The Pursuit of Liberty: How Hamilton vs. Jefferson Ignited the Lasting Battle Over Power in America

The bestselling author of The Pursuit of Happiness shows how the opposing constitutional visions of Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton have defined our country for 250 years, influenced presidents from Washington to Trump, and continue to drive the debate over the power of government today.

In The Pursuit of Liberty, bestselling author and president of the National Constitution Center Jeffrey Rosen explores the clashing visions of Hamilton and Jefferson about how to balance liberty and power in a debate that continues to define--and divide--our country: Jefferson championed states’ rights and individual liberties, while Hamilton pushed for a strong Federal government and a powerful executive. This ongoing tug-of-war has shaped all the pivotal moments in American history, including Abraham Lincoln’s fight against slavery and southern secession, the expansion of federal power under Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, and Ronald Reagan’s and Donald Trump’s conservative push to shrink the size of the federal government.

Rosen also shows how Hamilton and Jefferson’s disagreement over how to read the Constitution has shaped landmark debates in Congress and the Supreme Court about executive power, from John Marshall’s early battles with Andrew Jackson to the current divisions among the justices on issues from presidential immunity to control over the administrative state.

More than ever, the clash between Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian ideals resonates today in our most urgent national debates over the question of whether modern presidents are consolidating power and subverting the Constitution--the very threat to American democracy that both Hamilton and Jefferson were determined to avoid. The Pursuit of Liberty is a compelling history of the opposing forces that have shaped our country since its founding, and the ongoing struggle to define the balance between liberty and power.

Jeffrey Rosen is President and CEO of the National Constitution Center, where he hosts We the People, a weekly podcast of constitutional debate. He is also a professor of law at the George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor at The Atlantic. Rosen is a graduate of Harvard College, Oxford University, and Yale Law School. He is the author of nine books, including the New York Times bestsellers The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America and Conversations with RBG: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Life, Love, Liberty, and Law. His essays and commentaries have appeared in The New York Times Magazine; on NPR; in TheNew Republic, where he was the legal affairs editor; and in The New Yorker, where he has been a staff writer.