Reviewed by Alan Taylor | Book Review | The William and Mary Quarterly, 62.4

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Reviewed by Alan Taylor | Book Review | The William and Mary Quarterly, 62.4 | The History Cooperative

Reviews of Books

Alan Taylor, University of California at Davis

Beyond the Founders: New Approaches to the Political History of the Early American Republic. Edited by Jeffrey L. Pasley, Andrew W. Robertson, and David Waldstreicher. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004. 435 pages. $59.95 (cloth), $24.95 (paper).
Of whatever stripe, political historians of the early Republic seem surprisingly aggrieved. Grand biographies of the Founders sell remarkably well, yet their unhappy authors feel slighted by the cultural and social historians who currently rule the academic roost. Joseph J. Ellis grumbles that academics dismiss his work as "a form of intellectual bankruptcy."¹ Unrequited by his Pulitzer prize, Ellis still pines for respect from scholarly journals and conferences. Alas, book sales cannot buy academic love.	1
On the other hand, those cultural and social historians resent the success of grand biographies, derided in this essay collection as "Founders Chic" (4). How can such books about elites enjoy so much popularity, the editors wonder. Unhappy with what they have, each set of historians wants the other's greener grass (or dollars). Their mutual unhappiness will inevitably endure, for neither camp will play by the other's rules. Ellis will not forsake a glib phrase in favor of discussing theory. Nor will the authors in this collection pander to the masses with literary craft. Few nonacademics will prefer the historiographic focus of this collection to the heroic deeds narrated by David G. McCullough or Ellis.	2
Perhaps the essayists should be more grateful to the grand biographers for furnishing the essential foil to this intriguing collection of counterprogramming. As the title announces, the authors leverage the appeal of founders' history by promising something bigger and better. And without Founders chic as an other, this diverse collection would lack coherence.	3
As modern historians of culture, the editors seek political context in "class hierarchies, economic inequalities, and cultural differences" (10). They move beyond a few top leaders to examine their relationship with common voters. Several go even further, broadening the definition of political nation to include the women and blacks who contributed to informal political discourse and who attended political rituals as avid witnesses.	4
In apparent ephemera—parades, toasts, clothing, and giant cheeses—several authors find important modes for reproducing a political culture both broadly shared and deeply contested. By rescuing the "Mammoth Cheese" of Cheshire, Massachusetts, from Federalist and historical ridicule, Jeffrey L. Pasley vindicates Jeffersonian politics as highly "participatory and transformative" (45). David Waldstreicher explores the significance of clothing as a marker of political identity or of political exclusion. By examining Aaron Burr's highly sexualized identity, Nancy Isenberg illuminates the gendered language of political competition. By closely reading the diary of a Philadelphia lawyer, Albrecht Koschnik finds insecure young men in anxious search of masculine authority.	. . .

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