Invisible Sovereign: Imagining Public Opinion from the Revolution to Reconstruction

This history of early American political thought examines the emergence, evolution, and manipulation of public opinion.

In the early American republic, the concept of public opinion was a recent—and ambiguous—invention. While appearing to promise a new style of democratic politics, the concept was also invoked to limit self-rule, cement traditional prejudices, stall deliberation, and marginalize dissent. As Americans contested the meaning of this essentially contestable idea, they expand...