ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the impact of United States (US) constitutionalism in Spanish America, with specific attention to New Granada during the early independence period. It addresses the question of the possible impact of US constitutionalism in New Granada; this exercise ends by suggesting a cautionary tale. Some Spanish Americans had earlier access to the constitutional texts in their French editions that had circulated in the 1790s. By the time the Cadiz text landed on the shores of South America, some ten constitutions had already been published in New Granada and Venezuela. Without denying the connections with Cadiz, a charter that was as much American as Spanish, this chapter has shown that Spanish American constitutionalism was also in close dialogue with the US experience from its inception. US constitutional texts were known among intellectual circles of the late colonial period, and their circulation expanded following Spanish America independence as they were translated and published in newspapers and books.
