Forming American Politics: Ideals, Interests, and Institutions in Colonial New York and Pennsylvania

Originally published in 1994. In this pathbreaking book Alan Tully offers an unprecedented comparative study of colonial political life and a rethinking of the foundations of American political culture. Tully chooses for his comparison the two colonies that arguably had the most profound impact on American political history—New York and Pennsylvania, the rich and varied colonies at the geographical and ideological center of British colonial America.

Fundamental to the book is Tully's argumen...