Capitalism and the American Revolution

by Yuval Levin (Editor)

192 pages, Paperback

Published March 11, 2025

About the author

Yuval Levin is an Israeli-American political analyst, public intellectual, academic and journalist. His areas of specialty include health care, entitlement reform, economic and domestic policy, science and technology policy, political philosophy, and bioethics. He holds a BA from American University and a PhD from the University of Chicago.

He is the founding editor of National Affairs, director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, a contributing editor of National Review and a senior editor of The New Atlantis.
Levin was vice president and Hertog Fellow of Ethics and Public Policy Center, executive director of the President's Council on Bioethics, Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy under President George W. Bush and contributing editor to The Weekly Standard. Prior to that he served as a congressional staffer at the member, committee, and leadership levels.

Reviews

[Elliot D]

I bought this book after coming across it at the National Book Festival in Washington D.C. where I was pleasantly surprised to find a book on Law and Economics. My main interest was in Richard Epstein's essay "Laying the Foundations for a Market Economy", but found I enjoyed all the essays and learnt a lot from them. I review each in turn.

1. Jay Cost's essay on "Capitalism and Republicanism in the Founding Era" was perhaps my biggest takeaway. While I was well aware of the rivalry between Jefferson and Hamilton, this essay frames this debate beautifully in terms of a debate on capitalism. The detail in terms of specific legal debates is very informative. It also gives relevant insights into today's political debates; in so many ways Jefferson captures the anti-elitist (anti-market capitalist?) passions of the Democratic left and the Republican right, where one is tempted to see Hamilton's focus on growth as a hallmark of the modern political centre.

2. Clement Fatovic's essay on economic aspiration's role in the revolution was a wealth of detail in economic history. He survey's evidence on the living standards of the colonists and relates this persuasively to the pursuit of independence. It likewise gives great detail on the legal institutions of both pre-revolutionary and post-revolutionary America.

3. Contrasting with Fatovic's essay, Deirdre McCloskey's essay on the economic causes and consequences takes a different stance. While detailing the huge economic cost of the revolution in terms of living standards, McCloskey takes a stance that the culture of the colonists, influenced by liberal philosophy, was central to their pursuit of independence and to the long-term success of the American economy.

4. Epstein's essay, for which I bought the book, was a great exploration of the institutions that define the capitalist nature of the American economy. For anyone familiar with Law and Economics and who is interested in the history of capitalism in America this is a valuable read. It exquisitely details the early debates, both by political actors in Congress, the Executive, and the constitutional convention, and by the judiciary in its early landmark decisions that would go on to shape the young economy towards capitalism. In turn it goes through aspects of property law, contract law, and competition/trade law that I imagine would be insightful to lawyers, yet accessible to non-lawyers. It also highlights how these institutional choices were not inevitable. Overall a great read.

5. Christopher Demuth's essay serves as a more general walkthrough the history of capitalism in America, organized chronologically rather than thematically. While I perhaps connected with this essay the least, I was greatly interested in its discussion of the Bank of the U.S. debate that defined the early republic. This is also one of those topics that is often discussed at a general level but where the legal details are regularly glossed over. Demuth does a great job of discussing this in concrete legal terms, shedding light on how the debates shaped monetary policy in detail far beyond a discussion of borrowing or sound money.

Overall a great set of essays; a great find!

[Geonostalgist]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book - even if it was certainly denser for me (being only slightly familiar with much of economics), the major points and tie-ins I thought were well made. Indeed, I thought the somewhat overall punchline (to myself at least) of "American government and culture shaped American capitalism just as much as vice-versa" was well made and provokingly established, especially within concepts like competitive pluralism, the ties between wealth and classical republican virtues, and the seemingly natural or even serendipitous development of all of it. Indeed, on that last point the line "The Americans had declared their political independence before it was a reality, not after; and what they did in the matter of financial competence was much the same." really stuck out to me. Only a spot or two really lost my real comprehension and/or attention, but regardless I'd really like to re-read this one with more attention to detail, because I felt like there was a lot of real substance and value that I didn't keep good note and track of. I'll update this when I do!