Jack Rakove
@jrakove.bsky.social
Native Cook County Democrat, Cubs fan, and long-time historian of the American Revolution and Constitution
send your email to me at stanford and I will send you the draft, which is pretty close to final
November 29, 2025 at 9:09 PM
send your email to me at stanford and I will send you the draft, which is pretty close to final
I have a forthcoming essay in Journal of Constitutional Law on Trumped-up Presidential Immunity: A Constitutional Debacle. Probably won't come out until next summer, though, and I need to write some kind of update to document its evil and wholly predictable consequences.
November 29, 2025 at 5:08 PM
I have a forthcoming essay in Journal of Constitutional Law on Trumped-up Presidential Immunity: A Constitutional Debacle. Probably won't come out until next summer, though, and I need to write some kind of update to document its evil and wholly predictable consequences.
See my reply to Prof. Lahav. Historians would always go with the original (true) title, Hence I would never write Federalist Papers.
But if you only have endnotes, stick in an explanatory footnote with the magic symbol of the * at first usage.
This is Solomonic editing.
But if you only have endnotes, stick in an explanatory footnote with the magic symbol of the * at first usage.
This is Solomonic editing.
November 29, 2025 at 5:06 PM
See my reply to Prof. Lahav. Historians would always go with the original (true) title, Hence I would never write Federalist Papers.
But if you only have endnotes, stick in an explanatory footnote with the magic symbol of the * at first usage.
This is Solomonic editing.
But if you only have endnotes, stick in an explanatory footnote with the magic symbol of the * at first usage.
This is Solomonic editing.
So the opinion is Slaughter House? Historians would go with that. I would never write The Federalist Papers, the corrupted title for the 1961 Clinton Rossiter (of Cornell fame) edition. Two other editions published in 1961 went straight Federalist (J. Cooke and B. Wright).
Say hi to your mom!
Say hi to your mom!
November 29, 2025 at 4:57 PM
So the opinion is Slaughter House? Historians would go with that. I would never write The Federalist Papers, the corrupted title for the 1961 Clinton Rossiter (of Cornell fame) edition. Two other editions published in 1961 went straight Federalist (J. Cooke and B. Wright).
Say hi to your mom!
Say hi to your mom!
So the opinion is Slaughter House? The historian would go with that. I would never write The Federalist Papers, the corrupted title for the 1961 Clinton Rossiter edition. Two other important editions came out that year (Cooke and Wright); both went straight Federalist.
Say hi to your mom!
Say hi to your mom!
November 29, 2025 at 5:03 PM
So the opinion is Slaughter House? The historian would go with that. I would never write The Federalist Papers, the corrupted title for the 1961 Clinton Rossiter edition. Two other important editions came out that year (Cooke and Wright); both went straight Federalist.
Say hi to your mom!
Say hi to your mom!
Really? Who are the outliers who separate the two words, something I have never seen? And are there any examples of the two-word variant in the legal pleadings, opinions, etc? If they appear there it would be one thing (historical authenticity of a kind, I suppose). If not, why bother?
November 29, 2025 at 1:03 PM
Really? Who are the outliers who separate the two words, something I have never seen? And are there any examples of the two-word variant in the legal pleadings, opinions, etc? If they appear there it would be one thing (historical authenticity of a kind, I suppose). If not, why bother?
You might also consider Shelley Fishkin's Jim, then.
And I just learned that Everett's wife is a former student of mine from teaching the US history survey.
And I just learned that Everett's wife is a former student of mine from teaching the US history survey.
November 29, 2025 at 12:43 PM
You might also consider Shelley Fishkin's Jim, then.
And I just learned that Everett's wife is a former student of mine from teaching the US history survey.
And I just learned that Everett's wife is a former student of mine from teaching the US history survey.
I knew Willi and visited him once at the FU--the summer of 1967. Probably happened due to Gerald Stourzh, who was a friend of my dad from hanging out with Hans Morgenthau (his mentor) at the U. of Chicago and who I just saw in Vienna while at a conference there on Constitutional Justice.
November 27, 2025 at 4:12 PM
I knew Willi and visited him once at the FU--the summer of 1967. Probably happened due to Gerald Stourzh, who was a friend of my dad from hanging out with Hans Morgenthau (his mentor) at the U. of Chicago and who I just saw in Vienna while at a conference there on Constitutional Justice.
As a historian I'm not much of a hypothesis tester. But one could speculate that (a) the time spent together by "mixed" families will continue to decline ,or (b) the frequency of cases will diminish because such families can no longer stand each other ("a house divided against itself cannot stand")
November 27, 2025 at 3:37 PM
As a historian I'm not much of a hypothesis tester. But one could speculate that (a) the time spent together by "mixed" families will continue to decline ,or (b) the frequency of cases will diminish because such families can no longer stand each other ("a house divided against itself cannot stand")
Reminds me of a quasi-seminar I went to with Oscar Handlin circa 1971, including some visiting Russians. Handlin asked, how do historians know when a narrative should begin?Long earnest discussion followed. Then Oscar shrugged his shoulders and basically said, you just decide it somehow.
November 23, 2025 at 7:38 PM
Reminds me of a quasi-seminar I went to with Oscar Handlin circa 1971, including some visiting Russians. Handlin asked, how do historians know when a narrative should begin?Long earnest discussion followed. Then Oscar shrugged his shoulders and basically said, you just decide it somehow.
There are worse fates when one reads a serious and deeply learned book like Jim's.
November 23, 2025 at 3:46 PM
There are worse fates when one reads a serious and deeply learned book like Jim's.
Food fact you'll like: Kettner made fried bananas for us once when his grad school roommie was a future governor of Mississippi (talk about settler colonialism) and secretary of the navy. I have fond memories of Jim hard at work in the main reading room of Widener Library. A legend at Dwinelle Hall
November 23, 2025 at 12:12 PM
Food fact you'll like: Kettner made fried bananas for us once when his grad school roommie was a future governor of Mississippi (talk about settler colonialism) and secretary of the navy. I have fond memories of Jim hard at work in the main reading room of Widener Library. A legend at Dwinelle Hall
Looks like a go and will post it when it appears. Should be fun.
November 23, 2025 at 11:37 AM
Looks like a go and will post it when it appears. Should be fun.
If you are teaching AP, it might be fun to ask your students to read up on James Plumb Martin or, for that matter, Benedict Arnold (allegations of treason being much in the news these days).
As for watching I'll only say that I thought it pretty boring, visually, beyond my objections to the content.
As for watching I'll only say that I thought it pretty boring, visually, beyond my objections to the content.
November 23, 2025 at 12:27 AM
If you are teaching AP, it might be fun to ask your students to read up on James Plumb Martin or, for that matter, Benedict Arnold (allegations of treason being much in the news these days).
As for watching I'll only say that I thought it pretty boring, visually, beyond my objections to the content.
As for watching I'll only say that I thought it pretty boring, visually, beyond my objections to the content.
and the list could go on and on, which is exactly why studying the Revolution as a political event proves far more challenging and informative than retracing its military history, though of course that subject too is quite engaging
November 22, 2025 at 8:53 PM
and the list could go on and on, which is exactly why studying the Revolution as a political event proves far more challenging and informative than retracing its military history, though of course that subject too is quite engaging
Or maybe 5th grade if you just read the World Book, my go to encyclopedia when I attended the since-renamed J. J. Finley School (an obscure Confederate general) in Gainesville FL in 1956-57 and "edited" our class book on the Revolution.
November 22, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Or maybe 5th grade if you just read the World Book, my go to encyclopedia when I attended the since-renamed J. J. Finley School (an obscure Confederate general) in Gainesville FL in 1956-57 and "edited" our class book on the Revolution.
Definitely. But I think it is becoming much more complicated with the recent book by Kevin Kenny and the forthcoming book by @unlawfulentries.bsky.social (a.k.a. Anna Law). Although I still think my grad school friend Jim Kettner's book, The Development of American Citizenship, remains fundamental.
November 22, 2025 at 6:16 PM
Definitely. But I think it is becoming much more complicated with the recent book by Kevin Kenny and the forthcoming book by @unlawfulentries.bsky.social (a.k.a. Anna Law). Although I still think my grad school friend Jim Kettner's book, The Development of American Citizenship, remains fundamental.
Can I speak up as Mr. Articles of Confederation here? One could easily integrate the western-lands story of why it took over three years to get it ratified with the impact of the Revolution on native peoples.
November 22, 2025 at 4:12 PM
Can I speak up as Mr. Articles of Confederation here? One could easily integrate the western-lands story of why it took over three years to get it ratified with the impact of the Revolution on native peoples.
The concluding comments on the Constitution are essentially eighth-grade level.
November 22, 2025 at 12:16 PM
The concluding comments on the Constitution are essentially eighth-grade level.
I need a better definition than that, and Charles I might wish a word with you. And then there's the age-old question about the different models of revolution illustrated in the US and France. But my basic point is that the war subsumes everything and this political stuff is pretty marginal.
November 22, 2025 at 12:14 PM
I need a better definition than that, and Charles I might wish a word with you. And then there's the age-old question about the different models of revolution illustrated in the US and France. But my basic point is that the war subsumes everything and this political stuff is pretty marginal.
But that goes to my main point: what makes the Revolution revolutionary are the political changes that began when royal power collapsed in 1774-75? You can't talk about 1787 intelligently if you don't go back start to the creation of new governments in the mid-1770s, which the series fails to do.
November 22, 2025 at 6:16 AM
But that goes to my main point: what makes the Revolution revolutionary are the political changes that began when royal power collapsed in 1774-75? You can't talk about 1787 intelligently if you don't go back start to the creation of new governments in the mid-1770s, which the series fails to do.