We hear so much today about how divided we are as a country, how unable we are do engage in civil discourse. And yet, Alexander Hamilton predicted that the debate over the Constitution would only bring a “torrent of angry and malignant passions,” and the issue would be settled by the “loudness of their declamations,” etc. Do we feel slightly better to know that American politics has always been this way, even at the beginning? And that our Founders designed the Constitution to manage even our worst political tendencies? What did they seem to get right about human nature in even its ugliest forms?
Alexander Hamilton described the Constitution as the product of the “improved science of politics” in Federalist #9, referring to the breakthroughs of the Enlightenment. How much did modern thinkers (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau) improve on Greek and Roman political thought (Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Augustine, etc.)? Or how much did moderns displace ancient wisdom?