Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

The Value of Virtue
Article V Blog ^

Posted on 05/28/2016 1:43:50 AM PDT by Jacquerie

I recently dusted off an old friend: Gordon S. Wood’s The Creation of the American Republic 1776 – 1787*.

His research in the newspapers, pamphlets and sermons of the Revolutionary era led him to appreciate how complicated the creation of American political and constitutional structure really was. The individualistic and rights-oriented culture of today was not emphasized at all in 1776. No, the radical republicanism of the era stressed hostility to corruption of all sorts, and emphasized the importance of virtue for the public good.

Perhaps everyone in the eighteenth century could have agreed that in theory no State was more beautiful than a republic, whose whole object by definition was the good of the people. Yet everyone knew it was fragile, and that no society under any form of government could hold together without the obedience of its members to the legally constituted authority. In a monarchy the complicated texture of the society, “the magnificence, costly equipage and dazzling splendors” lavished on the prince, the “multitude of criminal laws, with severe penalties, the very rigor of the unitary authority often with the aid of a standing and an established religious hierarchy, all worked to maintain public order; an order derived only from the passion of fear.”

But in a republic which possessed none of this complicated social texture, where the elected rulers were merely the servants of the public, and where the people themselves shared in a large measure of the governing - in such a State, order, if there was to be any, must come from below.

The very greatness of republicanism, its utter dependence on the people, was simultaneously its source of weakness. In a republic there was no place for fear; there could be no sustained coercion from above. The State, like no other, rested on the consent of the governed freely given and not compelled. In a free government, the laws, as the American clergy never tired of repeating, had to be obeyed by the people for conscience’s sake, not for wrath’s.

In a republic, each man must somehow be persuaded to submerge his personal wants into the greater good of the whole. This was termed “public virtue.” A republic was such a delicate polity precisely because it demanded an extraordinary moral character in the people. Every state in which the people participate needs a degree of virtue; but a republic which rested solely on the people absolutely required it.

Although a particular structural arrangement of the government in a republic might temper the necessity for public virtue, ultimately no model of government whatever can equal the importance of this principle, nor afford proper safety and security without it. Without some portion of this generous principle, anarchy and confusion would immediately ensue, the jarring interests of individuals, regarding themselves only, and indifferent to the welfare of others . . . would end in ruin and subversion of the State.

The eighteenth century mind was thoroughly convinced that a popularly based government could not be supported without virtue. Only with a public-spirited, self-sacrificing people could the authority of a popularly elected government be obeyed, but more by the virtue of the people, than by the terror of punishment. Because virtue was truly the lifeblood of the republic, the thoughts and hopes surrounding this concept of public spirit gave the American Revolution its socially radical character.

*Wood, Gordon S. The Creation of the American Republic 1776-1787. The University of North Carolina Press, 1969.


TOPICS: Government; History
KEYWORDS: virtue

1 posted on 05/28/2016 1:43:51 AM PDT by Jacquerie
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

How virtuous are those that entered the republic illegally? How virtuous are those that excuse their illegal entry and hinder their legal expulsion?


2 posted on 05/28/2016 1:53:55 AM PDT by OldNewYork (Operation Wetback II, now with computers)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

sry didn’t read it but IMO virtue is always doing the right thing 24/7, it’s as simple as that


3 posted on 05/28/2016 2:45:13 AM PDT by Undecided 2012
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Undecided 2012

It is worth reading to understand the necessity of a virtuous people to the survival of a republic.


4 posted on 05/28/2016 3:36:34 AM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

Thank you. An excellent history lesson on why a Republic works and why we are doomed as a Republic.


5 posted on 05/28/2016 3:49:10 AM PDT by Fzob (Let the saving love of Christ be the measure of our lives.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Fzob; ProtectOurFreedom

Thanks. In part II tomorrow, I will describe how America, right after independence, began to pervert its liberty, and why a new plan of government was necessary.


6 posted on 05/28/2016 3:59:30 AM PDT by Jacquerie (ArticleVBlog.com)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

OUTSTANDING post. Thanks, Jacquerie.

DEPOPULATE liars, criminals, conmen, thieves, reprobates, scumbags, socialists, collectivists, totalitarians from the body politic.

DEFUND their collectives, foreign and domestic.

Ballot box BUMP!

C’mon November


7 posted on 05/28/2016 4:10:35 AM PDT by PGalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

Thanks for posting.


8 posted on 05/28/2016 4:14:23 AM PDT by kalee
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

I bought Gordon S. Wood’s “The Radicalism of the American Revolution” years ago, but had trouble sticking with it and never finished it. The Amazon reviews of his “The Creation of the American Republic 1776 – 1787* are all five-star and I like the excerpt you posted, so I just bought it. Thanks for posting.


9 posted on 05/28/2016 6:59:38 AM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: ProtectOurFreedom

Wood is awesome. IIRC, his Creation was his doctoral dissertation.


10 posted on 05/28/2016 7:34:13 AM PDT by Jacquerie (ArticleVBlog.com)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: Jacquerie

BUMP-TO-THE-TOP


11 posted on 05/28/2016 4:31:36 PM PDT by PGalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: PGalt; All

DEPOPULATE liars, criminals, conmen, thieves, reprobates, scumbags, socialists, collectivists, totalitarians from the body politic.

They are not virtuous. Our lives, our fortunes, our sacred honor should not be sacrificed to such men.

“If sacrifice is equated with virtue, there is no stopping the advance of the totalitarian state.” - Ominous Parallels - The End of Freedom in America; Leonard Peikoff


12 posted on 05/30/2016 4:46:21 PM PDT by PGalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson