Madison and the French enlightenment: The authority of public opinion

William and Mary Quarterly

Volumn 59, Issue 4, 2002, Pages 925-956

  Sheehan, Colleen A ^a  

^a VILLANOVA UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 4644316879     PISSN: 00435597     EISSN: 1933-769     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/3491576     Document Type: Review

References (69)

1. Robert A. Rutland et al., eds., The Papers of James Madison, 17 vols.(Chicago and Charlottesville, 1962-1991), 14:233-34 (hereafter cited as Madison Papers).
2. Madison Papers, 14:233.
3. In a seminal study of philosophical referents by the founding generation, Donald S. Lutz, "The Relative Influence of European Writers on Late Eighteenth-Century American Political Thought, " American Political Science Review, 78 (1984), 189-90, has shown that Montesquieu ranks significantly aboveall others, including John Locke. Yet, as Lutz points out, greater referencingdoes not necessarily imply greater agreement; a proportion of the citations to aparticular political philosopher may have as their objective a demonstration ofdisagreement with that thinker.
4. John Zvesper, Political Philosophy and Rhetoric: A Study of the Originsof American Party Politics (Cambridge, 1977), 114 - 15),
5. Paul A. Rahe, Republics Ancient and Modern, vol. 3: Inventions of Prudence: Constituting the American Regime (Chapel Hill, 1994), 180-81,
6. Lance Banning, in The Jeffersonian Persuasion: Evolution of a Party Ideology (Ithaca, 1978), 167-68,
7. The Sacred Fire of Liberty: James Madison and the Founding of the Federal Republic (Ithaca, 1995), 358-59, briefly discuss Madison's alternativecategorization of governmental types and correctly identify the type thatoperates "by corrupt influence" as an unmistakable reference to the British government, as well as to U. S. administration policies of the 1790s.
8. Preliminary studies of Madison's conception of "public opinion"include my "The Politics of Public Opinion: James Madison's 'Notes on Government, '" William and Mary Quarterly, 3d Ser., 49 (1992), 609-27,
9. "Madison's Party Press Essays, " Interpretation: A Journalof Political Philosophy, 17 (1990), 355-77.
10. See Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, Federalist No. 39 and No. 49, in The Federalist Papers, ed. Clinton Rossiter (New York, 1961), 240-41, 317.
11. Zvesper, Political Philosophy and Rhetoric, 110-19;
12. Jack N. Rakove, James Madison and the Creation of the American Republic, ed. Oscar Handlin (Glenview, 111., 1990), 99-102;
13. Garrett Ward Sheldon, The Political Philosophy of James Madison(Baltimore, 2001), 78-82.
14. Conversely, Banning, Sacred Fire of Liberty, 348-49, argues that Madison's 1790s writings in the National Gazette "represent, at once, aneffort to explain the author's earlier positions and another major landmark inthe evolution of his thought. . . . [The Party Press Essays] did not repudiateor even contradict The Federalist or . . . [his previous writings or speeches].Rather, they illuminated the assumptions of preceding years as those, in turn, throw needed light on them." Rahe, Inventions of Prudence, 182, also offersa nuanced interpretation, arguing that Madison never doubted the need for aconsolidation of sentiments on fundamental principles, but by the end of 1791"thought the arguments presented in The Federalist seriouslyinadequate. "
15. Madison Papers, 11:298-99.
16. Madison later defended his change of position on the issue of theconstitutionality of the national bank on the grounds that the issue had beendetermined by established precedents and settled public opinion. He denied thecharge of inconsistency by demonstrating that in both cases he had appealed tothe same standard of public opinion. By 1816, not only had the national bankbeen sanctioned by successive legislatures and by local authorities, it hadreceived the "acquiescence ... of the nation at large" and there waslittle if any prospect for "any change in the public opinion." Undersuch circumstances, Madison concluded, an executive veto would have "been adefiance of all the obligations derived from a course of precedents amountingto the requisite evidence of the national judgment and intention"; Marvin Meyers, ed., The Mind of the Founder: Sources of the Political Thought of James Madison (Hanover, N. H., 1981), 393.
17. Madison, "Helvidius No. 1, " Madison Papers, 15:68.
18. Baker, Inventing the French Revolution: Essays on French Political Culture in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1990), 187.
19. The numerous works by Baker on the society and politics of 18th-century France, and particularly his writings on the concept of public opinion duringthis era, make a path-breaking and brilliant contribution to understanding thepolitical thought of French thinkers during this period. Also excellent is Mona Ozoufs work, particularly "'Public Opinion' at the End of the Old Regime, " trans. Lydia C. Cochrane, Journal of Modern History, 60 Supplement(1988), S1-S21.
20. For a comprehensive treatment of the concept of public opinion in Frenchthought see J.A.W. Gunn, Queen of the World: Opinion in the Public Life of France from the Renaissance to the Revolution (Oxford, 1995).
21. Madison Papers, 10:128-29, 11:212, 214n13, 295, 413, 414n4, 5, 12:142, 13:286-89.
22. In Madison's book list of Aug. 1790, indicating the texts he would sendto his residence in Philadelphia, he marked those books purchased for him by Jefferson in France; Madison Papers, 13:286-89.
23. See, for example, Paul A. Palmer, "The Concept of Public Opinion in Political Theory, " in Essays in History and Political Theory in Honor of Charles Howard McIlwain (Cambridge, Mass., 1936), 236.
24. Gunn, Queen of the World, 122, argues that the term " publicopinion" is employed much earlier than 1750 and, though Rousseau may havebeen the earliest prominent author to use it, he cannot be credited withoriginating the expression.
25. Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiryinto a Category of Bourgeois Society, trans. Thomas Burger (Cambridge, Mass., 1989), 98, 99.
26. Mercier, Tableau de Paris: Nouvelle édition . . . , 12 vols.(Amsterdam, 1782-1788), 4:289.
27. Guillaume Thomas François Raynal, Histoire philosophique etpolitique des établissemens . . . dans les deux Indes, ? vols.(Amsterdam, 1770), 6:391-92.
28. [Guillaume] Le Trosne, De l'administration provinciale et de laréforme de l'impôt (Basel, 1779) 117.
29. Necker, A Treatise on the Administration of the Finances of France, 3vols., trans. Thomas Mortimer (London, 1786), 1:1v, 1viii, 3:461.
30. On the politics of party contestation, see Baker, Inventing the French Revolution, 186. Mably and Moreau set themselves apart from most other theoristsof public opinion in arguing that partisan struggles are beneficial to goodgovernment since they release an energy for public matters. Later in his life Moreau dispensed with any discussion praising the British system of partypolitics. Necker, on the other hand, wanted to discourage factionalism andpromote unity and tranquility in political life, though he was in general anadmirer of the British government.
31. Barthélemy, Travels of Anacharsis the Younger in Greece during themiddle of the fourth century before the Christian aera, 8 vols. (Philadelphia, 1804), 5:277.
32. Peuchet, "Discours préliminaire, " in Encyclopédieméthodique: Jurisprudence, vol. 9: La Police et les municipalités(Paris, 1789), clviii;
33. Tocqueville, Democracy in America, trans. George Lawrence, ed. J. P.Mayer and Max Lerner (New York, 1966), 264, defines moeurs in its original Latinmeaning, applying it "not only to 'moeurs'in the strict sense, which mightbe called the habits of the heart, but also to the different notions possessedby men, the various opinions current among them, and the sum of ideas that shapemental habits."
34. Montesquieu, De l'esprit des lois (1748), 6.38.
35. This phenomenon is associated with England's extreme political liberty.It may in fact be one of the reasons Montesquieu does not unqualifiedly endorsethe English model. See Rahe, "Forms of Government: Structure, Principle, Object, and Aim, " in David Wallace Carrithers, Michael A. Mosher, and Rahe, Montesquieu's Science of Politics: Essays on "The Spirit of the Laws"(Lanham, Md., 2001), 69-108, esp. 82-83.
36. See, for example, Ozouf, "Public Opinion at the End of the Old Regime, " S8-9 n. 24,
37. Peuchet, "Discours préliminaire, " ix-x. Peuchetpublished a second volume on police in 1791. Carol Allen and William B. Allenare currently completing the first English translation of Peuchet's introductionto his work on police in the Encyclopédie méthodique. I amgrateful to them for sharing their preliminary draft with me.
38. Condorcet, quoted in Ozouf, "Public Opinion at the End of the Old Regime, " S8-9n24.
39. Necker, Treatise on the Administration of the Finances of France, 1:lxv-lxvi.
40. See Gunn, Queen of the World, 293, 325.
41. Turgot, Mémoire: qui contient les principes de l'administrationpolitique . . . (Paris, 1790).
42. Condorcet, Selected Writings, ed. Baker (Indianapolis, 1976), 221.
43. Condorcet, Selected Writings, ed. Baker, 58.
44. In this work Robertson recognizes public opinion as a force for politicalchange in civilized nations. Karen O'Brien, "Robertson's Place in the Development of Eighteenth-Century Narrative History, " in Stewart J. Brown, ed., William Robertson and the Expansion of Empire (Cambridge, 1997), 83, arguesthat although Robertson did not assign to the idea of opinion the authoritativerole it has in contemporary political life, he nonetheless envisioned a muchmore demanding and creative role for it than one can find in Hume's rather"passive and normative processes of opinion";
45. Robertson, The History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles the Fifth(1782), ed. William A. Prescott (Philadelphia, 1856).
46. Peuchet, "Discours préliminaire, " v, iv.
47. Mably, Doutes proposés aux philosophes économistes surl'ordre naturel et essentiel des sociétés politiques (Nyon, 1768);
48. Mably, Des droits et des devoirs du citoyen, ed. Jean-Louis Lecercle(Paris, 1972), 212.
49. Baker, Condorcet: From Natural Philosophy to Social Mathematics (Chicago, 1975), quotations on 260, 265;
50. In 1793, in "On the Principles of the Constitutional Plan Presentedto the National Convention, " Condorcet wrote, "If the constitution ofa people is based on the principle of the balance of the vicious powerscombatting or combining one with another; if it gives different classes ofcitizens prerogatives that must balance one another; if it creates permanentbodies and establishes powers long entrusted to the same individuals, no doubtthe moment of examining such a constitution will be a moment of alarm becausethese diverse interests it has created will raise vigorous and implacable warupon each other"; Condorcet, Selected Writings, ed. Baker, 178.
51. See also Baker, Condorcet, 323.
52. Condorcet, Selected Writings ed. Baker, 79, 80.
53. P. F. Willert, Mirabeau (London, 1923), 119;
54. Mirabeau, Aux Bataves sur le stathouderat (n.p., 1788).
55. Brissot de Warville, "Discours sur l'humanité des juges dansl'administration de la justice criminelle, " in Bibliothè quephilosophique de législateur, de politique, du jurisconsulte. . .(Berlin, 1782-1785), iv.83-124, quotation on 86n-87n.
56. Madison Papers, 11:32m, 227, 13:288.
57. For example, in his "Discours préliminaire, " lxxv, Peuchet briefly discusses the effects of the size of a nation on the formationof public morality, arguing that in a larger nation public morality is lesslikely to be grounded in an artificial or factious opinion and more likely toaccord with the principles of justice. The date of publication of Peuchet's workis 1789, leaving open the possibility that he was indebted to Madison's Federalist essays for this idea. In his 1791 essay "Public Opinion, "Madison Papers, 14:170, Madison may in turn have been influenced by Peuchet'sidentification of factious opinion as an artificial or counterfeited opinion.
58. Federalist No. 49, ed. Rossiter, 317;
59. When Thomas L. Pangle, The Spirit of Modern Republicanism: The Moral Vision of the American Founders and the Philosophy of Locke (Chicago, 1988), 118-19, asserts that Publius understood the idea of justice in light of thenotion of a state of nature, whose fundamental norm is revealed by itsanarchical character, he could not have misstated Madison's case in Federalist No. 51 more dramatically.
60. Madison's argument is clearly that where there is no justice, there is nogenuine civil society, not where there is no civil society, there justice is tobe found! For an insightful treatment of Madison's thought in Federalist No.51, see W. B. Allen, with Kevin A. Cloonan, The Federalist Papers: A Commentary(New York, 2000), 233-88 and passim.
61. See, for example, Federalist No. 46, No. 52, No. 58, ed. Rossiter, 297, 327, 357.
62. Federalist No. 51, ed. Rossiter, 324.
63. The explication by Anthony J. La Vopa, "The Birth of Public Opinion, " Wilson Quarterly, 15 (Winter 1991), 46-55, of "publicopinion" is characterized by the Rousseauian ideal of isolating theindividual conscience so that a consensus of disinterested judgments would beformed. La Vopa fails to distinguish between this earlier understanding ofpublic opinion and the later strand of French thought on the subject, which notonly permits but advances the process of communication and deliberation.
64. Federalist No. 51, ed. Rossiter, 324;
65. "Notes on Government, " 158.
66. See Banning, Sacred Fire of Liberty, 195-233, for discussion of "thepracticable sphere" and Madison's evolving vision on this issue.
67. See "Public Opinion, " 170
68. Matthews, If Men Were Angels, 217, interprets Madison's task for thecitizenry as "simply vigilant guardianship" and not a model of"active citizen-participation."
69. Federalist No. 49, ed. Rossiter, 283;