American Ideals and American Thought: Liberalism and Republicanism in the American Revolution

Dr. Andrew Wilkins from the Wright State Civics Center will present this professional development seminar. What did “freedom” mean to the American founders? This talk traces the two main intellectual traditions they drew on—liberalism and republicanism—and shows how they combined them rather than treating them as opposites. By looking at thinkers from Machiavelli and Locke to Jefferson, Adams, and Madison, the session explains how the Revolution and Constitution were designed to create a political system that could actually sustain liberty in practice.