Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitutional Framers
“Whatever Principles are imbibed at College will run thro' a Man's whole future Conduct.”—--William Livingston, signer of the Constitution

Schools for Statesmen explores the fifty-five individual Framers of the Constitution in close detail and argues that their different educations help explain their divergent positions at the 1787 Constitutional Convention. Those educations ranged from outlawed Irish “hedge schools” to England’s venerable Inns of Court, from the grammar schools of New England to ambitious new academies springing up on the Carolina frontier. The more traditional schools that focused on Greek and Latin classics (Oxford, Harvard, Yale, William and Mary) were deeply conservative institutions resistant to change. But the Scottish colleges and the newer American schools (Princeton, Philadelphia, King’s College) introduced students to a Scottish Enlightenment curriculum that fostered more radical, forward-thinking leaders. Half of the Framers had no college education and were often self-taught or had private tutors; most were quiet at the convention, although a few stubbornly opposed the new ideas they were hearing. Nearly all the delegates who took the lead at the convention had been educated at the newer, innovative colleges, but of the seven who rejected the new Constitution, three had gone to the older traditional schools, while three others had not gone to college at all.

Schools for Statesmen is an unprecedented analysis of the sharply divergent educations of the Framers of the Constitution. It reveals the ways in which the Constitutional Convention, rather than being a counterrevolution by conservative elites, was dominated by forward-thinking innovators who had benefited from the educational revolution beginning in the mid-eighteenth century.

Andrew Browning offers a new and persuasive explanation of key disagreements among the Framers and the process by which they were able to break through the impasse that threatened the convention; he provides a fresh understanding of the importance of education in what has been called the “Critical Period” of US history.

Schools for Statesmen takes a deep dive into the diverse educational world of the eighteenth century and sheds new light on the origins of the US Constitution.
1140780431
Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitutional Framers
“Whatever Principles are imbibed at College will run thro' a Man's whole future Conduct.”—--William Livingston, signer of the Constitution

Schools for Statesmen explores the fifty-five individual Framers of the Constitution in close detail and argues that their different educations help explain their divergent positions at the 1787 Constitutional Convention. Those educations ranged from outlawed Irish “hedge schools” to England’s venerable Inns of Court, from the grammar schools of New England to ambitious new academies springing up on the Carolina frontier. The more traditional schools that focused on Greek and Latin classics (Oxford, Harvard, Yale, William and Mary) were deeply conservative institutions resistant to change. But the Scottish colleges and the newer American schools (Princeton, Philadelphia, King’s College) introduced students to a Scottish Enlightenment curriculum that fostered more radical, forward-thinking leaders. Half of the Framers had no college education and were often self-taught or had private tutors; most were quiet at the convention, although a few stubbornly opposed the new ideas they were hearing. Nearly all the delegates who took the lead at the convention had been educated at the newer, innovative colleges, but of the seven who rejected the new Constitution, three had gone to the older traditional schools, while three others had not gone to college at all.

Schools for Statesmen is an unprecedented analysis of the sharply divergent educations of the Framers of the Constitution. It reveals the ways in which the Constitutional Convention, rather than being a counterrevolution by conservative elites, was dominated by forward-thinking innovators who had benefited from the educational revolution beginning in the mid-eighteenth century.

Andrew Browning offers a new and persuasive explanation of key disagreements among the Framers and the process by which they were able to break through the impasse that threatened the convention; he provides a fresh understanding of the importance of education in what has been called the “Critical Period” of US history.

Schools for Statesmen takes a deep dive into the diverse educational world of the eighteenth century and sheds new light on the origins of the US Constitution.
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Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitutional Framers

Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitutional Framers

by Andrew H. Browning
Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitutional Framers

Schools for Statesmen: The Divergent Educations of the Constitutional Framers

by Andrew H. Browning

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Overview

“Whatever Principles are imbibed at College will run thro' a Man's whole future Conduct.”—--William Livingston, signer of the Constitution

Schools for Statesmen explores the fifty-five individual Framers of the Constitution in close detail and argues that their different educations help explain their divergent positions at the 1787 Constitutional Convention. Those educations ranged from outlawed Irish “hedge schools” to England’s venerable Inns of Court, from the grammar schools of New England to ambitious new academies springing up on the Carolina frontier. The more traditional schools that focused on Greek and Latin classics (Oxford, Harvard, Yale, William and Mary) were deeply conservative institutions resistant to change. But the Scottish colleges and the newer American schools (Princeton, Philadelphia, King’s College) introduced students to a Scottish Enlightenment curriculum that fostered more radical, forward-thinking leaders. Half of the Framers had no college education and were often self-taught or had private tutors; most were quiet at the convention, although a few stubbornly opposed the new ideas they were hearing. Nearly all the delegates who took the lead at the convention had been educated at the newer, innovative colleges, but of the seven who rejected the new Constitution, three had gone to the older traditional schools, while three others had not gone to college at all.

Schools for Statesmen is an unprecedented analysis of the sharply divergent educations of the Framers of the Constitution. It reveals the ways in which the Constitutional Convention, rather than being a counterrevolution by conservative elites, was dominated by forward-thinking innovators who had benefited from the educational revolution beginning in the mid-eighteenth century.

Andrew Browning offers a new and persuasive explanation of key disagreements among the Framers and the process by which they were able to break through the impasse that threatened the convention; he provides a fresh understanding of the importance of education in what has been called the “Critical Period” of US history.

Schools for Statesmen takes a deep dive into the diverse educational world of the eighteenth century and sheds new light on the origins of the US Constitution.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780700633104
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Publication date: 07/09/2022
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 368
File size: 2 MB

About the Author

Andrew H. Browning is author of The Panic of 1819: The First Great Depression. He was educated at Princeton and the University of Virginia and has taught history in Washington, DC; Portland, Oregon; and Honolulu, Hawaii.

Table of Contents

Delegates to the 1787 Federal Convention: Age and Education

A Note on Names

Introduction

Part I

1. The Framers

2. Education Demigods

Part II

3. The Self-Taught and the Tutored

4. Writing Schools and Grammar Schools

5. The Schools of the Prophets: Harvard and Yale

6. Their Majesties’ College in Williamsburg: William and Mary

7. The Old World’s Old Schools:England, France, and Ireland

8. The Inns of Court and Legal Apprenticeship

Part III.

9. The New Old World: The Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh

10. Presbyterian Schools and Scottish Schoolmasters

11. Mirania in America: The College of Philadelphia and King’s College

12. Princeton in the Nation’s Service: The College of New Jersey

13. At the Convention: “To Form and More Perfect Union”

Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

Index

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