, that is, the one where the central government rests on popular sovereignty - on the people. The author shows that is mostly a convenient fiction, but one that must be honored to legitimate democratic governments. In the first place, "the people" is a most nebulous concept - sufficiently vague to not affix specific rights and duties.

The author devotes at least half the book to 17th century English political history where the divine right of kings was gradually replaced by popular sovereignty exercised by Parliament. He shows where the Long Parliament of 1640 assumed supreme authority in the name of the people with no mechanisms actually in place for the "people" to check Parliament. The Levellers of that time attempted to bridge the gap of empowerment for the people, but were essentially ignored and suppressed keeping power in the hands of the few.

In later years and in America, the myth of the power of people has been sustained in many ways: extolling the importance of the virtuous yeoman (farmer), requiring participation in local militias where local social hierarchies can be reinforced, elections where pre-selected, elite candidates pander for votes, and holding carnivals where the gentry and peasants pretend to swap social roles. In all of these cases there is the pretense of social equality. It is all an elaborate game where elites interact with the ordinary just enough to remind everyone both of their superiority and sameness and to deflect grass-roots efforts to exercise power.

There is a great deal of discussion concerning the agreement of men in a hypothetical past to emerge from a state of nature to form a community and then to establish a government. In theory the community of men retains its superiority over the government, but the problem is that once power is invested in representatives, presidents, judges, etc, how can the people regain the upper hand. In America, Constitution writing was a pre-government community activity that prescribed a government and had to be ratified by state conventions of the people. The author points out that during the time of the Glorious Revolution of 1688 in England, the Convention (actually Parliament) was unwilling to return to a pre-government state to construct a constitution - too much chance for actual people's voices.

Since the time of the founding much has changed in America. Landed elites have long since been surpassed by business and financial elites. The rise of mass communications while increasing information flows also facilitates the ability to sustain all manner of myths including the myth of popular empowerment. This is a good book to understand that some key political myths in this country have been with us a long time.

8 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Book to Understand our Forefathers, March 10, 2006

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Jonathan Gardner (Federal Way, WA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America (Paperback)

I'm barely a quarter of the way through the book. It's very dense in that there is so much to read and ponder within its covers. But what I have read shows that he has done his homework, and is presenting the material in a way that makes me feel like I was part of the popular debate occuring in the halls of government at the time.

If you want to know why the constitution is written the way it is, where our forefathers got the crazy idea that men are inherently sovereign and have God-given rights, you'll need to get this book. It explains the slow, awkward, and surprising evolution of philosophy as people began to realize kings were no more endowed with a a mandate from God than men were. If you can't imagine what was really going on in people's minds between the Magna Carta and the Declaration of Independence, this book will fill in all of the missing gaps.

6 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Boring but relevant, June 21, 2006

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Jeffrey Demers - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America (Paperback)

Inventing the People is a study of the relation between political ideas and political reality in the Anglo-American world. Morgan's ultimate goal is to explain the development of the American way of government. Morgan's thesis is that both the divine right of kings and the sovereignty of the people are political fictions designed to justify government of the many by the few. These fictions have been created by the people and
serve to both shape and reflect upon the nature of political reality.


Morgan's thesis is that both the divine right of kings and the sovereignty of the people are political fictions designed to justify government of the many by the few. These fictions have been created by the people and serve to both shape and reflect upon the nature of political reality.

Inventing the People is an examination of the relation between political thoughts and political reality in the Anglo-American world. Morgan's ultimate goal is to trace the development of the American style of government. Morgan's, Hume inspired, thesis is that both the divine right of kings and the sovereignty of the people are political fictions designed to justify government of the many by the few. These fictions have been created by the people and serve to both shape and reflect upon the nature of political reality.