The Summer of 1787: The Men Who Invented the Constitution (The Simon & Schuster America Collection) | 
 enlarge | Author: David O. Stewart
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Category: Book
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Rating:  36 reviews
Sales Rank: 91455
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 368
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.1 x 1
ISBN: 0743286936
Dewey Decimal Number: 342
EAN: 9780743286930
ASIN: 0743286936
Publication Date: May 20, 2008
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Product Description
The successful creation of the Constitution is a suspense story. The Summer of 1787 takes us into the sweltering room in which delegates struggled for four months to produce the flawed but enduring document that would define the nation -- then and now.George Washington presided, James Madison kept the notes, Benjamin Franklin offered wisdom and humor at crucial times. The Summer of 1787 traces the struggles within the Philadelphia Convention as the delegates hammered out the charter for the world's first constitutional democracy. Relying on the words of the delegates themselves to explore the Convention's sharp conflicts and hard bargaining, David O. Stewart lays out the passions and contradictions of the often painful process of writing the Constitution. It was a desperate balancing act. Revolutionary principles required that the people have power, but could the people be trusted? Would a stronger central government leave room for the states? Would the small states accept a Congress in which seats were alloted according to population rather than to each sovereign state? And what of slavery? The supercharged debates over America's original sin led to the most creative and most disappointing political deals of the Convention. The room was crowded with colorful and passionate characters, some known -- Alexander Hamilton, Gouverneur Morris, Edmund Randolph -- and others largely forgotten. At different points during that sultry summer, more than half of the delegates threatened to walk out, and some actually did, but Washington's quiet leadership and the delegates' inspired compromises held the Convention together. In a country continually arguing over the document's original intent, it is fascinating to watch these powerful characters struggle toward consensus -- often reluctantly -- to write a flawed but living and breathing document that could evolve with the nation.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 31 more reviews...
 Three Stars August 9, 2008
This book was an exciting telling of the events of that wonderful summer. However, I would have prefered more analyse of the events rather than straight story telling. Also for a book subtitled "The Men Who Invented the Constitution" it gives only basic biographical information of the men. The author also did not use footnotes which made it difficult to track down further information. An example of this would be the author citing another persons work, "A scholar once said..." and it wouldnt be given a reference number to the idex, so this basicly made it impossible to match up citations. Another downside is this book does not mention the judiciary. I know there was minimal debate over the judiciary at the convention, but it still deserves at least a few pages worth of ink. To conclude, those who are looking to read the basic story of how the United States constitution was made this book is for you. Those looking for deeper analyse should try another book.
 Like Making Sausage July 25, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Twain once said that there are two things you don't want to see made - sausages and laws. This is certainly true for the making of our Constitution and Mr. Stewart takes the reader into the kitchen to see how it was made.
This is a riveting account of the Constitutional Convention in 1787 where a host of interesting characters muddled, blundered, compromised, posed, blustered and worked diligently to come up with what is considered the greatest work of republican government. It wasn't pretty but the delegates got the job done.
Mr. Stewart provides a fast-paced and clear account of the convention with very good thumbnail sketches of the participants. There are no grand theorums in the book. This is straight historical writing; which is a good thing, because the history is often over-looked for the theorizing and "spinning".
What the reader does learn, in addition to what happened that fateful summer is just how difficult a task it is to come up with an entire scheme of government from a perfectly clean slate. No country had attempted to form such a government and no one knew, even after the Constitution was completed, just what the government would look like and how it would function.
This is an extremely good account that keeps the reader's attention throughout.
A Fascinating Read on Many Levels July 22, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I took this book on my vacation to Hawaii and found that it was hard to put down. It was engaging, briskly written, and a fascinating insight into the men who wrote our Constitution, their biases, foibles, and prejudices drawn from the records, notes and letters of those involved. Author David Stewart spends a little time setting the historical context and then moves right into the topic. It helps to visit the America's most historic mile in Philadelphia to get a feel for what Stewart describes, but it is by no means necessary.
In addition, the book is a remarkable study in negotiation. There were certainly many compromises and trade-offs made in the drafting of the U.S. Constitution, and if anything, Stewart spends a little too much time discussing slavery, but that is, in retrospect, perhaps appropriate in that the compromises made to accommodate slavery in the Constitution shaped the history of America thereafter.
The one area where Stewart gets off base, in my view, is near the very end when he criticizes the Electoral College process for selecting the President and suggests that a direct election would be preferable. The Founders knew better, and many of the issues that Stewart spends a great deal of time discussing in the book are lost in what is his seeming disappointment at the outcome of the 2000 election. After all, the Founders were concerned that the President would be the head of a Federal group of States, not of the most people. A direct election would cause candidates to focus just on the most populous areas and not on the several states. Without the Electoral College, the two party system would crumble into a number of splinter groups, and candidates would rarely be elected with more than 50% of the vote. In addition, the Electoral College has the effect of turning close elections into landslides when the electors are counted, with the result that the President becomes the elected head of the United States, not just of those states with the most people in them.
Aside from this criticism, though, Stewart's effort is a good one and an enjoyable read.
History goes Mainstream July 7, 2008
The Summer of 1787 adds nothing new to the mountains of work on the subject. However, this does not seem to be the intent of the author. Rather than add to a subject that has been analized inside out, Mr. Stewart attempts to bring History to a mainstream audience. The writing style is interesting and readable (more as a narrative with a cast of characters than as a scholarly work of History).
The Summer of 1787 reminds everyone that the Founding Generation was just human like the rest of us. Their work, the U.S. Constitution, has developed a following that revere it almost as its own religion. Mr. Stewart bravely reminds them that it was written by mere mortals, and thus succeptible to our flaws, mistakes, and self interest.
Mr. Stewart grounds the "Founding Fathers" in reality like few authors in the past century have dared. He reminds us that their work was a product of hurried compromise, not the well planned Balance of Power we were taught in school. He is not afraid to point out its faults (putting off the slavery question for future generations to consider, &tc.).
This book is not for the experienced scholar, there is nothing new here. However, The Summer of 1787 is a must-read for everyone else.
 Excellent Analysis July 6, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The Summer of 1787 is quite simply a well written book. The author very skillfully presents both sketches of the participant personalities and the
events that transpired. If you want to know about the significant elements of the Constitution and how they were included, this is the book to read.
The author excels at explaining the impact of the subject of slave states
versus free states. What I wanted to do as a reader was visit the events
of the Constitutional Convention, learn what happened, and learn who was there and what they did. I accomplished these goals. This is a straight forward book which is quite readable from the prose standpoint. It gives
you what you need to know but also piques one's interest to learn more
about some of the specifics.
Richard Macomber
Cape Coral, FL
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