Constitutional Development in the South Atlantic States, 1776-1860..

2008. ISBN-13: 9781584779285; ISBN-10: 1584779284. Green, Fletcher M. Constitutional Development in the South Atlantic States, 1776-1860. A Study in the Evolution of Democracy. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1930. xiv, 328 pp. Reprinted 2008 by The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. ISBN-13: 978-1-58477-928-5. ISBN-10: 1-58477-928-4. Cloth. Cover lightly bumped. Very good. $15. * Green analyzes two interpretations of the constitutional history of Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. One says that they were so dominated by the slave-holding planter class that few if any democratic aspects appeared before the Civil War overthrew this group. The other theory accepts the dominance of the planters, but holds that the South was still democratic because the planters ruled by the consent and in the interests of the general population. Green evaluates these theories and concludes that both are partially true. "Students of constitutional history are indebted to Dr. Green for the clear and scholarly way that he has unfolded the political and economic ideas that lay buried in the tangled web of the debates of the constitutional conventions of the South Atlantic states.": J.E. Pate, The William and Mary Quarterly, Second Series, Vol. 11, No. 3 (July 1931) 276.