In his The Origins and Progress of the American Revolution, loyalist Peter Oliver spoke of the New England clergy as the “black regiment” of the Revolution who, “tinctured with republicanism,” supported the war for independence. John Witherspoon was a New Jersey Presbyterian, but he might well fit Oliver's description. He brought Princeton University to the side of the Revolution, mentored the first generation of the new regime's leadership, served in the Continental Congress, signed the Declaration of Independence, and was an active supporter of the Constitution. Yet while Witherspoon was highly praised by his contemporaries, who predicted that he would be honored by later generations of Americans, he instead became a neglected figure with few memorials erected in his name. Somehow, despite credentials that compared favorably to Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Hamilton, fame deserted him. Jeffry H. Morrison's engaging and enthusiastic study of John Witherspoon attempts to redeem him as a “forgotten founder.”

Morrison attributes Witherspoon's invisibility to a number of factors, including the destruction of many of his papers, some by British troops and some by his own hand, and possible antipathy to clerics in politics. Most prominent, however, is the later consensus that Witherspoon was an “unoriginal” political thinker “not worth the effort it would take to read through the multivolume Works, provided a circulating copy could be had” (p. 18). Morrison struggles with this assertion and devises various approaches to overcome it. First, he suggests that Witherspoon's contributions to American political thought should be judged through the achievements of his students. He contends, for example, that Madison's religious views can be traced to the influence of his former teacher. Witherspoon's defense of religious liberty was advocated by Madison. So too, argues, Morrison, can the notion of a “public religion” respectful of minorities be traced to Witherspoon. His introduction of the principles of the Scottish Enlightenment, particularly moral sense philosophy, is also given extensive treatment. Morrison credits Witherspoon with almost single-handedly carrying its precepts across the Atlantic.

The problem with this approach is that it is very circumstantial. Morrison at one point suggests that Madison's pessimistic assessment of human nature was derived from Witherspoon's Calvinism and that one can “feel a reverberation” of Witherspoon's doctrine of the independence of religion from the state in Federalist #51 (p. 40). In another instance, he notes that Jefferson mentioned the “very same three” exemplars—Locke, Bacon, Newton—as did Witherspoon in his Lectures on Moral Philosophy. Given the complexity of relationship between students and teachers generally, perhaps Morrison is correct in Madison's case to suggest parallel positions as evidence of influence, but this leaves open the question of whether Madison's views on human nature were derived from other sources as well. The Calvinist dispositions in the Lectures were hardly unique in eighteenth-century America, nor was a profound skepticism about setting up a “theocracy” after the Revolution. Sometimes, too, a mentoring relationship can be just as importantly established through an analysis of the student's rejection or modification of his teacher's views. Were Madison's changing positions on religion and politics a kind of negative influence, an inventive engagement with Calvinist and nascent liberal sensibilities? Similar doubts arise with Morrison's case for Witherspoon's influence on the founders through his teachings on the Scottish Enlightenment. Moreover, even granted Morrison's contention, does it matter that the founders were acquainted with moral sense philosophy? Jefferson used the doctrine to solidify racist sentiments. Morrison believes that moral sense philosophy “inoculated” American revolutionaries from the excesses that later arose in the French Revolution, which if true would place us all in Wintherspoon's debt, but plain old Calvinism might have been enough.

Another tactic used by Morrision is his assertion that all Americans were unreceptive to political theory, preferring always to approach issues from the standpoint of the “practical and experimental” (p. 118). This Boorstinism is supplemented by an acknowledgement of liberal, biblical, and republican strands in America, but for Morrison, all of these blend into a melodious “chorus of many voices and many parts” (p. 122). Thus, Witherspoon's eclecticism and lack of originality are an almost exact replica of American political culture in general: “Perhaps more than any other single founder, Witherspoon embodied all the major intellectual and social elements behind the founding” (p. 127). Morrison treads a fine line between the exceptional and the typical on this point, but he attempts to resolve the contradiction by contending that Witherspoon combined these strands more elegantly than any of his “more verbose brother founders” (p. 3).

A case can be made for Witherspoon, however, that proceeds from almost an opposite direction. What is so intriguing about him is not so much his talents as a synthesizer but his capacity to swiftly embrace and act upon discordant elements of a new political culture. This aspect of his political theorizing is most evident not from his stolid Lectures but from his addresses and sermons. When criticized by Scottish authorities for his lack of patriotism in urging his countrymen to emigrate to America, Witherspoon replied that a true patriot works to help his nation's people. Emigration did threaten the interests of landowners who could no longer command high rents but, as Winthrop wrote in a letter to Scots Magazine, “is this a liberal way of thinking, to say that a man is an enemy to his country when he promotes the happiness of the great body of its people with a small dimunition of the interest of a handful?” (Thomas Miller, ed., The Selected Works of John Witherspoon, 1990, p. 28). Jefferson could not have written a sharper reply. In his An Address to the Natives of Scotland residing in America three years later in 1774, Witherspoon argued that since America was being created voluntarily and not by the “caprices” of kings, it had the potential to be a unique commonwealth in human history. Two years later, he reiterated a fundamental truth derived from his Calvinist beliefs. Religious and political freedom must both be supported because “there is not a single instance in history in which civil liberty was lost, and religious liberty preserved entire” (Miller, pp. 140–41). In a speech before Congress, “Upon the Confederation,” Witherspoon, risking the conclusion that he had become “visionary and romantic,” suggested that proper constitutional arrangements, such as a “balance of power,” could actually change human nature itself. As president of Princeton, he purged the faculty of conservative elements and transformed the university into a modern institution by introducing English and reducing the study of classics, and encouraging civic obligations (even to the point of collecting revolutionary pamphlets by students). It is perhaps this jerky aspect of his political thought, as well as his ability to move with striking rapidity to new positions rather than any pragmatism and empiricism, that may better explain Witherspoon's genius as revolutionary and founder.

Assessing the stature of any political theorist, however, is a difficult task, particularly for a neglected one in the American context. Morrison deserves much commendation for his efforts.