Democracy in America: Labor Mobility, Early Liberalism, and Constitutional Reform

Abstract

Relatively liberal economic and political institutions emerged earlier in America than appreciated by most social scientists. They did not emerge in one great leap forward, but through a gradual process of experimentation, yardstick competition, and constitutional bargaining during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. As in Europe during the nineteenth century, colonial legislative authority gradually increased, privileges and anti-privileges diminished, property and trade institutions liberalized, wealth-based requirements for suffrage gradually reduced, and public education expanded. This paper explores the extent to which economic interests and early liberalism can account for the constitutional and legislative bargains adopted. No revolutions or revolutionary threats were necessary or evident during most of the period of interest.