What is a political regime (politeia)? To what extent is its character a consequence of education (paideia)? To what extent is its character a consequence of rule by a political class? What presumption underpinned classical republicanism? Was it a reasonable presumption? Why were the ancient Greeks and Romans so skeptical with regard to commerce? What does it mean to speak of a martial economy? What was the character of the education the ancient Greek polis gave its citizens? How does pederasty fit in? What does Aristotle mean when he describes the human being (anthropos) as "a political animal?" Benjamin Franklin once described man as "a tool-making animal." From our perspective, who is more nearly right? In Aristotle's view, what makes of a people a political community? What does Pericles' Funeral Oration tell us about the Athenian outlook? Could such a speech be given in a liberal democracy today? Why does Polybius include a discussion of funerals and of the Roman military camp in his account of the Roman constitution? What was the character of medieval liberty? Why is it so rarely a focus of attention today? Why did self-government flourish in the high Middle Ages? What occasioned self-government in the guilds, the towns, and the monarchies of Western Christendom? Did it flourish because of or despite Catholic Christianity? Why was there no analogue to this in Eastern Christendom? Why was there none under Islam? Is Machiavelli a friend or a foe of liberty? Does he reaffirm Europe's classical heritage or reject it? What was the character of the Rome he imagined in his Discourses on Livy? Did Machiavelli restate or reject Aristotle's account of the foundations for republican freedom? What was the character of the republicanism espoused by Marchamont Nedham? Did it differ at all in spirit and institutions from that proposed by Machiavelli? What did Machiavelli and Nedham think of the Christian church? How does James Harrington fit into this scheme? What was the character of his republicanism? When were Cato's Letters published? What is the character of the polity espoused therein? To what degree are these arguments familiar to Americans?

To what degree do the arguments advanced by the American colonists echo those of the ancient Greeks and Romans? To what degree are they a restatement of the arguments advanced by the English republicans and their Whig successors? Do they owe anything at all to Machiavelli? Do they owe anything to Montesquieu? How do the arguments of the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1765 and 1768 differ from the argument of the Declaration of Independence? Is it possible to trace a development in the argument of the Colonists? What do they emphasize more as the conflict with Great Britain proceeds? What becomes less important? Is it true, as Edmund Morgan says (p.100), that "all the colonial demands might have been satisfied within the limits of [the] empire"? How would the colonial demands have changed the empire? How did the American revolutionaries understand "the laws of nature and of nature's God" and the "unalienable rights" of man? What did they mean by proclaiming that "all men are created equal"? How did they deduce from those principles the moral necessity of government founded on consent? Is it true, as Edmund Morgan claims (p.76), that the Declaration of Independence "would not have precluded a monarchial form of government for the United States"? What does Montesquieu have to do with the modern repub lican tradition? How does he reshape its arguments? Where lies his emphasis? What does he mean by principle? In his opinion, how do republics, monarchies, and despotisms differ? Why does he speak of monarchy as a moderate government? What does he mean by liberty? Why does he so praise the English form of government? What is the principle of the English government? Do the English enjoy liberty?

What was the nature and what were the defects of America's first national constitution, the Articles of Confederation? Outline a chronology of the major events of the Constitutional Convention as if you were describing the plot of a play. What are the major "turning points" of the action? Who are the major characters? What are the major differences in structure, powers, and functions between the various plans in the Convention? How was the question of the authority of the Convention and the proper scope of its deliberations raised and dealt with? What were the major questions in the construction of the major institutions of the Constitution? Where is the concept of "judicial review" and the overall character of the judiciary formulated in the Convention's deliberations? Why is the Judiciary so sketchy in the final Constitution as opposed to the other branches? How did the issue of slavery slip in and out of--and occasionally dominate--the deliberations of the Convention? How really "novel" is the United States Constitution? If it is truly novel, how so? If not, why did its framers believe that it was? Is there a "design" or "overarching theory" to the final Constitution? Or, is it best understood as a "loose compromise" without guiding principle to either its whole structure or its parts? What did some of the major players in the Convention consider the Constitution's major defects? What do you think the Constitution's major defects are/were? From the perspective of ancient regime analysis, was the American constitution democratic? aristocratic? monarchical? mixed? How was the Constitution influenced by Machiavelli, the English republicans and their Whig successors, and Montesquieu?

What is Publius' ends/means argument? Does it imply that our Government is unlimited in its powers? What is the Anti-Federalist response to Publius? To what extent can and should government be limited by restricting constitutional grants of power? What is Publius' view of Federalism? Does the Constitution establish a stable, limited federalism or an uneasy compromise tending toward consolidation? How important is federalism to the maintenance of limited government? What is the case for the separation of powers? What view of politics underlies it? What is the argument against it as presented by the Anti-Federalists? To what extent do they agree with current critics of separation? Is separation a source of energy', liberty, and institutional vigor or a cause of stagnation, confusion, and irresponsible government? What is Publius' argument for an energetic government? What leads his executive to be a source of that energy? How does he understand the job of presidential leadership? How democratic is his executive? Does the Constitution establish Presidential government? What is Publius' argument against a Bill of Rights? Why do the Anti-Federalists desire a Bill of Rights? Do their arguments differ from the current defenses of a Bill of Rights? How essential is the Bill of Rights to the maintenance of liberty in America? What issues dominated the task of constitutional and political formation after the ratification of the Constitution? What differing interpretations of the new constitutional structure and of national purpose divided the Federalists from the Jeffersonian Republicans? What is the historic significance of the election of 1800? Is John Marshall's argument for judicial review persuasive?

What are the contributions and weaknesses of each of the major interpretative frameworks of the American Founding?

What direction should scholarship on the Founding turn?

Should we teach the American Founding with the assumption that it the key or defining moment in American history? Do the principles of the Founding deserve some kind of independent status as "first principles" of the American regime? Are they, in other words, indisputable, foundational ideas on which the regime rests and without which it will fall?

Should we focus more on documents such as the Declaration of Independence than on other documents such as pamphlets of the revolution? Are we trying to capture the "political culture" of the period or gain insight into the most sophisticated understanding that we can of its enduring principles?

Can we justify the study of the ideas of the Founding? If so, then how? Are they motives for action? Are we examining their truth or validity?

Who are the Founders? Does everyone get included equally or are the Founders really "the Founding Fathers" - the group of patriarchal leaders of the Revolution?

What set or sets of ideas were most important at the Founding? Do these ideas form our national character? Are we an exceptional people and if so in what sense?

How democratic were the Framers and how democratic is the American Constitution?

What view of human nature does the argument of The Federalist No. 10 suggest?

Why does Madison abandon the goal of "removing the causes of faction?"

What is his strategy for controlling its effects?

What does Madison believe are the proper purposes of representation?

Why does Madison argue that majority factions pose a particularly difficult problem in republican governments?

How does Madison define a republican government?

Does Madison underestimate the strength and force of minority factions in the American political system?

Does Madison's theory still apply today, even as advances in technology have made it possible for individuals to communicate instantly?

How did his experience during the War of Independence turn Captain Hamilton of the NY Artillery company from the radical idealist he was in 1775-1776 into the practical realist that we see in Lt. Col. Hamilton of the Continental Army in 1780-1781?

Why did Hamilton (in Staloff's view) see the three foundations of government in Finance, Interest (as in self-interest and group interests), and Public Opinion?

Why was Hamilton so successful, despite strong opposition, in bringing about the US financial revolution as Treasury Secretary during 1789-1795?

What exactly was the financial revolution? What effect did it have on US economic growth and development?

Because parts of Hamilton's financial system were dismantled after he left the scene, some (eg, Rahe) argue that he failed. Do you agree? (Think about our current financial system, and compare it with Hamilton's.)

Toward the end of his essay, Staloff (125-26) makes two seemingly clashing points: first, "By almost any measure, Alexander Hamilton was the most important figure in the founding of the American republic," and second, "Despite his myriad accomplishments and larger-than-life legacy, Hamilton is perhaps the least loved founding father." Do you agree with both of these? One of them? Neither? Why?

What were the features of early 19^th-century American materially-supported existence that led its citizens to value gentility where crudeness and crassness formerly reigned? What kind of disposition might have led Americans to begin to acquire the characteristics of gentility? Was there not some previous set of experiences that constituted a softening of temperament? Might it have been the neoteny associated with the shrinkage of the family to its nuclear form? What were gentility's religious foundations?

What caused men and women to care about the appearance and odor of the human body? What were the sources of delicacy and sensibility? Of compassion, the "pity and humanity" that Paul Rahe suggests replaced the "ferocity of the ancients" as desirable personality attributes? How were the nascent genteel set on the path toward residential development, from a big (unpartitioned) dwelling place, to a housing at least rudimentarily subdivided? What were the earliest subdivisions? What was the "I" house? How did its development proceed? How were the residential subdivisions related to personality structure? To tradition or "inner" direction? To distinctions between "public" and "private"? What came to be the attraction of the Georgian design? What was the significance of the development and diffusion of the parlor?

How did conversation relate to gentility? What happens in conversation between persons of different ages or experiential background? Between persons of similar age or experience? Which combination is likely to lead to the articulation of explicit intent? Which is likely to exhibit a "tough" speech code and which is likely to produce speech characterized by expressions of tender feeling, of gentility? Speaking of the verbal, how did the development among churches of "note singing" relate to the process of refinement?

How was the refinement of America related to the country's burgeoning economic system? In what sense might it be said that it was Alexander Hamilton's financial system, finally implemented during his incumbency as Secretary of the Treasury, that was responsible for the refinement of America? Why is the term "stratified diffusion" useful in summing up the refinement process? How might one cite the work of Richard Bushman to resolve Alexis de Tocqueville's paradoxical observation that self-interest in America "establishes habits which unconsciously turn [the will]" to virtue? How might Bushman's work explain the observation of Brigitte and Peter Berger that it is "individual responsibility and performance of duty," not greed, that brings economic success in a free enterprise society?