Books: The Transformation of the American Democratic Republic by Stephen M. Krason

An American Decline?

by Joseph Postell

Joseph Postell reviews a new book that claims America has departed

 from the founding vision, in part because of the founders themselves.

As Stephen Krason's new book argues, America has departed from the founders' design, and the founders may be partially responsible. But this claim is only as strong as the interpretation of the founding behind it.
Is it really true that America's political and social life has fundamentally changed since its birth? Have we departed from the "golden age" of the founding? If so, when did this change happen, and did the founding itself make the change likely?
These questions, especially whether we can trace America's problems to the founding, are hotly debated among conservatives, including here at Public Discourse by Philip Muñoz, Patrick Deneen, and Nathan Schlueter. Stephen M. Krason enters the conversation with his new book, The Transformation of the American Democratic Republic. As the title suggests, Krason, a professor of political science and legal studies at Franciscan University of Steubenville, traces a gradual departure from the institutions, principles, and social conditions of the Founding, even though his interpretation of the founders' views is debatable in many ways.
Krason's first chapter explains the institutions, principles, and social conditions necessary, in the founders' view, to sustain a democratic republic. His outline is a broad one, not designed to favor any one interpretation of the founding. He then surveys American history from 1789 to the present to see if and when America departed from its framers' vision.
Of course, the task is enormously ambitious: Krason spans America's political, legal, economic, social, and philosophical developments in each major period of our history. His goal isn't to describe any one era in great depth, but to give an overview that can be compared to the founding era. Krason's approach has many virtues and the result is a valuable summary of trends in American history.

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