"How do you Define "Founding Fathers"?" Topic

"You can define it either broadly or narrowly. By consensus, most historians limit the narrow definition to six. Washington, Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton and Madison. A broader definition would include many worthwhile individuals, such as Sam Adams, John Hancock, Joseph Warren, Nathanael Greene etc.

I don't. I think the term trite, a fortuitous alliteration that has caused great harm. That said, I write about the "Founding Era." It is interesting to note that the Founding Generation (no alliteration, but that term does have meaning) did not see the "Founding Fathers" as we do now. Adams was despised by half the people, Jefferson by the other half. At first, the men Americans most venerated were military heroes, Washington of course, and many local favorites: in New England, Old Put, the Fighting Quaker, Henry Knox, and the martyred Joseph Warren; in the South, Lighthorse Harry, the Swamp Fox, the Carolina Gamecock. Then, with Jefferson's ascent to power and the politically inspired veneration of the Declaration of Independence, the 56 "signers." Not until the 50th Jubilee, when both Adams and Jefferson died on the same day, did Americans begin to feature the small crew we know today…"

From Journal of the American Revolution Blog

link

Armand

I would consider anyone who signed the Declaration of Independence or the US Constitution a Founder, and to that would add all who served in Congress or state legislatures and ratifying conventions, etc. Tom Paine never held political office but was very influential. Patrick Henry was a Founder although he was a political opponent of most of the big names.

That treats the Founding as a political/constitutional event. More broadly, all who fought for independence should qualify. I think one can legitimately speak of the "founding generation."

The Revolution was a mass-participation event. But the term Founding Fathers is reasonably focused on the men who shaped a novus ordo seclorum which includes the anti-federalists who demanded and got the Bill of Rights.

Oh, and the top paragraph citing six names as a "consensus" is absurd. George Mason wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights in 1776 and demanded and got the Bill of Rights. He was, you will recall, at the Philadelphia Convention but refused to sign the Constitution because it lacked that. He is the "Father of the Bill of Rights" and so a Founding Father. So the original post is seriously incomplete.

John Dickinson (November 13 [Julian calendar November 2] 1732[note 1] – February 14, 1808), a Founding Father of the United States, was a solicitor and politician from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware, known as the "Penman of the Revolution" for his twelve Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania, published individually in 1767 and 1768. As a member of the First Continental Congress, where he was a signee to the Continental Association, Dickinson drafted most of the 1774 Petition to the King, and then, as a member of the Second Continental Congress, wrote the 1775 Olive Branch Petition. When these two attempts to negotiate with King George III of Great Britain failed, Dickinson reworked Thomas Jefferson's language and wrote the final draft of the 1775 Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms. When Congress then decided to seek independence from Great Britain, Dickinson served on the committee that wrote the Model Treaty and then wrote the first draft of the 1776–1777 Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. Dickinson later served as president of the 1786 Annapolis Convention, which called for the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Dickinson attended the convention as a delegate from Delaware and signed the United States Constitution.

So not too impressed with that blog entry.

Those involved in the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. It cracks me up when some talking head says "The Founding Fathers believed…" as there were many different views among the Founding Fathers. To think Hamilton saw things the same way as Jefferson is silly.

Grattan, yes. Of course they saw some things the same; they both wanted an independent America.

However, would you agree that their differences were a process out of which emerged what we enjoy? Hamilton didn't think we needed a Bill of Rights; Jefferson thought it essential.

I like to remind students that the US wrote AT LEAST sixteen constitutions during the Revolution: 13 states, of which at least one, PA, wrote and used two radically different ones, plus the Articles and then the present one. That is a LOT of practice. There were differences, but also a lot of pragmatic experience and experiments.

Some of the people cited did not get involved in the Constitution – Paine famously was not even invited because he believed in democracy too much, which put him at odds with those aristocrats running the show. Sam Adams didn't show, saying he "smelled a rat"

That's why I find it so funny when people treat it like a holy writ. Even at the time, a lot of the "founding generation" thought it sucked.

Thanks!

Armand

In a "REALISTIC/Practical" sense, I honestly consider Nathaniel Bowditch to be the "youngest" Founding Father…his complete upheaval of nautical astronomy (Celestial Navigation) was a definite benefit to our fledgling Navy during the Barbary & 1812 Wars, along with the fact that he pretty much helped "found" what would one day become MIT.

Doc,

Yes the Constitution is a work of compromise and the understanding of the sinful nature of mankind. Many checks and balances. But one can't say (as some do) that all the Founding Fathers believed in limited government. That just isn't true. There is a reason why two opposing political parties emerged fairly soon in the Republic.

There I would disagree, to this extent: the FF all DID believe in limited government; the debate was HOW limited. And also limited HOW?

Disagree. Hamilton did not a limited government. He wanted a strong centralize government. He even hoped to get rid of state governments entirely. Nor do I doubt he is the only one.
Also, we had a constitution that had limited government it was called the Articles of Confederation and it failed. The Constitutional convention was made up mainly of men who wanted a stronger central government. There was a real "fear of the Many" among the FF. Now, I am not saying they wanted what we have today or an absolute government but they did want a stronger government than what we had under the AofC.

Most of the Founders distrusted democracy, yes. And Hamilton had few ties and no loyalty to any state, true. But Hamilton deeply admired the British constitution, corruption and all, which is certainly not an unlimited government. Indeed, the parliamentary system — Commons is really sovereign — was the product of a century of conflct against wannabe absolute monarchs.

Btw, I do not agree that the Articles failed. They worked well enough to win the war and get a great peace and solve the northwest land problem brilliantly. Had the 3% impost passed they'd have been able to pay off the debt. That got 12 states approval. They could have kicked out Rogues Island and proceeded.

I would say all of Continental Congress

You may have felt they worked and you make some good points. But clearly the men going to the Constitutional Convention did not agree with you. Again, mainly because they saw the articles as being to weak.

Societies need heroes and create them as necessary. We see the same today.

+ Gus Fring, our "history" has been about myths taking place of facts. An then we get bent out of shape when the truth is dug up ever so often. Like kids who learn about Santa Claus running around saying that can't be true, as adults we say your revising history.

The sad truth is history is just sad.

You are assuming history is the truth. But the line between fact and myth is rarely clear or clean.

History is our collective memory. It defines us, as one's individual memory defines oneself. But it is partial and fallible, just as individual memories are. That is quite APART from our human propensity for deception including self-deception.

It is, however, what we have to work with.

Not exactly, we have desire to believe things (because they make us feel good about ourselves.) Trying to go angst this does not make one popular. So lot's of folks will try to blur the two because the reality is to much for them.

Then there is the other shoes lot's of folks now a days seem committed to erasing the lines when they happen to be pretty clear, because it fits their agenda and narrative.

Glup!

Armand

Gus, I think most of us understand that our ancestors were human with the usual mix of strengths and weaknesses. However, a society needs heroes, who need not be perfect but merely exemplary in particular attributes. I'd be glad to defend any of the Revolutionary figures you named.

Sam Adams was not renowned as an orator; he was basically a backroom politician. But he deserves to be remembered if only for this:

If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.
- Samuel Adams

I would like to agree with you doc mcb, but I cannot. Popular histories of the United States started developing very early in our history. They developed at a time when people were alive who remembered the facts. Those popular histories were a civic opiate for the masses. They were intended to convey the message that we were the good guys and our actions were just. Facts which were inconsistent with this message were ignored. Stories that supported this message were incorporated into the popular histories, even when the factual basis for them was weak. Deception was at the core of these popular American histories.

For the more educated who were thought to be able to handle a history that wasn't black and white there were fact based histories. These fact based histories reflected the biases of those who created them. They were however willing to acknowledge that things were more complicated than popular histories reflected.

I say "histories" rather than history because they could vary from one region to another. They could also change as societal values changed.

What bothers me when talking about how the "Founding Generation" thought of the "Founding Fathers" is the element when. Ben Franklin would probably be among the few Founding Fathers known outside his region by more than just a narrow circle of elites at the start of the AWI. By the end of the war Washington, Greene and a number of others join that list. Going in to the Constitutional Convention I doubt the average American outside their regions would have known who Alexander Hamilton or James Madison were. The split between Adams and Jefferson comes even later.

Bill, yes, and it is the same dynamic as with Shakespeare's historical plays. Societies need heroes, but when a nation, a nationality, is being built, they need more than heroes, they need a history, a narrative. It helps if it is based on some fact -- Henry V really did win at Agincourt -- but sometimes myth serves the purpose better. And we won't mention Henry ordering the slaughter of the surrendered French nobles.

History is what the Present find USEFUL to remember about the Past.

Those who tear down our heroes are no more interested in TRUTH than was Parson Weems; they have their own agenda, perhaps a hatred of our nation or of nationalism in general, which is served by dismantling heroic myths.

"Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing – say Pimlico. If we think what is really best for Pimlico we shall find the thread of thought leads to the throne of the mystic and the arbitrary. It is not enough for a man to disapprove of Pimlico; in that case he will merely cut his throat or move to Chelsea. Nor, certainly, is it enough for a man to approve of Pimlico; for then it will remain Pimlico, which would be awful. The only way out of it seems to be for somebody to love Pimlico; to love it with a transcendental tie and without any earthly reason. If there arose a man who loved Pimlico, then Pimlico would rise into ivory towers and golden pinnacles. Pimlico would attire herself as a woman does when she is loved. For decoration is not given to hide horrible things: but to decorate things already adorable. A mother does not give her child a blue bow because he is so ugly without it. A lover does not give a girl a necklace to hide her neck. If men loved Pimlico as mothers love children, arbitrarily, because it is theirs, Pimlico in a year or two might be fairer than Florence. Some readers will say that this is mere fantasy. I answer that this is the actual history of mankind. This, as a fact, is how cities did grow great. Go back to the darkest roots of civilization and you will find them knotted round some sacred stone or encircling some sacred well. People first paid honour to a spot and afterwards gained glory for it. Men did not love Rome because she was great. She was great because they had loved her."

G.K. Chesterton, ORTHODOXY, chapter 5

I fail to see how we as a nation benefit from embracing myth, and punishing those who do not embrace the myth.

But hopefully you do see some use in our common memories, which define us. I would not "punish" those who fail to "embrace the myth" but I hold in disesteem those who try to tear down what other people cherish. And would ask the wreckers, to what end?

I do not see doc how you say that "history is what the present find useful to remember about the Past" and at the same time complain about the present generation tearing down the heroes of yesteryear. If one generation is entitled to deify its heroes, why is the next generation not entitled to trash those same individuals. This would certainly be in keeping with Jefferson's view that one generation did not have the power to bind the next.

Its only by arguing that there is a timeless, fact based history that exists independent of the popular mythology that for many passes as history that you can make the case for keeping those heroes of yesteryear around.

Nationalism is dangerous and has never led to anything good. Just ask all of Europe.

Patriotism? Good, absolutely. Nationalism? Burn it in a fire.

But how do you have patriotism without a nation? And nations have been the basic building block of the world order for 500 years. Isn't Shakespeare good?

What do you see us being loyal to, if not a nation? The human race in general? Good luck with that.

Bill, I think the present tearing down of heroes is not useful but worse than useless. They are entitled to try, and I am entitled to oppose them.

As to universals, it is his character, his integrity and courage and self-restraint that make Washington a hero, not just then but always.

According to Polybius, what distinguishes democracy from mob rule is piety, respect for traditional and inherited values. We are well on the way to mob rule, as we have ceased to be pious to any significant extent. Restoring that piety is an important task.

Can you give me an example of myths in this context? I'm involved now in building curricula for US history for middle school, and I don't think we are doing any mythology. But we DO select topics and facts, for age appropriateness and also because we expect students will take US again in high school.

At the younger grades, elementary especially, we want stories of heroes. So Harriet Tubman, yes; John Brown murdering people and committing treason, not so much. And Tubman's association with Brown not at all. Those complexities can come when students are more mature.

We do, for middle school, begin to give students some concepts and vocabulary for debating ethical/moral issues. Does intent matter more, or does outcome? Are unjust actions justified in a just cause? Hard to discuss Brown or, say, Nat Turner, unless some such concepts are available.

I would show 1776, yes, and certainly "Molasses to Rum to Slaves" -- with lyrics printed so they can follow it.

I would use 1776 without hesitation in a high school class. (edited for length, it is at least an hour too long).

In middle school I'd use shorter bits of it, probably. Class time is always my most precious scarce commodity.

I have a rather standard assignment to critique a film in terms of historical accuracy. In fact, I'll post it.

FILMS AS HISTORY:

If "history is what the Present finds useful to remember about the Past," then a Hollywood film probably counts. But can a film be GOOD history? Yes and no.

History can never be the "truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," because it is written and read by human beings. History is our collective memory, and memory is inexact and fallible. But the truth — "what really happened" — is the STANDARD by which history is measured as better or worse; the closer to the truth, the better.

Images and sounds have great power, often more so than the printed page. But does this make films dealing with historical subjects better than books? or far more dangerous? I like to use films in my teaching, because we need to "equip our imaginations" to understand times and places not our own. A movie can give us a good picture of what things looked like, and to an extent what things felt like. If you want to understand D-Day, the Normandy invasion, then watching the first 30 minutes of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN is essential. But . . .

There are several characteristics of Hollywood films that seem unavoidable and which limit their effectiveness as history:

The first is that films are ENTERTAINMENT. Sometimes important topics are intrinsically boring; how did Federal fiscal and monetary policy in the 1920's create the conditions for the stock market crash of 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression? You probably won't see a Hollywood flick examining that topic; films will show unemployed men and starving children, because those images have emotional impact.

The second is that films are SHORT; two hours or maybe three is a long movie, but a pretty short time to spend studying an important topic. Movies ALWAYS LEAVE THINGS OUT. They must. And in light of their nature as entertainment, what they leave out is the most boring — but not necessarily the least important — part of the story. When you watch a film about a historical topic, always ask: what part of the story have they left out?

Third, movies almost always compress both time and people. A film such as LUTHER covers a man's life over many years within two hours on the screen. It shows only key episodes, and while the important events may have happened years apart, in the movie they come minutes apart. Also, there is a limit to how many characters an audience can keep up with; if there were three or four characters in the historical event who played similar roles, the film will generally compress them into one.

Finally, Hollywood knows that people expect certain things. Vikings really didn't wear horned helmets, but they have to in a Hollywood film, because otherwise nobody knows they are Vikings. Knives (or Buffy's wooden stake) are most effectively wielded underhand, but in films they are almost always used overhand, because that is what people expect because that is what films show.

Teachers may wish to assign papers evaluating one or several related films as history: if your main knowledge of the people and events depicted is what Hollywood shows you, would you be well-informed, poorly informed, or MIS-informed? The first part asks you what the film covers versus what it leaves out; the second asks whether what is shown is accurate or inaccurate or even misleading. To evaluate a film as history, it is necessary to know a good bit of the larger historical narrative within which the film is set. This is what is required for this type of paper.

I have had students do comparative papers on 1776 and the Lincoln film about passing the 13th amendment. That is a TOUGH assignment and I challenged a few top students with it.

When I turn into a "real teacher" I'll let you know.

But I would like to see examples of what myths you are concerned about?

I do not know of -- and really cannot imagine -- any history curriculum that includes any of that. Certainly no class of mine ever would. I think you are afraid of monsters in the closet, or under the bed.

Show me an actual history text that includes any of that. Betcha can't.

No, not after seventy years. But you have been writing as though such myths are currently being taught, and not merely that they used to be. So I guess I do not understand your complaint.

Me too in the 60 and 70 just propaganda.

Heh. My history in high school was taught by football coaches who showed us old WWII news reels. Most of what I learned I taught myself, accidentally, by reading books like Fletcher Pratt's BATTLES THAT CHANGED HISTORY. The truth is always out there, if anyone is interested in finding it, I guess.

The Founders were indeed those who signed the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution. And not all of them signed all three.

The Founders were also those who helped gain Independence, such as Washington and the Continental Army.

The Declaration of Independence while a founding document, is not US law. The Articles of Confederation, though weak and needing either revision or replacement after the war was, as is the US Constitution.

The Articles failed after the war had ended, and it is a weak document merely for the fact that it did not establish a strong central government which the Constitution did, and that was one of, if not the, main purpose of the Constitution while maintaining civil rights.

Interestingly, Washington, at least after the replacement of Gates in the south, was the de facto head of government as the Congress deferred to him in many important matters.

And Washington's importance to the United States is either taken for granted or overlooked. Without Washington there would have been no Lincoln.

Actually the Declaration has been repeatedly cited by the U.S. Supreme Court as part of the fundamental law of the United States of America. "The United States Code Annotated includes the Declaration of Independence under the heading 'The Organic Laws of the United States of America' along with the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution, and the Northwest Ordinance. Enabling acts frequently require states to adhere to the principles of the Declaration; in the Enabling Act of June 16, 1906, Congress authorized Oklahoma Territory to take steps to become a state. Section 3 provides that the Oklahoma Constitution 'shall not be repugnant to the Constitution of the United States and the principles of the Declaration of Independence.

That is correct-my error. I looked it up after reading the above posting.

However, Article VI states that the Constitution is the Law of the Land, not the Declaration or the Articles. And the Articles were superceded by the Constitution.

Yes. But acts passed under the Articles remain in force unless amended -- most significantly, the Land Ordinances. And the Declaration expresses our fundamental principles, which the Constitution implements with institutions.