> Behalf Of Andrea Leistra
> On Sun, 17 Dec 2000, Gautam Mukunda wrote:
> [The Founders]
> > They certainly didn't think of themselves that way. They thought
of
> > themselves as Americans first, and citizens of their respective
states
> > second.
>
> That's interesting.
>
> I had always heard, and conventional wisdom certainly has it, that
> it was the other way round, that they (and most Americans) thought
> of themselves as citizens of their states first, and as Americans
> second. Are you saying that wasn't in fact the case?
> --
> Andrea Leistra [EMAIL PROTECTED]
It's a question of interpretation, I think. I would agree that most
Americans certainly thought of themselves as citizens of their states
_first_. The particular people who made up the Founding Fathers,
though, were, you might say, on the right hand side of the spectrum.
They were pretty much the most nationalistic people in America -
that's why they got together to write the Constitution in the first
place. It's hard to know for sure - and I wrote that hastily or I
would have been less definitive, and it certainly varies from person
to person. But I do think that Washington, for example, thought of
himself as an American more than a Virginian, as Adams did the same
for Massachusetts, and his actions do seem to bear that out.
********************Gautam "Ulysses" Mukunda**********************
* Harvard College Class of '01 *He either fears his fate too much*
* www.fas.harvard.edu/~mukunda * Or his deserts are small, *
* [EMAIL PROTECTED] *Who dares not put it to the touch*
* "Freedom is not Free" * To win or lose it all. *
******************************************************************
