Customer Reviews

What the Anti-Federalists Were For: The Political Thought of the Opponents of the Constitution

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Cannot recommend this book highly enough. If you want to know what the Anti-Federalists were thinking, why they ultimately lost the debate, and their proper place in the history of the Founding, this is the book to read. Easy read and short, but full of great information.

The anti-federalists were really the federalists, they lost, and they're forgotten. Some of them predicted that if the constitution were adopted, even with the Bill of Rights, that the government it created would abuse its power and that there would be no agency to stop it. Imagine that!
Dr. Storing gives the antis a fair hearing, though he (mistakenly in my opinion) believes them wrong. I don't know of many other sources for that.

Guy Smith complains that can't understand Herbert Storing's prose (but is this Storing's fault or Mr. Smith's? This was one of the most helpful books I read in graduate school, and I found Storing's writing academic, but accessible) and then makes errors in his critique! Unbelievable. This is an oustanding book by the person almost singularly responsible for recovering the thought of the anti-Federalists.

This book is a classic example of a potentially valuable resource nearly destroyed with poor prose. The well-studied Mr. Storing produced an almost unreadable book through the use of awkward sentence structure and the liberal intermixing of his prose and quotes from founding fathers. He main literary abuse is convoluted sentences, such as "In reply to all of these objections, the Anti-Federalists complained, they were told, . . . .". Simple declarative sentences would have made this a wonderful book., and not an exercise in frustration.

academic book which provides a serious overview of where our nation started. Discusses significant issues as well as bringing up issues not normally mentioned in regards to the Federalist Papers

"Federal", as in "federation" and "league", relates to commercial entities and commercial contract. Keep in mind, the United States is not a country but a corporation with no jurisdiction outside it's "ten mile square" district and the 18 enumerated functions of Congress Assembled (aka The United States).