ABSTRACT
In this chapter the focus is primarily on America, with clarifying references to England, Scotland, and France. The argument is that scholars have taken the wrong turn in claiming to have discovered in the past a civic, classically inspired republicanism that should be contrasted favorably with, and against, an uncivic liberalism in more recent times. The thrust of much of the scholarship of our times has been that in earlier America, “positive freedom” (immersion in public activities) was the defining characteristic of the age, whereas more recently it is “negative freedom,” freedom to go one’s own way that has triumphed. Against such a view it is essential to recognize that the liberal tradition has always championed both positive and negative freedom, the classic statement being that of Benjamin Constant’s essay on “The Liberty of the Ancients Compared with that of the Moderns.” We need to reconsider our examination of republicanism in America, and if we do so what awaits us is not a story of republicanism versus liberalism but of liberal republicanism. Distinctively modern and liberal notions of natural rights, consent, and social contract dominated America at the time of the founding and persisted long afterward.
