October 27, 1787....

Please note the names of the following writers that wrote under the nom-de-plume, Publius, are credited with producing the Federalist Papers and compare them to the name of this blog. As far as I am concerned, these three guys are among the most important people of the past 500 years.

A New York newspaper published the first of 77 essays explaining the new Constitution and urging its ratification, written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay and later combined as The Federalist Papers.

Milton Friedman was not an inspiration for this blog but was an inspiration for me as were several University of Chicago thinkers. So Milton is really Alexander Hamilton, J. is John Jay and Madison is James Madison.

Madison is generally credited as the father of the Constitution and became the fourth President of the United States. Hamilton was an influential delegate at the Constitutional Convention, and later the first Secretary of the Treasury. John Jay would become the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Hamilton penned the majority and Madison made several significant contributions to the series. Jay, who fell ill early in the project, wrote but five.

I think the name of my blog is quite clever.

The American Constitution has proves to be the foundation of the American success and has also proved to be flexible and able to change with the times. These writers wrote essays published in the newspapers of the day that were designed to influence public opinion to accept and ratify the document.

The Federalist Papers serve as a primary source for interpretation of the Constitution, as they outline the philosophy and motivation of the proposed system of government. The authors of the Federalist Papers were not above using the opportunity to provide their own "spin" on certain provisions of the constitution to (i) influence the vote on ratification and (ii) influence future interpretations of the provisions in question.