First Principles
What America's Founders Learned from the Greeks and Romans and How That Shaped Our Country
Book Edition Details
Summary
In the quiet dawn following the 2016 presidential election, Thomas Ricks embarked on a journey through time, curiosity ignited by the founding fathers' true inspirations. This Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist peels back the layers of history, revealing how the wisdom of ancient Greece and Rome sculpted the ideals of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison. Rather than dwelling on the Enlightenment thinkers often credited with shaping America, "First Principles" immerses readers in the classical teachings that fueled the minds of these revolutionary leaders. With a narrative as engaging as it is enlightening, Ricks paints vivid portraits of these statesmen as they wrestled with independence and governance. Delve into this masterful exploration of how the echoes of antiquity continue to resonate within the American fabric, inviting readers to see these historical figures—and the nation they forged—in a transformative light.
Introduction
Picture a young Thomas Jefferson in his Williamsburg study, carefully copying passages from Cicero's letters while drafting what would become the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom. Or imagine James Madison at Princeton, filling notebook after notebook with observations about the rise and fall of ancient Greek confederacies, insights that would later shape the Constitution's federal structure. These scenes reveal a profound truth about America's founding that modern citizens rarely appreciate: the men who created our republic were thoroughly steeped in the political wisdom of ancient Greece and Rome. The founding generation didn't just study classical antiquity as an academic exercise. They lived and breathed the stories of Roman senators who chose death over dishonor, Greek philosophers who questioned the nature of justice, and ancient historians who chronicled the eternal struggle between liberty and tyranny. When George Washington chose to resign his military commission rather than seize power, he was consciously modeling himself on Cincinnatus, the Roman general who returned to his farm after saving the republic. When the founders designed the Capitol building with classical columns and Roman architectural principles, they were making a statement about the kind of civilization they hoped to create. This classical foundation shaped not only the intellectual framework of American independence but also the practical institutions that have governed us for over two centuries. Understanding how ancient wisdom influenced modern democracy reveals both the brilliance of the founders' achievements and the contradictions they failed to resolve. For anyone seeking to understand why American democracy works the way it does, why the founders feared political parties, and how classical ideals both enabled and limited their vision, this exploration offers essential insights into the deeper currents that continue to shape our political life.
Classical Education and Revolutionary Thought (1730s-1776)
The intellectual revolution that preceded America's political revolution began in colonial classrooms where young men absorbed the political lessons of antiquity alongside their Latin grammar. By the 1750s, institutions like Harvard, Yale, and Princeton were producing a generation of leaders who could quote Cicero as easily as they cited contemporary political theorists. This wasn't mere academic pretension but practical preparation for the challenges of governing free societies in a world dominated by monarchies and empires. John Adams exemplified this classical education in action. His Harvard training in rhetoric and ancient history provided him with both the intellectual framework for understanding British tyranny and the practical skills for resisting it. When Adams defended the British soldiers accused in the Boston Massacre, he drew on Cicero's techniques for swaying juries while invoking classical principles about the rule of law. His diary entries from this period reveal a young man constantly measuring contemporary events against ancient precedents, seeking guidance from Roman statesmen who had faced similar challenges to republican government. Thomas Jefferson's classical education ran even deeper, shaping his fundamental beliefs about human nature and political organization. His reading of Epicurean philosophy convinced him that the pursuit of happiness was not just a personal goal but a legitimate political right. His study of Tacitus provided him with a historian's understanding of how liberty could be gradually eroded by ambitious rulers. When Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence, he was translating complex philosophical ideas drawn from ancient sources into language that ordinary Americans could understand and embrace. The shared classical education of the colonial elite created a common vocabulary for political resistance. When they spoke of virtue, they meant the Roman concept of putting public good above private interest. When they warned against corruption, they had in mind the luxury and faction that had supposedly destroyed the Roman Republic. This classical framework enabled them to see their conflict with Britain not as a mere tax dispute but as part of the eternal struggle between liberty and tyranny that had defined political life since ancient times.
Constitutional Design Through Ancient Lessons (1776-1800)
The transition from declaring independence to actually creating a stable government revealed both the power and the limitations of classical political wisdom. The Articles of Confederation, America's first attempt at national government, reflected classical fears about concentrated power but created a system so weak it could barely function. The founders had studied the failures of ancient confederacies extensively, but applying those lessons to a vast, diverse nation proved more challenging than their education had suggested. James Madison emerged as the crucial figure in transforming classical learning into practical constitutional design. His systematic study of ancient and modern confederacies convinced him that previous republics had failed because they were either too small to defend themselves or too large to maintain unity. Madison's revolutionary insight was that a large republic might actually be more stable than a small one, because competing factions would check each other rather than allowing any single group to dominate. This was a direct challenge to classical political theory, which had always assumed that republics could only survive in small, homogeneous communities. The Constitutional Convention of 1787 became a sustained dialogue between ancient wisdom and American innovation. Delegates constantly invoked historical examples, from the democracy of Athens to the mixed government of Rome to the confederacies of Greece. Yet they also recognized that they were creating something genuinely new. Alexander Hamilton captured this tension when he observed that while the ancients provided valuable warnings about the fragility of free government, Americans couldn't simply copy institutions designed for city-states and expect them to work across a continent. The resulting Constitution represented a remarkable synthesis of classical principles and modern realities. The separation of powers reflected centuries of political theory about the dangers of concentrated authority, while the system of checks and balances drew on ancient ideas about mixed government. Yet the founders also broke new ground, creating a federal system that balanced national authority with local autonomy and a presidency that was neither a monarch nor a mere administrator. Their classical education had prepared them to learn from ancient failures while designing institutions that could adapt to changing circumstances.
Democratic Transformation and Classical Decline (1800-1860s)
The early decades of the nineteenth century witnessed the gradual erosion of classical influence as American politics became more democratic and less deferential to educated elites. The election of 1800, which brought Thomas Jefferson to power, demonstrated that the constitutional system could survive peaceful transfers of authority between opposing parties. Yet this very success began to undermine the classical assumptions about virtue and disinterested public service that had shaped the founding generation. Andrew Jackson's rise to the presidency in 1828 symbolized this transformation. Unlike his predecessors, Jackson drew his authority not from classical learning but from popular appeal and military reputation. His supporters celebrated the wisdom of the common man over the bookish knowledge of traditional elites. When Jackson received an honorary degree from Harvard in 1833, former president John Quincy Adams boycotted the ceremony in disgust, but the gesture only highlighted how thoroughly American culture had moved beyond classical assumptions about education and leadership. The expansion of democratic participation created new forms of political organization that bore little resemblance to the carefully balanced republics the founders had studied in ancient history. Political parties, despite the founders' hopes that factional conflict could be avoided, became permanent features of American life. Professional politicians emerged who were more skilled at mobilizing voters than at quoting Cicero. Newspapers and popular literature replaced classical texts as the primary sources of political ideas for most Americans. By the 1850s, the classical curriculum that had shaped the founding generation was giving way to more practical subjects like engineering, modern languages, and natural sciences. The Industrial Revolution was creating new forms of wealth and power that dwarfed anything the ancients had imagined. The classical ideal of the citizen-farmer, so central to Jefferson's vision of America, seemed increasingly irrelevant in a world of factories and railroads. The shared intellectual tradition that had enabled the founders to work together despite their differences was fragmenting along sectional and ideological lines that would soon tear the nation apart.
Summary
The story of classical influence on American democracy reveals a fundamental tension that continues to shape our politics: the conflict between high ideals and practical governance. The founding generation's immersion in Greek and Roman political thought provided them with both the intellectual tools to create lasting institutions and the moral framework to restrain their own ambitions. Their classical education taught them that republics were fragile, that virtue was essential for free government, and that the lessons of history could guide contemporary political choices. Yet this same classical tradition also created blind spots that would haunt the nation for generations. The founders' emphasis on virtue and education made it difficult for them to accept the legitimacy of partisan conflict and popular democracy. Their classical models, drawn from small city-states, provided limited guidance for governing a continental nation with diverse interests and populations. Most tragically, their classical education offered justifications for slavery that prevented them from fully realizing their own ideals of liberty and equality. The gradual decline of classical influence reflected broader changes in American society, as democratic participation expanded and new forms of education and communication emerged. While this democratization brought many benefits, it also meant the loss of a shared intellectual tradition that had enabled leaders to think beyond immediate interests and partisan advantage. For contemporary Americans grappling with political polarization and institutional dysfunction, the classical tradition offers both warnings about the fragility of democratic government and inspiration for the kind of civic education and public virtue that free societies require to survive and flourish.
Related Books
Download PDF & EPUB
To save this Black List summary for later, download the free PDF and EPUB. You can print it out, or read offline at your convenience.
By Thomas E. Ricks
