Papers by Mortimer Sellers
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
The words liberty (libertas) and republic (res publica) grew up together in the political vocabul... more The words liberty (libertas) and republic (res publica) grew up together in the political vocabulary of the Roman state and its would-be successors. Liberals separated the two by discarding the republican commitment to popular sovereignty and balanced government. Pursuit of the common good and the rule of law remained, at least initially, to support the idea that governments should rule by consent. This meant that liberalism and republicanism were not very different, at least at the outset. John Locke defined the "liberty of man in society" as subjection to the duly enacted laws of a legislature established by consent, and independent of any private will. 1 The legislative power itself should be "limited to the publick good'' of society. 2 Benjamin Constant saw "liberty" in England, France, and the United States of America as "the right to be subjected only to the laws" and never to the "arbitrary will of one or more individuals." 3 These definitions simply repeat the old republican conception of liberty as service to the common good, under the rule of law. Republican vocabulary had distinguished liberty from license (licentia), meaning the unrestrained power to do what one wants. 4 Locke endorsed this distinction, 5 and castigated the monarchist theorist Sir Robert Filmer for identifying "freedom" as the ability "for every one to do what he lists, to live as he pleases, and not to be tyed by any Laws." Locke's liberty required "having a standing Rule to live by, common to every one of that Society, and made by the Legislative Power erected in it. 6 This republican distinction between "liberty" and "license" becomes hard to sustain without recourse to popular sovereignty and procedures of balanced government. The early liberal commitments to law and the common good came into conflict once legislatures lost the legitimacy of their republican foundations. If the public good sets the "utmost bounds" of the legislature's power, 7 then laws that contravene the public good are void. Liberals need a new technique to distinguish the boundaries of valid legislation. This was the purpose of John Stuart Mill's harm principle, and remains the central dilemma of liberal theorists ever since. 8 What is liberty if not the simple ability to what one wants? And who would be safe from their neighbors, if everyone did what they wanted? 103
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
American Republicanism, 1994
The specifics of the Roman example, and the various commonwealths that followed it, were availabl... more The specifics of the Roman example, and the various commonwealths that followed it, were available to American republicans in John Adams’s Defence of the Constitutions of the United States of America, which appeared on the eve of the United States Constitutional Convention. Adams’s Thoughts on Government had guided the forms of most of the new American state constitutions, as well as the more recent and widely respected constitution of Massachusetts, which Adams had largely drafted himself. This gave Adams particular authority on the structure of republican government, and explains his considerable influence during the convention, and the importance of his views afterwards. Adams repeated Cicero’s definition of republics as governments for the people, associated in pursuit of the common good, and divided into the one, the few and the many, mixed properly together. Balanced government alone could secure ‘liberty’, and Livy’s ‘government of laws and not of men’. Adams praised Rome as the ‘wisest republic’ with the ‘noblest people’ the world has ever seen, but also reported Tacitus’s grim assessment that republics are ‘easier to commend than to create’.
American Republicanism, 1994
The Sacred Fire of Liberty, 1998
Thomas Hobbes disparaged the common law, republican institutions, and liberty itself, whenever th... more Thomas Hobbes disparaged the common law, republican institutions, and liberty itself, whenever they weakened the sovereign’ s prerogative to regulate the state. Where Hobbes derived justice from power, Locke and Coke sought laws in human reason, above the power of the king. This English tradition of liberty through law diminished in later years, without ever losing its resonance completely. When William Blackstone restated the common law in his Commentaries1 he accepted the Hobbesian language of sovereignty, while insisting that England’s sovereign power rested equally in three balanced branches of king, lords and commons,2 as provided in the “free constitution of Britain.”3
American Republicanism, 1994
John Adams’s use of the word ‘republican’, to evoke Roman models of probity and a balanced consti... more John Adams’s use of the word ‘republican’, to evoke Roman models of probity and a balanced constitution strengthened America’s first self-consciously ‘republican’ party — the Republicans of Pennsylvania, whose fight for a bicameral Pennsylvania constitution paralleled and prefigured the Constitutional Convention’s move towards a bicameral Federal Congress.1 The Republican platform became the Pennsylvania Federalist platform after 17872 and leading Pennsylvania delegates to the United States Constitutional Convention, including James Wilson, Robert Morris, Thomas Fitzsimons, and Thomas Mifflin, had signed the Republican manifesto of 1779.3
American Republicanism, 1994
John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon felt bound by political reality to deny that they supported a ‘c... more John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon felt bound by political reality to deny that they supported a ‘commonwealth’ or ‘republican form of government’ for England. But they knew and praised other modern Englishmen who did, or had, and preeminently Algernon Sidney, most of whose book was ‘eternally true’ and even ‘agreeable to our own constitution’.1 ‘Sidney’ also supplied the most popular English pseudonym of the American revolution,2 and was first in John Adams’s list of writers who ‘will convince any candid mind, that there is no good government but what is republican’.3
American Republicanism, 1994
James Harrington was second on John Adams’s list of republican authors, ‘sneer[ed]’ at by ‘modern... more James Harrington was second on John Adams’s list of republican authors, ‘sneer[ed]’ at by ‘modern Englishmen’.1 He also rivalled Sidney as America’s most popular English pseudonym,2 and anticipated Sidney’s preference for a strong senate in the legislature. John Adams quoted from Harrington’s Commonwealth of Oceana at length in his Defence as a ‘specimen of that kind of reading and reasoning which produced the American constitutions’,3 and praised him again as the leading theorist of the interregnum4 whose ‘reasons’ and ‘judgment are often eternal, and unanswerable by any man’.5 Harrington wrote, like Cicero, before all hope for his republic had been lost, and he dedicated his Oceana to Oliver Cromwell, to guide England’s dictator towards establishing a purified Commonwealth in Britain. American colonists read Harrington in Toland’s eighteenth-century editions of Oceana which began with the same quotation from Cicero that Sidney had paraphrased in his Discourses and Adams quoted in his Defence.6
American Republicanism, 1994
The first formal public debate on the new United States Constitution took place in Pennsylvania, ... more The first formal public debate on the new United States Constitution took place in Pennsylvania, site of the Federal Convention, and home of America’s first ‘Republican’ party.1 The Federalists’ spokesman throughout the state-ratifying Convention was James Wilson, a Scottish graduate of the University of St Andrews, and a prominent Philadelphia lawyer. Wilson’s Considerations on the Nature and Extent of the Legislative Authority of the British Parliament, composed in 1768, had provided many of the arguments that would lead to the American Declaration of Independence2 Wilson signed the Declaration of Independence, represented Pennsylvania in the Continental Congress under the Articles of Confederation, and became a delegate to the United States Constitutional Convention in 1787, where he was a member of the Committee of Detail, which prepared the first draft of the new constitution. With Gouverneur Morris and James Madison, Wilson was one of the most frequent speakers during the preparation of the new constitution. Wilson had long been a leading figure in Pennsylvania’s Republican party, and a strong advocate of a balanced bicameral republican constitution for the commonwealth of Pennsylvania.3
American Republicanism, 1994
The republican revival in England after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 led to a renewed interest... more The republican revival in England after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 led to a renewed interest in Roman authors and new translations and commentaries on Tacitus, Sallust, and passages from Cicero by the Whig propagandist Thomas Gordon.4 Gordon also collaborated with John Trenchard on a series of ‘Essays on Liberty’ entitled ‘Cato’s Letters’, which became immensely popular among American revolutionaries.5 Josiah Quincy’s will, written in 1774, left to his son ‘when he shall arrive at the age of fifteen years’ Algernon Sidney’s works, John Locke’s works, Lord Bacon’s works, Gordon’s Tacitus, and Cato’s Letters. ‘May the spirit of liberty rest upon him!’6 Gordon’s translations were available in nearly every library on the American continent, and widely read.7
American Republicanism, 1994
John Adams’s Defence of the Constitutions of the United States of America provided American repub... more John Adams’s Defence of the Constitutions of the United States of America provided American republicans with their most comprehensive contemporary commentary and sourcebook for republican institutions and attitudes, which is why both Adams and his Defence were so often cited (or attacked) in public debates concerning the design and nature of the United States’ new government3 Adams’s eighteenth-century education and sensibility render him opaque and unappealing to many modern scholars,4 but the very classicism which makes Adams so obscure today was one of his strongest assets at the time of the revolution. Most of Adams’s constitutional views prevailed at the federal convention, and the people endorsed them again (and him personally) by electing Adams Washington’s VicePresident and eventual successor as President of the American republic.
American Republicanism, 1994
The strong senates, bicameral legislatures and independent judiciaries that protected the rule of... more The strong senates, bicameral legislatures and independent judiciaries that protected the rule of law in the new American republics reflected a new confidence that well-ordered constitutions could secure liberty and create a virtuous citizenry.3 But Liberty, Justice and Virtue remained the emblems and purpose of republican government in practice as much as on the currency and public icons.4 The elaborate forms of government Americans borrowed from the Roman and English republics existed to create republican attitudes without which true happiness was thought to be impossible. John Adams suggested that even highwaymen might become good republicans, given the right institutions.5 The ‘manners’ and ‘principles’ which marked a successful republic, reflected more than excellent political institutions; they also followed the stirring ‘examples’ of previous generations6 Republican frames of government existed to protect ‘liberty’ and the republican way of life. Social mores could serve the same purpose, and were equally important to effective republican government.
American Republicanism, 1994
The pervasive Latinity of America’s revolutionary imagery reflected the conscious decisions of po... more The pervasive Latinity of America’s revolutionary imagery reflected the conscious decisions of political actors who thought that appeals to antiquity would advance their programme. This implies an audience who knew and cared about Roman history. Such an audience existed in the class of educated Americans who had attended grammar schools, or sought to mimic the accomplishments of those who had. This group would include nearly everyone at the Constitutional Convention, and the state ratifying conventions that ratified the Constitution. The people who led the revolution and designed its institutions exploited a republican ideology they knew well, and strongly approved. Their ability to do so depended on the American system of education.
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to crimina... more Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. This book is dedicated with love, gratitude and admiration to Evelyn Mary Stead and to the memory of John Sumner Stead "Neque vero hoc solum natura, id est iure gentium, sed etiam legibus populorum, quibus in singulis civitatibus res publica continetur, eodem modo constitutum est, ut non liceat sui commodi causa nocere alteri." 1 M. Tullius Cicero, de officiis, III.v.23 "ut iam universus hic mundus sit una civitas communis deorum atque hominum existimanda." 2 M. Tullius Cicero, de legibus, I.vii.
The American Journal of Comparative Law, 2002
has not ratified the treaty establishing a permanent international criminal court, and it is high... more has not ratified the treaty establishing a permanent international criminal court, and it is highly unlikely to do so. This is not simply a question of delay caused by cumbersome ratification procedures; rather, it reflects deep-seated opposition by the U.S. executive branch and by many members of Congress. The United States voted against the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court 1 when it was adopted on July 17, 1998, at the U.N. Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries. President William J. Clinton approved signature of the statute on the last day that a state, by signing, could continue to take part in discussions on ICC matters. 2 But he stressed that he did so largely to remain "in a position to influence the evolution of the court," adding that "I will not, and do not recommend that my successor submit the treaty to the Senate for advice and consent until our fundamental concerns are satisfied." 3 Senator Jesse Helms, chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, labeled the U.S. signature "as outrageous as it is inexplicable." He promised, "This decision will not stand." 4
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Papers by Mortimer Sellers