A Short History of American Liberalism
41 Pages Posted: 22 Apr 2013 Last revised: 4 Mar 2014
Date Written: March 4, 2014
Abstract
This paper provides an overview of the history of American liberalism. Its focus is on constitutional documents, laws, and speeches rather than books written by intellectuals, because that is where the clearest statements of liberalism, surprisingly, are found. The paper provides more excerpts from documents in the early colonial period than from later periods, because this is necessary to defend the hypothesis that liberalism in the United States was substantially home grown.
Keywords: liberalism, history, political science, law, economics, constitutional design
JEL Classification: B19, D60, D70, P10, P4
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation