Michael Barone, the senior political analyst at the Washington Examiner and resident fellow emeritus at the American Enterprise Institute, has written a rather interesting geographical and geopolitical analyses of six men from the founding generation. For all that has been written of these men, or at least almost all of them, Barone’s perspective is taken literally from the ground up.
Of the six men discussed in “Mental Maps of the Founders: How Geographic Imagination Guided America’s Revolutionary Leaders,” five―Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison―are usual suspects often found under the label of American Founders, but the sixth, Albert Gallatin, was indeed a surprising, but refreshing choice. For all six, Barone dissects in essay form how the land from which they sprung, and even lands where they had never ventured, formed their thinking and visions of America and its future.
While Franklin and Jefferson stand out for their extensive travels, it was Washington and Hamilton, at least for this reader, who seemed truly transformed by their geography. Barone sustains his thesis thoroughly with Washington and Hamilton, though it seemed more difficult to obtain the same success with the other four. Though not a failure in any sense, the other four did fall short of the author’s explanation of how geography influenced America’s first president and first secretary of treasury.
Barone’s Best Bits
Washington’s experience as a surveyor and farmer developed his mental maps. These maps guided him as a general in his understanding of how the terrain could be used as a military advantage. They also assisted him as a landowner and during his presidency: He knew how geography could develop his personal economy and the national economy. Hamilton’s upbringing in the Caribbean, where maritime trade and commerce ruled, provided him a vision of how to capitalize on international trade and commerce. Barone demonstrates masterfully the mental mapping that both of these men applied to the new nation through domestic and foreign policy, and how their view of the world, whether in politics or economics, still affects modern Americans.While the work laid out important features of each founders’ mental mapping, most interesting was that many of their views differed, although that didn’t necessarily mean they conflicted. There was conflict to be sure, as Barone exemplifies through Washington’s presidential term, where Jefferson and Hamilton often butted heads. Washington typically sided with Hamilton, especially in terms of finance, commerce, and economics.
Found throughout much of the book, accounts show that the headstrong Hamilton was often in conflict with others. In the section on Madison, Barone writes, “Hamilton, as always, was operating from a mental map, focusing on the invisible lines of trade routes across the Atlantic and potentially farther around the world. Madison, as always, was operating from my mental map in which almost all American growth for at least a generation or two would―or should―consist of an expansion of small farmers west and southwest of Virginia, filling in the countryside south of the Ohio River and heading east toward the Mississippi and perhaps, as in Jefferson’s Notes, continuing beyond.”
For those with a keen interest in learning more about early America and some of its founders, Barone’s “Mental Maps of the Founders” is an enjoyable read. It does offer a new way to think about some of the founders, though the book itself is hardly groundbreaking (no pun intended). For readers just learning about the founders, this book also works as a nice introduction.
Revolutionary Leaders."
