Month: September 2026

 Political Philosophy Posted on

James Wilson and Popular Sovereignty: Recovering the Democratic Foundations of the American Constitution

Recovering James Wilson’s Constitutional Vision Few figures of the American founding exhibit a greater disparity between historical significance and public recognition than James Wilson. A signer of both the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution, one of the Constitutional Convention’s most influential delegates, and an original Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, Wilson […]

by Kelly Coats
Music Posted on

From Roxbury to Exeter: The Evolution of a Revolutionary Song

Revolutionary patriotic songs did not always remain fixed after entering circulation. Soldiers, civilians, and families copied and performed them in manuscripts and other informal settings, allowing their wording and content to change over time.[1] A small manuscript ledger kept in rural Exeter, Rhode Island, between approximately 1793 and 1798 preserves evidence of this process. Amid […]

by Marc Lee
Interviews Posted on

This Week on Dispatches: Davis Richardson on Lafayette, Jefferson, and Revolutionary Ideas

On this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews JAR contributor and historian Davis Richardson about the correspondence between the Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson in the wake of the American Revolution and the coming French Revolution. New episodes of Dispatches are available for free every Sunday evening(Eastern United States Time), first on iTunes, Stitcher, […]

by Editors
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The War Years (1775-1783) Posted on

Washington’s Invalid Corps: Wounded Warriors Still Served the Revolutionary Cause

Although some readers may be familiar with the Civil War’s Invalid Corps, which wrought value and service from even grievously wounded men during that conflict, few probably know that America’s first such organization appeared during the Revolutionary War. Like its later counterpart, Washington’s Corps of Invalids provided the nation valuable service and roles for men […]

by David A. Welker
Reviews Posted on

One Nation Under Law: The Meaning of the Declaration of Independence

BOOK REVIEW: One Nation Under Law: The Meaning of the Declaration of Independence by Carlton F.W. Larson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2026. $33.00 paperback) Carlton F.W. Larson’s monograph One Nation Under Law: The Meaning of the Declaration of Independence published by Cambridge University Press, discusses the origins of the Declaration of Independence. Through looking at […]

by Bridget Donahue Farrell
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Postwar Politics (>1783) Posted on

A Tale of Two Revolutions: Jefferson, Lafayette, and the Empire of Liberty

When Thomas Jefferson arrived in Paris in 1784, he carried with him the ideals of the American Revolution. Buoyed by the success of a revolution against the British empire, the soon-to-be appointed Minister to France found himself attempting to reconcile Republican principles with the complex political realities of Paris. It marked an intriguing reversal for […]

by Davis Richardson
Critical Thinking Posted on

The Swap Not Heard ’Round the World: Ordering the Declaration’s Grievances

After two hundred and fifty years, there couldn’t possibly be any more stories hiding away in the Declaration of Independence, right? The shelves groan with the collective weight of all the books written about it, not to mention the untold gallons of ink expended by social commentators, historians, political scientists, cultural critics, activists, radicals, and […]

by Robert G. Parkinson