With the entry of the Tea Party onto the US political scene, America's Constitution has become a political battleground, with liberals and conservatives trading fire over its meaning and intent. Amid all the hubbub, historian Ray Raphael was struck by how much both sides got wrong, and how falsehoods have largely overtaken history in Americans' understanding of the nation's most important document. In Constitutional Myths, he sorts out the truth from fiction, juxtaposing what historians know about the Constitution with what most Americans and politicians think they know.

About the Author

Ray Raphael is a Senior Research Fellow with Humboldt State University in Northern California. His sixteen books include A People's History of the American Revolution; Founding Myths: Stories That Hide Our Patriotic Past; and Mr. President: How and Why the Founders Created a Chief Executive.

Reviews
Praise for Constitutional Myths:
"Take off your rose-colored glasses, people: The Founding Fathers embraced a strong federal government, at the risk of falling into anarchy and disintegration. Therein lies the kernel of the author's readable demystification of some of the ongoing crusades by conservatives touting the supremacy of "originalism." With documents amply provided at the close of the text, Raphael provides a truly accessible teaching tool."
Kirkus

"Wonderfully lucid and highly informative."
Edward J. Larson, Pulitzer Prize winning author of A Magnificent Catastrophe

"[A]n adept corrective to some of the most strident imbalances in contemporary debates over the implications of the Founding."
Political Science Quarterly

"An extraordinarily important and nuanced work of history that places the Constitution, and the men who created it, in their proper eighteenth-century context."
Richard R. Beeman, author of Plain Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution.




Book Information
ISBN 9781620971345
Author Ray Raphael
Format Paperback
Page Count 336
Imprint The New Press
Publisher The New Press
Weight(grams) 455g