FORMATION OF PARTNERSHIPS

 

The last posting reported that during the lifetime of the first generation of settlers in the New England colonial area a religious debate developed.  That contention pitted those who idealized religiosity being the product of the intellect as opposed to being more passionately based as expressions of the will.  The purpose of this posting is to contextualize the debate as one that did not challenge the basic federalist landscape that the colonists established under their covenantal arrangement.

          This landscape is described by Daniel Elazar,

 

Indeed, it is the development of the social, economic and constitutional as well as the political bases of American federalism in the colonial period that created the federalist political culture which influenced the framers of the Constitution to invent the federal system.  As in every other aspect of American life, the colonial background was crucial.  It was within the five generations of American colonial history that the basis was laid for a covenantal federalism.  Indeed, it was so well laid that Americans have taken it utterly for granted and have virtually ignored it ever since.[1]

 

This posting describes how this general relationship between federal thinking and the evolvement of basic social institutions among these settlers took form.  It is through institutional arrangements that one can detect and to a degree measure the attributes of a people’s culture, including its political culture.  One can term these arrangements as the “roots” of a culture and of its various components.

          Elazar focuses his commentary on the settlers’ economy, social structures and processes (along with their functions), and the religious elements.  One of the first points Elazar makes is that one can trace these developments all the way back to the Mayflower Compact (1620) and that he cites that document as an example of a covenant.  Why?  It is an agreement that situates its signees to unite in order to seek common purposes but with the understanding that each signee retains his/her “respective integrity.”[2]

          To further contextualize this development, one should keep in mind that among the colonies, there were countless expressions of unity.  They committed the involved participants to establish, maintain, and/or assume united efforts.  They were numerous covenants and compacts that the colonists drew up and agreed to from the time of the Mayflower Compact to the US Constitution[3] – and beyond in the years of this nation’s history.  They, the agreements, affected the behavior of colonists, but also affected their formation of their ideals – a reciprocal relationship.

          As for the economy, what federal/covenantal attributes can one detect?  There, one can find that British and Dutch trading companies were organized around federal elements.  They were royal entities that enjoyed monopolistic advantage, but they were also set up as shareholder ownership arrangements which, in turn, controlled their business operations. 

Often, these shareholders attempted to control their operations from Europe, but this eventually failed due to the long distances involved in handling the inherent politics.  There were exceptions in that in some limited cases the shareholders were themselves settlers.   Usually, these actors were politically influential individuals in the respective settlements who in addition to their political power also enjoyed economic power as well.  But the point is that this shareholder structure reinforced a federal model of organization. 

The organization of trading ships also provides an example.  On those ships, the typical organization had crew members sign up not merely as simple employees.  They instead signed a ship’s articles.  Through that instrument, these members agreed to submit to the ship’s authority, which was ultimately in the person of the captain, in exchange for an agreed upon portion of the ship’s profits.  This model interestingly reappeared in American history in the way wagon trains were organized as they made their way westward.  Each of these examples were incidents of efforts being arranged through the instrument of a compact.

Important to consider or recognize in these arrangements, is that the path leading to the necessary collaborative effort was this essential step in forming an agreement that held a level of sanctity (either religiously or securely based).  So, one would think that this model would apply to religious entities.  Did it?  Yes, and initially, as this blog has reported, that tie-in started with the Puritans. 

And, in turn, that Puritanical mode of organization can be traced to the biblical accounts of the Jewish covenant with God.  This is further cited due to the essential attributes that characterized those covenants.  While this agreement was believed to be with an all-powerful entity, God, the signees retained their integrity. 

Why?  Because only a sufficiently free agent can enter into a meaningful agreement.  While this calls on God to forsake a degree of His omnipotence, the resulting agreement is established as a partnership in its truest sense.  It also sets a foundation for human freedom since only a free person can enter into a true partnership.

Extending this basic relationship, therefore, one can deduce that all social or political arrangements derived their legitimacy from this basic covenant between humans and God, or in this case, the settlers and God.  Practically, this sets up the formation of congregations, townships, and more inclusive political/governmental arrangements all the way up to what would become state governments and the national government as well.

Okay, that might have happened in New England, how about in the other colonies farther south?  Elazar reports that roughly half of the churches established in the other colonies followed this congregational model.  In addition, he states that a significant number of townships were so organized. 

One area where this was commonly true was Virginia where Puritans had a clear presence.  Elazar writes, “Even after the eighteenth century secularization of the covenant idea, the camps of southwestern Missouri, central Colorado and the mother lode country of California, or in the agricultural settlements of the upper Midwest.”[4]  He goes on to describe how this prevalence led to an ideal, that of “federalistic individualism” (which this account will call “federal individualism”).

This individualism parts from what Elazar designates as Latin individualism which he describes as anarchic.  Instead, this individualism recognizes agreed to limitations on individual prerogatives so as to abide by covenantal or compact-al provisions.  But even in this, the individual retains his/her integrity.  What ideally results are subtle bonds of partnership. 

This holds that despite the challenges a diverse population presents to such bonds, this writer concludes that through waves of immigration, for example, a centered (to the elements of this partnership) pluralism should hold among the American people.[5]  This is a fairly nuanced ideal, but it is central to federalist thought.

Within this theorized construct one can detect and Elazar provides a functional definition for federalism.  It is:

 

… American pluralism is based upon the tacit recognition of those bonds.  Even though in the twentieth century the term pluralism has replaced all others in describing them, their federal character remains of utmost importance.  At its best, American society becomes a web of individual and communal partnerships in which people link with one another to accomplish common purposes or to create a common environment without falling into collectivism or allowing individualism to degenerate into anarchy.  These links usually manifest themselves in the web of associations which we associate with modern society but which are particularly characteristic of covenanted societies such as that of the United States.[6]

 

And with this last claim, unfortunately, this writer parts company with Elazar. 

Until his death, he claimed that in a dominant position of influence, if somewhat or significantly tacit, the US retained this ideal, which he and others call federalism.  This writer also calls it federalism but does not agree that it has retained its dominant position.  That change occurred in the years following World War II and what is dominant today is the natural rights construct.

But that is not to say all those years in which federalism was dominant did not leave its mark.  For example, much of what is described in this posting might seem necessary for a nation to be sufficiently cohesive.  The next posting will offer other ways to go about establishing and maintaining a polity.  This is deemed as important because what federalism offers seems, especially to Americans, often to be the only option available to a people.

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[1] Daniel J. Elazar, “How Federal Is the Constitution? Thoroughly,” in a booklet of readings, Readings for Classes Taught by Professor Elazar, prepared for a National Endowment for the Humanities Institute (conducted in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, 1994), 1-30, 9.

[2] This aspect is very important in theorizing the attributes of federation theory.  To consider this aspect, the reader is directed to read this blogger’s book, Toward a Federated Nation and its description of regulated equality.  In turn, he counts on the arguments of Philip Selznick.  See Robert Gutierrez, Toward a Federated Nation:  Implementing National Civics Standards (Tallahassee, FL:  Gravitas/Civics Books, 2020) AND Philip Selznick, The Moral Commonwealth:  Social Theory and the Promise of Community (Berkeley, CA:  University of California Press, 1992).

[3] Donald S. Lutz (ed.), Colonial Origins of the American Constitution:  A Documentary History (Indianapolis, IN:  Liberty Fund,1998).

[4] Elazar, “How Federal Is the Constitution? Thoroughly,” 10.

[5] See Robert Gutierrez, “A Case for Centered Pluralism,” Curriculum and Teaching Dialogue 5, 1 (2003), 71-82.

[6] Elazar, “How Federal Is the Constitution? Thoroughly,”, 11 (emphasis added).