Founding Finance: How Debt, Speculation, Foreclosures, Protests and Crackdowns Made Us a Nation

Arguments over taxation and “constitutional conservatism” are nothing new, William Hogeland points out. His new book brings to life the violent conflicts over economics, class, and finance that played directly into the hardball politics of forming the nation and ratifying the Constitution — conflicts that still affect our politics, legislation, and national debate.

Hogeland exposes and corrects a perpetual historical denial — by movements across the political spectrum — of America’s all-important founding economic clashes, a denial that he maintains cheapens public discourse on American finance just when we need it most.