The Federalist Papers

By: Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay

Narrated by: Alastair Cameron

Length: 19 hrs and 10 mins

Publisher's Summary

Written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, The Federalist Papers have long been considered to be some of the most important works in political science ever written.

The Federalist Papers establishes a method of constitutional government that was the building block for the type of government the United States has operated under for over 200 years. At the time, the idea that man has a basic right be self-governing was considered radical but these ideas grew in popularity prior to and during the American Revolutionary War.

This collection of essays and articles was originally published serially in the Independent Journal and the New York Packet between October 1787 and August 1788 and would later become known as The Federalist Papers. The authors published the collection hoping to influence the vote to ratify what would later become the Constitution and the cornerstone of the United States of America.

Public Domain (P)2017 A.R.N. Publications

A Great Constitutional Refreshment

With so much political discord these days, I think The Federalist Papers is a great educational read for people that are interested in U.S. history and the intentions of our founding fathers…

At the time the Federalist Papers were published there was a lot of opposition to the idea of the Constitution. These publications were written to convince the public of how important the Constitution was to the stability of the Union.

If you’re debating whether to listen to this book or actually read it, you may want to take into consideration the length of the book and all the old English that’s in it, which may make the reading aspect more difficult rather than listening to it in my opinion. The narrator has a very pleasant voice and his accent gives you a nice feel to that era…

Overall this is a very interesting book that history aficionados will enjoy, and can learn a lot from in regards to the foundation of the United States Government.

27 of 27 people found this review helpful

The Foundation of the Constitution

Heard this title referenced numerous times in political talk shows and thought I’d give it a listen. It really opens your eyes as to how this great country’s foundation was built from the ground up in a very detailed manor. Kuddos to the narrator who did a marvelous job with this book. Can’t recommend this any higher!

12 of 12 people found this review helpful

Evan Review

This isn't a book for everyone. If you want to understand the reasons for the constitution ratification plus and interpretation by the authors Hamilton, Madison, and Jay this book is for you. I strongly believe that if you are a candidate for a public office and sorwn in to uphold the constitution you need to understand the document that you sworn to uphold.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

great support information for constitutional study

excellent for students of the Constitution and also for any American that wants to understand our freedoms better. narration is good. this is not a narrative explaining some interpretations but the actual text of the papers which is great.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Mispronounced Worda and Weird Verbal Inflections

I jave tried for 18 sections to acclimate to the narrators strange way of pronouncing words, and I just can't. Ill return this book and find one that is understandable. This work is too important to be muddied up by "artistic license".

This guy talks like a droid.

But not like a sincere earnest droid, like C-3PO, more like a mounted head, divested of its body, mechanically and perversely kept alive for a century, in which the only activity available was to memorize The Federalist Papers, and after achieving that, to recite it by reeling it off as rapidly as possible, without true inflection, barely pausing for breath, only the droning on and on and on in the monotone of every mounted head that ever existed, stereotypically searching for any purpose at all in its peerless eternal half life, and concurrently milking its listener of joy, liveliness, and connection, which can be detected before the reading of the second federalist paper begins by glancing into the glazed, surprised and disappointed eyes of said listener.

I thought the narration could have been better.

Not As Good As Its Reputation

Hamilton admits right at the beginning that he and Madison and Jay are writing as partisan defenders of the proposed constitution. But admitting the flaw is not the same as it not being there.

One grating feature is that they repeatedly argue that various features of the proposed constitution were the result of impartial consideration when we know that they were actually political compromises. An example is slaves counting as 3/5 of a voter in apportioning congressional seats. There was no rational reason for this whatever except that it was the product of a compromise. Since they could not vote there was no reason for them to have congressmen to represent them as voters. If they were to be represented as people, they were entitled to full representation. Defending 3/5 was ridiculous, Founding Father or no.

Also annoying is the fact that it was written specifically for the voters of New York since their ratifying vote was coming up, and addresses no other voters.

Another jarring note is that it was written before the inclusion of the Bill of Rights at the insistence of Rhode Island two years after the other states had all ratified. Hearing them insist that explicit guarantees of rights were not necessary is disturbing in view of the all the good things that have flowed from the Bill of Rights over the centuries, particularly the First Amendment. Considering how large a role the First, Second, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments have played in our history, hindsight shows how very wrong they were.

Also their insistence that the rights of the people would be respected because if the proposed federal government behaved badly, the remedy of the people was revolution. That was a stupid argument even at the time, especially in New York, which of all the colonies had seen the least revolutionary activity during the Revolutionary War.

We see now how tragically wrong and short-sighted such a prescription was. From Gettysburg to Atlanta and Vicksburg, armies of the dead mutely testify to how unthinking the Founding Fathers were in suggesting revolution as a way to enforce the political contract underlying the constitution.

It is hard to imagine reading it without knowing of the war that was to come seventy years later, but to the extent that I could, it felt irresponsible and puerile. We marvel at how young the Foundiing Fathers were, but it was not always a virtue. I don't think older men would have been so cavalier.

9 of 26 people found this review helpful

The reader is mind numbingly boring.

I like the machine-read text much better than this human reader. His voice is not bad, but the cadence is awful. There is little emphasis, very flat. Stultifying.

0 of 1 people found this review helpful

Terrible narration

This narration is horrible. The cadence and stressing of articles is like nails on a chalkboard.

0 of 1 people found this review helpful

Intriguing

200+ years later and the Federalist Papers can still walk you through the conception of the United States. It tells you enough to give a glimpse of understanding but also makes it obvious that some topics they weren't really sure about themselves and so they were left open for posterity to ponder.

0 of 1 people found this review helpful