Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution

by Woody Holton

Average Americans Were the True Framers of the Constitution
Woody Holton upends what we think we know of the Constitution’s origins by telling the history of the average Americans who challenged the framers of the Constitution and forced on them the revisions that produced the document we now venerate.  The framers who gathered in Philadelphia in 1787 were determined to reverse America’s post–Revolutionary War slide into democracy. They believed too many middling Americans exercised too much influence over state and national policies. That the framers were only partially successful in curtailing citizen rights is due to the reaction, sometimes violent, of unruly average Americans. 
 
If not to protect civil liberties and the freedom of the people, what motivated the framers? In Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution , Holton provides the startling discovery that the primary purpose of the Constitution was, simply put, to make America more attractive to investment. And the linchpin to that endeavor was taking power away from the states and ultimately away from the people. In an eye-opening interpretation of the Constitution, Holton captures how the same class of Americans that produced Shays’s Rebellion in Massachusetts (and rebellions in damn near every other state) produced the Constitution we now revere.  Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution is a 2007 National Book Award Finalist for Nonfiction.

Genres: History, American History, Nonfiction, Politics, American Revolution, Law, The United States Of America

384 pages, Hardcover

First published October 2, 2007

Reviews

[Phrodrick slowed his growing backlog · Rating 2 out of 5]

TEDIOUS a few well argued/documented positions and too many pages!

Here is the first 1/2 of this book:
After only a few years under the Articles of Confederation, American leaders wrote the Constitution in secret, specifically to limit what we now call: State Rights.

The American Revolution was funded mostly by debt. Bonds had been issued and continued to be issued to cover everything from capital purchases, in lieu of salaries to the army, for on going operating expenses and even to pay for previous bond issues.

Individuals who had been given bonds in lieu of payments needed to sell these bonds to provide for their expenses; creating a huge market in bond speculation. Those who had money could buy bonds at a fraction of the face value, effectively multiplying the percent return where bond interest was paid and further limiting general access to hard money (silver and gold).

This created or exaggerated the separation between those in debt, represented by the farmers and the bond speculators, (the 1 per centers of their day).

The state governments, being more democratic, that is closer to the more numerous farmers engaged in many efforts at debt relief. Often this was at the expanse of the bond holders, but often having unintended negative consequences on the farmers. Ultimately people were faced with a multiple of the taxes they had paid under the just ejected British. Further American's credit, national and personal was diminished, and the inability to field an army left the 13 states exposed to enemies foreign (mostly the Indians) and domestic (mostly tax-payer rebellions).

The only thing more you will get by reading the first 170 to 200 pages is a huge number of specific examples, quotes and needlessly repeated arguments.

This book reads like a classic in academics. A well received, tightly written paper is padded out into a full length book.

Even on this basis, Dr Woody Holton, could have better served his readers. Much is made of the scarcity of hard currency. Where are the tables that would have document this scarcity? What was American production of raw or domestically minted gold and silver? Dr. Holton talks about the loss of hard currency to overseas markets that provided slaves, carriages and female fripperies. What was the balance of payments over these years?

For that matter: How much money in bonded debt existed? Was it primarily at the state or national level? How many people owned bonds? How many were original bond holders and how many were speculator? How much money did one have in bonds to be considered a speculator?

These questions are not intended to challenge his findings. Most likely the answers would strengthen Dr Holton's hypothesis. The point is, he could have left out about 30 pages of contemporary newspaper quotes, another 20 pages in repetitions and added in this specific data thereby producing a better book.

The last 100 pages are somewhat more readable. There is coverage of the Constitutional Convention, with emphasis on the need to make compromises. The purpose of the compromises was to make the loss of power at the state level less obvious and to make the debt collection aspects of the Constitution less manifest. The framers did not want to be too specific.

State level adoption of the Constitution is presented as a matter of very slick local work. This topic seems to be peripheral the purposes of this already too long book and is not very well addressed in these pages.

This book proposes some original thoughts. In recent years many politicians and political opinions are supposed to be based on the intent of those who wrote the constitution. If Dr. Holton is correct, the framers were against the notion of the states as "laboratories of Democracy".

Even if he is wrong, there remains a very important question: If the original intent was states rights, why did we dump the Confederation?

If you can survive his incredibly incrementally tediously built case; and his too often repeated arguments, you will be exposed to some important information and insights. Surviving this book will help you to better understand why America abandoned the Articles of Confederation. Otherwise this book is too much work.

[Geoffrey Gordon · Rating 4 out of 5]

The authors of the Constitution portrayed themselves in The Federalist Papers and elsewhere as disinterested citizens who sought to improve upon the poor performance of the Articles of Confederation regime that governed the American states in the decade following the Revolution. Holton shows that they were far from disinterested, arguing that the authors of the constitution were largely concerned with ensuring that states paid their creditors (many of the Constitution's authors and proponents were holders of public debt) and making America safe for foreign investment. He also shows how self-consciously elitist the institutional choices of the Founding Fathers were. Read alongside recent work on elite efforts to "game democracy" during democratic transitions in the 20th century 'third wave of democracy' (see Michael Albertus and Victor Menaldo's "Authoritarianism and the Elite Origins of Democracy"), we see that America's founding fathers weren't so different from oligarchs in other societies who sought to use constitutional design to "lock in" their preferred policies and preserve their privileged place in society. While this interpretation is not necessarily all that original -- Holton's thesis is clearly in the tradition of Charles Beard and others who viewed the constitution as an elitist project to defend the interests of property holders, even if he points out weaknesses of Beard's project at times -- this is an approachable work that I would recommend to readers who are interested in learning more about the origins of the constitution but who are not necessarily historians or political scientists. The book raises the following interesting question: could statesmen of the early American republic have found a way to create institutions that encouraged foreign investment without creating so many obstacles to popular voice in government?

[Jeff Raymond · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Hey, I have an idea, I’ll write a 200+ page history of the Constitution using only debt and money as the basis.” Maybe the whole Ron Paul thing has really made me overly sensitive to money policy lately, but this got very tiring very quickly. An interesting premise that would have worked better in a compilation of ideas around the Constitution rather than a full-length work.

[Yazeed AlMogren · Rating 2 out of 5]

كتاب إقتصادي بحث يشرح بطريقة مملة العوامل الإقتصادية للشعب الأمريكي التي أدت الى ظهور بعض تشريعات الدستور الأمريكي، في البداية أعتقدت أن الكتاب سياسي ويتحدث عن الأسباب التي أدت الى ظهور كامل تشريعات الدستور

[Wayne White · Rating 2 out of 5]

Holton made some pretty controversial claims in this book, and I'm not convinced that the evidence fully backs up his thesis. His central claim--that the framers of the Constitution were interested in dampening the democratic impulses of the middling and lower sorts while simultaneously securing the economic interests of the elite--is a relatively old idea, promulgated by Charles Beard, among others. It is not really that controversial. Holton's claim, though, that the phrase "to establish justice" in the preamble to the Constitution referred to establishing justice for creditors and bond speculators was built on a paltry amount of primary evidence. Holton also contended that the phrase "to ensure domestic tranquility" alluded to the fact that the new national government would be able to maintain a large standing army to quell insurrections such as Shay's Rebellion. This simply doesn't square with other evidence, though. Overall, I thought Holton rehashed an old thesis, and then did a very poor job of defending it.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Holton presents some interesting, albeit rather depressing arguments here. He strips away the glory and romantic ideals of the Revolution and forces the reader to focus on the obligatory tasks and needs of the ordinary eighteenth-century American. He claims, in short, that those Americans sold their soul for prosperity in exchange for less freedom - by diminishing the democratic heft they'd claimed post-Revolution - and that the idealized Founders knew what they were doing but did it anyway out of distrust of the commoners and a deeply ingrained elitism. In other words, we're less free than we think. But we do have money, so there's that.

[Emma Wallace · Rating 1 out of 5]

Had to read for class, would not recommend

[Peyton Pratt · Rating 3 out of 5]

after peer pressure and deep reflection, here is my 3

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Holton's book begins with a fascinating in-class exercise from his undergraduate teaching. He puts three columns on the board and asks students to shout out Constitutional principles and protections they admire. Once the columns are filled in, the students see that most of what they like about the constitution, especially the individual rights, did not come from the 1787 Constitution. Holton uses this story to illustrate a fundamental popular misunderstanding about the intent of the supporters of the 1787 Constitution. He argues that they saw the Constitution as creating a strong central government that would be controlled by elites and make the country more economically viable. He believes that a deep disdain and fear of "excessive democracy" in the state governments, including measures such as debt relief and the printing of paper money, drove elites at the Convention to create a federal government that was not very responsive to the people, whom they viewed as dangerous, irrational, and unable to see the public good. The only part of the federal government that would be elected directly by the people was the House. The Senate was elected by state legislatures, the President by the electoral college, and the Supreme Court by a combination of the President and . They left out a list of individual rights because they found it satisfactory to leave those rights assumed rather than explicitly stated. Between 1787 and 1791, "unruly Americans" demanded that the peoples rights had to be enumerated and protected in exchange for a strong federal government, leading to the Bill of Rights in 1791. Holton emphasizes that this strengthening of the federal government was significantly influenced by economic concerns, including the desire to repay federal bondholders, to restore faith in credit by mandating debt enforcement, to standardize comment by barring state governments from printing paper money, and to make the US more attractive to foreign investors.

Holton is right to point out the elitist basis of the Constitution, but he seriously overstates his argument and creates a simplistic hero-villain portrait of this period. While the elites were clearly elitist, there are far more roots to the Constitution than economics and class conflict. Brilliant founding writers like Madison also had complex ideas about how to design a government that would address a number of issues, including factionalism, separation of powers, and rights of the individual against the principle of majority rule. There's no reason why the founders can't be portrayed as having personal motivations, class interests, and genuine principles. Maybe by this point there are just so many books on this topic that you have to get a little outlandish to write something new.

By the end of the book, Holton gets pretty angry at the elites, saying that the Constitution is a "slur" against the faculties of the common man. At this point it becomes difficult to level a charge of Tea Party-ism against him. On one hand, this book would please a Tea Party type because of its near conspiratorial skepticism of elites and the federal government. However, Tea Partiers worship the Constitution like the Bible (ok close to the Bible), and Holton sees the Constitution as part of the problem. The biggest strike against his argument is that the Constitution more or less was and still is a success. He doesn't address the logic behind the system in anything but economic and elitist terms. He discusses how it contributed to an economic recovery and the prosperity and stability of the young nation, but that doesn't seem to register with his pronounced disdain for the document. The fact that the Constitution is 200+ years old, has only been amended 26 times, and still works pretty well is a testament to the skill and wisdom of the people who wrote it. Holton does a good job contextualizing this document and avoiding romanticization, but he ultimately takes his argument too far. As Tony Stark once said, "That's how Dad did, that's how America does it, and it has worked out pretty well so far." My view on the Constitution in a nutshell.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

Woody Holton in this book challenges the narrative that the Constitution was simply an effort to divide up powers and strengthen the new nation over the failed Articles of Confederation. Instead, he noted the economic conditions, debates, and farmers movements/rebellions that had swept the 13 states in the post-revolution years. Holton focused on the post-war national depression as the British had maintained the closure of its Caribbean ports to American traders, and kept its forts and help towards Native American allies in retaliation for the lack of court redress to debtors. His basic argument is that the Founders wanted to create a more investment friendly United States, since democracy was interfering with profit and debt collection. Since most states were fairly democratic after the revolution, with one year terms and recallable representatives in small districts, they were susceptible for debt relief and printing of paper money, and since many of the Founders were lenders, they sought to roll back democratic gains of the revolution in return for strengthening the economy.

Much of the first part of the book is repetitive, noting over and over again the complaints of elites about state legislatures granting debt relief and printing paper money to deal with the crisis, after heavy taxes to service war debts became the target of agrarian movements. The last third of the book is where it gets really interesting, when the Founders debated over what sort of government would replace the Articles of Confederation. Much of the agreement was that it needed to be far less democratic, with strong proposals that both the President and Senators would be life-terms and not elected directly by voters, while Representatives would be from very large districts so the wealthy could possibly hold office. There was a strong agreement for this incredibly undemocratic setup, but the unrepresented farmer stalked the Founders like a monster under their bed, in that they feared more farmers rebellions, the big one being the recent Shays' Rebellion, which would make it almost impossible to pass and may spark a heightening of civil war if the Founders went too far in destroying democratic movements. Indeed, much of the rights guaranteed in the Constitution that Americans speak so highly of were not of the Founders' Constitution, but instead in their Anti-Federalist opponents who demanded the Bill of Rights in order to get it passed.

Get it passed they did, and the economy did improve as local taxes fell with the new federal tariff, which enabled the federal army to seize more land from native americans. But it was at the cost of much of the gains of revolution being erased, and only slowly were they regained over the course of the two and a half centuries since, though some still never have been clawed back, like direct election of the President.

I would have liked to have seen more on Shays' Rebellion, which is mostly just mentioned in how much it scared the elites across the States, who feared more revolts of poor/enslaved people unless they could properly finance a military to crush such risings. It's like a ghost that haunts the book, but never gets in depth into the particulars of the rising. Much of the book is on the debates of the 1780s over debt relief and printing of paper money, and how the Founders feared democracy would destroy the economy. Still, good specifics on why the history of the Constitution is not straight forward.

[mohab samir · Rating 4 out of 5]

الدستور الأمريكى . أفضل دساتير العالم لأكثر من قرنين من الزمان . لم يدخل عليه الكثير من التعديلات طوال هذه المدة . لكن ترى ما هى العوامل التى أدت لإنتاج مثل هذا الدستور عام 1787؟
عقد الثمانينات من القرن الثامن عشر هو المرحلة الحاسمة فى مستقبل الدولة الوليدة التى خاضت الحرب الثورية ضد أقوى إمبراطوريات العالم حوالى منصف العقد السابق لهذا العقد وقد نالوا إستقلالهم بموجب إتفاقية السلام فى باريس من بريطانيا الأم عام 1783.
من الطبيعى ان كانت نتائج الثورة كما هى نتائجها فى أى مكان فى العالم لكن هناك من يتحمل هذه النتائج وهناك من يندم على القيام بثورته فى الواقع إننى ذهلت لما قرأت فى سطور هذا الكتاب عن التوابع الثورية فى هذا البلد الناشىء الذى يخوض تجربة الإتحاد والحكم الذاتى والديموقراطية لأول مرة وما كان هناك من فقر وتخبط ومحاولات للإستبداد والعنصرية وما إل ذلك .
لكن يبدو ان العنصر الأهم الذى أدى لإنشاء هذا الدستور هو العامل الإقتصادى الذى كان شديد الصعوبة فى فترة ما بعد الإستقلال فكان الصراع بين مالكى سندات الحرب عن طريق الإستثمار وأصحاب الشهادات الأصليين والدائنين والمدينين من جهة وحكومات الولايات ومجالسها التشريعية الضعيفة والخانعة للدهماء من الشعب من جهة ونقص العملة الصعبة من الذهب والفضة من جهة أخرى وبالتالى نقص الثقة فى مجالات الإستثمار أو الإقراض كان النتيجة المؤسفة الكبرى لهذه الظروف .
كان على واضعى الدستور إرضاء أطراف عدة لا تقل قوة كل منها عن الأخرى وأن يكون ذلك فى إطار رؤية مستقبلية لإقتصاد الولايات المتحدة وكان نتيجة مرور الولايات الناشئة بعدد كبيرة من التجارب المريرة والصعوبات كتمردات العبيد والفلاحين فى عقد الثمانينات ومع وجود رجال فكر من أمثال جيمس ماديسون أبو الدستور الأمريكى كانت النتيجة هى هذا الدستور الأقوى بين دساتير العالم
التفاصيل كثيرة والصعوبات التى مرت بها كلا من الولايات ولجنة وضع الدستور كثيرة ايضا والكتاب لا يترك اى من هذه التفاصيل ويقوم على أساس تحليلى دقيق لهذه العناصر فى صورة دفاع ونقض لهذه العوامل التى ادت لإنتاج هذا الدستور وأيضا لعناصر الستور نفسه . منها ما كان على لسان المعاصرين فى تلك الفترة الحاسمة ومنها ما هو رأى خاص للكاتب.
أعتقد أنى مهما حاولت التعليق على الكتاب فمن المستحيل أن يكون التعليق وافيا أو منظما . ومن سيقوم بقراءة الكتاب سيتفهم ذلك جيدا .
لكن الدرس الأهم الذى يجب أن نخلص به من هذا الكتاب هو أن من يثور على ظلم ويتحمل تبعات ثورته فبالتأكيد سيحصد ثماراً جيدة فى نهاية المطاف .

[Alec Gray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of us who remember our American history classes got a one paragraph summary of Articles of Confederation America-1782 to 1787. But to have any understanding of the Constitution and the founding of the U.S. You have to delve into this tumultuous post war period. With the war won, the peace was being lost-government was not working, the "economy" was a mess, protest and disillusion was setting in. Bond speculation, paper money and devalued currency, high taxes(sometimes 4-5 times the rate under the British) led many to believe the fruits of "liberty" would be lost unless something was done. The result was the constitutional convention. You can't understand what happened there without understanding what brought the founders there. This book is an excellent and detailed account of that time-essential reading and fascinating! (Spoiler alert conservatives-the "founders" wanted a strong central government!)

[Alan Mauerman · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a great idea for a book, but I got the general theme within the first few chapters and got bored with it. I did not finish the book.
I did not know much about this part of our county's history and I was waiting for the "human drama" in the writing style to make it come alive.
It has many parallels to today's crushing financial debt.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Few vs. the Many. The (too) much venerated Founding Fathers were mostly interested in the contracts clause--they wanted to be able to get loans to buy land and get amazing returns on the war bonds they bought in bulk. "What they meant to give the ordinary citizen was prosperity, not power."

While Hamilton, Madison, et al. weren't wrong about needing to strengthen the new republic's economy, they weren't right that the economic problems were caused by the lazy masses. This historian's thesis is that modern scholars shouldn't take their diatribes about farmers and debtors at face value. The farmers' uprisings were significant enough to force a constitutional convention in the first place and to make the drafters write a constitution that wasn't quite as elitist as the Few wanted (though they still had to engage in various types of subterfuge to get it ratified).

Lots and lots and lots of quotes from primary sources, with all the kind of exhausting 18th century writing style and spelling variations. I often skipped these paragraphs, but I see the author's goal of letting today's audience read exactly what people were saying in the 1780s. A *lot* of detail about bonds, taxes, paper money. At times I wished I'd paid more attention in my college econ classes.

Mostly about class, but a fine job dealing with issues of race and gender. I expected much of the white anxiety about enslaved Black people and wasn't surprised to read about their willingness to drain away precious hard currency to buy more Africans to replace the enslaved people who'd joined the British during the war. But new to me: (1) Abigail Adams was a major bond trader (she couldn't own land, so why not speculate in financial instruments?), and (2) Native nations did an impressive job unifying to resist expansion to the west.

The founders feared "too much democracy." So right from the beginning, they baked in layers to distance ordinary U.S. citizens from policy-making, especially policy-making about the money supply. They did this even knowing that the Few would be able to unite and affect policy while the Many would not, and that the Many would become apathetic in the face of such a non-responsive system and stop voting. Here we are . . .

[bup · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't pick this up expecting an argument to entirely shift the paradigm of why the constitution came about, and what the framers were trying to accomplish, but that's what I got. I just ran into this title somewhere and thought I had never read much about the period between when the Revolutionary War ended and when the constitution was ratified.

I think the most convincing and engaging part of the book is in his analysis of how the framers combined what they wanted in the document with slick ways to make it palatable to Joe Yankee Doodle - we don't need to say the federal judicial system can strike down state laws, we just need to say federal law is higher than state law, and let John Marshall spell it out later in Marbury versus Madison. We don't need to point out that the members of the House of Representatives will only be in Washington part time, while the senate is there most of the time; it's just understood. And we don't need to say that we're trying to keep representatives from having to cater to every constituent's whim, we'll just increase the number of constituents until there is a leveling effect that only the most urban, dense districts could organize citizens well enough to overcome.

And money. So much of the constitution had to solve the problem of how badly the individual states had messed up monetary policy. You couldn't borrow a nickel in the 1780's because real money was so scarce and states were too happy to print up worthless paper.

Bill of Rights to protect individual liberties? That's aftermarket bells and whistles to get America to buy the car. Want to sort of slip in the fact that we intend to have the feds assume all state debt from the war? Put in some boring boilerplate sounding language, call it Article VI, and maybe nobody will notice.

These guys knew how to take an excess of democracy away from populists, and sell something that could fix the economic mess of the 1780's and by the way make a Republic that would last.

[Aisha Manus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly, because politics and economics are topics that I have always struggled with, I had a hard time understanding this book. Because it is a topic I generally avoid, I spent way too much time trying to figure out who the “Farmers” of the Constitution were until my dyslexic self realised it said “Framers”. Needless to say, I had to reread a portion of the book to try to get a better grasp of the topic now that I read the actual word, and still I had a hard time digesting it. Also, because this book discusses what happened in all 13 colonies it would skip from town to town and state to state throughout it which sometimes made it hard to follow since each state did things differently at that time. I was just lost.

This book was clearly not meant for the general population but rather people with an already basic understanding of economics and politics of the time, or at least someone who likes these topics. It had moments of clarity for me but most of the time I wasn't even sure what was going on. Had it not been assigned reading I wouldn't have finished it. However, I will say I am glad I read it because now I know that: “Paper money then prophesied that, like Jesus Christ, it would soon return. 'I died for the deliverance from foreign foes,' it declared, 'and will rise again to deliver them from their domestick [sic] ones.'” (93) Truth really is stranger than fiction sometimes!

[Motorcycle Tourist · Rating 3 out of 5]

In 1781, when the thirteen state legislatures ratified the Articles of Confederation, they agreed never to change them without unanimous consent. Six years later, every state but RI sent delegates to a Federal convention in Philadelphia. The meeting had been called, as Congress observed, “for the sole purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation”. The delegates decided to ignore these instructions, proposing not to alter the Articles, but destroy them. This process, which resulted in the Constitution, was indisputably, according to the rules at the time, unconstitutional. Why? Most believed that the government under the Articles was too weak; that Congress did not have sufficient authority. And that the country suffered from “an excess of democracy” or “democratic tyranny”. Finally, there needed to be some coherent economic strategy to revive the economy. In peacetime, no governmental policy has greater impact on ordinary citizens than taxation and the money supply.

[I think the book gets too bogged down in state debt and worthless money discussions.]

While there is no reason to question the Framer’s claim that they hoped to benefit all free Americans, what they meant to give ordinary citizens was prosperity, not power. But what is ironic is that what has arguably become history’s greatest experiment in shielding the powerless began as an insult on the capacities of ordinary citizens.

[Patricia Joynton · Rating 4 out of 5]

When all is said and done: The book is primarily about the flow of money.

The author has done his research very well, and it's a wonderful resource for college level history.
However, I personally did not want or need all the information about money or just who thought what about money minutiae. It's just too detailed for a warm, summer read, but an excellent resource in the right hands.

The best sentence in the book: Recognizing that most of the members of the Constitutional Convention shared the desire to create a national government that was substantially immune to popular influence -- and yet sufficiently democratic to be ratified -- may make it possible to solve one of the convention's great mysteries.

[Khaled Esilini · Rating 4 out of 5]

كتاب رائع يحلل فيه اجتماعيا واقتصاديا اسباب وحدة اميركا بعد الاستقلال والعوامل التي انتجت الدستور الامريكي بصيغته وشروطه.
البعض يراه كتاب متخصص في الضرائب والجوانب الاقتصادية لكن يجب ان نعلم ان المواثيق والمعاهدات والقوانين السياسية هي الوجه الاخر من العملة مع الاقتصاد وأليات الارتزاق.
الكتاب ليس سهل القراءة فهناك الكثير من المصطلحات تحتاج الى فهمها اولا قبل قراءته بطريقة سردية وكأنه رواية لكن بالنسبة لي من افضل الكتب التي قرأتها

[Noah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’ve been coming to this book off and on for years and finally just did the Historian’s Skim: read the big stuff fast and Imbibe what I could. Holton’s book is dense and esoteric and dives deep into constitutional era monetary policy and the debates around it. If that is your thing, this book is a winner. Kudos to Holton for putting thousands of Americans back in to the story of the national charter; I prefer the philosophy of the thing to the economics of it.

[Reggie Cahoon · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a struggle to get through as I really wanted this to be a good book. It is hands down probably the most well referenced history book I have come access. (5 stars for that) But he’s long winded and goes on and on. Would recommend the preface and epilogue, the rest is redundant reference material. A fabulous dissection of the circumstances around the writing of the constitution, just not a pleasant read.

[Aren Lerner · Rating 2 out of 5]

On one page Holton claims that the Constitution framers meant to oppress the lower classes, and on the next page states the Constitution offered what the lower classes wanted most: lower taxes. The argument is very poorly supported, and the only consistency was in how often it contradicted itself.

[Michael Craft · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read for any would-be scholars of the U.S. Constitution. Holton's discourse of the economic concerns driving the decision to draft the Constitution is comprehensive and challenges the modern perception of that all-important document and the Framers that we venerate today.

[Joel Austin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating view of the making of the Constitution

In this we'll-written book, the author convincingly presents a different scenario for how the US Constitution was created and who it was trying to protect.

[Bob Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of really good information from primary sources but the author gets a little bogged down in it.

[Bryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Required reading.

[Annemarie Mueller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Super interesting perspective on the Founders’ intentions when making the Constitution. Definitely an economic perspective, but I found his argument very convincing and the stories fascinating.

[bored reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excruciating read but good info

[Maddie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not the most impressive work I’ve read, but the Woody Holton vs Gordon Wood debate is important for historians to know.

[Iggy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Having read several books about the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and about the politics of the era prior to reading this book, including the impressive "Original Meanings" by J. Rakove, I was disappointed with this book. Stylistically, it is fast paced and readable. At times, it feels like a long essay, or someone thinking out loud. But while it succeeds in readability, it fails at careful and serious analysis and interpretation.

"Unruly Americans" sets out to disprove what it claims most scholars and historians erroneously claim: that the founding fathers designed the Constitution to empower ordinary Americans and protect their basic civil rights. Nay, says Woody Holton, the founding fathers' principal motivation in drafting the Constitution was to accomplish the opposite: take power away from ordinary Americans and consolidate it in the national gov't, because the founding fathers determined that ordinary Americans were incapable at self-governing and therefore needed to be guided by the elites who were better equipped at making economic and public policy decisions.

In fleshing out his thesis, Holton spends more than half of the book going over the financial and economic issues that were plaguing the colonies. The primary issue Holton focuses on (in fact, nearly the only issue) is the financial and political chasm that existed between the creditors and debtors; bondholders and taxpayers. This is the first problem of Holton's analysis: the labels. Inevitably, this kind of dichotomy helps in explaining certain issues and makes them easier to follow and understand. However, it's overly simplistic. For one, not all creditors agreed with each other on policy issues, as neither did all debtors (which Holton, to his credit, does point out at times). Secondly, bondholders were not separate from taxpayers, as these are not mutually exclusive: bondholders were taxpayers too.

The biggest problem of Holton's interpretation is the almost total lack of a broader political and economic context of the times. This shows especially in the later part of the book which discusses the ratification debates and commentaries, as well as Holton's take on James Madison's intellectual and political conversions post the Constitutional Convention. The author provides no serious analysis of the ratification debates, except for some out of context quotations made by several Federalist and anti-Federalist essayists and commentators; and provides no context whatsoever to try to explain Madison's conversion. Indeed, the idea that Madison flipped his views 180 is itself simplistic, since while Madison's views certainly evolved through the years and readjusted, it's a stretch to suggest that he became a genuine intellectual and political convert.

While Holton attempts to distance himself from the Charles Beardian thinking and interpretive framework, he doesn't fully succeed at it. For while he concedes that the Beardian framework was too simplistic and therefore erroneous, Holton doesn't himself supply the alternative, more realistic framework, all the while casting doubt on the mainstream scholarship.

Nonetheless, Holton does make some interesting points and arguments, that if fleshed out and analyzed in a more consistent, serious and penetrating fashion, had some potential to become a competing and realistic alternative framework to the mainstream scholarship.
The book is also not very well organized. For one, much of the facts and quotations are redundant throughout the book, as if Holton deliberately distributed them in this way to remind the readers of the information provided in earlier parts of the book. In fact, due to this disorganization, some chapters truly seem indistinguishable from one another.

In sum, if you are an early entrant into the Constitutional reading materials, this book may provide some interesting information and points. However, if you are a seasoned veteran - skip it.