The Republic of the Moderns: Paine's and Madison's Novel Liberalism

Abstract

The relationship between republicanism and liberalism has emerged as a central issue for students of political thought. Neo-republican scholars in particular have advanced a stark conceptual opposition between two competing intellectual and political projects, and have claimed that liberalism decisively defeated and replaced republicanism. By contrast, in exploring the writings of Thomas Paine and James Madison, this article shows how they initiated a radical and unexpected reconfiguration within the republican tradition that fashioned a surprisingly liberal doctrine for a modern republic. Their “republic of the moderns,” we argue, altered the contours and content of classical republicanism, transmuting it into an important strand of liberal political thought and institutions.