Forrest McDonald

Forrest McDonald (1927- ) is an American historian who has written extensively on the early national period, on republicanism, and on the presidency. He is Distinguished University Research Professor Emeritus at the University of Alabama and is considered a leading conservative scholar.

He was born in Orange, Texas, Jan 7, 1927. He earned his BA and PhD degrees (1955) from the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied under Fulmer Mood. He worked at the American History Research Center at the Wisconsin State Historical Society then taught at Brown (1959-67), Wayne State (1967-76), and Alabama (1976 to present).

In We The People: The Economic Origins of the Constitution he argued that Charles Beard had misinterpreted the economic interests involved in writing the Constitution. Instead of just two interests, landed and mercantile interests, which conflicted, there were three dozen identifiable interests that forced the delegates to bargain.

• Online Bio-Bibliography

His books

• Let There Be Light: The Electric Utility Industry in Wisconsin (Madison: American History Research Center, 1957)
• We The People: The Economic Origins of the Constitution (University of Chicago Press, 1958; new ed. Transaction, 1992)
• Insull (University of Chicago Press, 1962)
• E Pluribus Unum: The Formation of the American Republic (Houghton-Mifflin, 1965; new ed., Liberty Press, 1979)
• The Presidency of George Washington (University Press of Kansas, 1974, paperback ed., 1985) excerpt and text search
• The Phaeton Ride: The Crisis of American Success (Doubleday, 1974)
• The Presidency of Thomas Jefferson (University Press of Kansas, 1976; paperback ed., 1987) excerpt and text search
• Alexander Hamilton: A Biography (Norton, 1979; paperback ed., 1980) online edition; also excerpt and text search
• The American People, textbook with David Burner and Eugene D. Genovese; Revisionary Press, 1980 online edition
• Novus Ordo Seclorum: The Intellectual Origins of the Constitution (University Press of Kansas, 1985; paperback ed., 1987) excerpt and text search
• Requiem: Variations on Eighteenth-Century Themes (University Press of Kansas, 1988), with Ellen Shapiro McDonald
• The American Presidency: An Intellectual History (University Press of Kansas, 1994; paperback ed., 1995) excerpt and text search
• States' Rights and the Union: Imperium in Imperio, 1776-1876 (University Press of Kansas, 2000) excerpt and text search
• Recovering the Past: A Historian's Memoir (2004), autobiography excerpt and text search