of evil, etc., etc., have floated away,ndrifted away after the first third of thenbook to be replaced by stories of work atnthe office, Andy’s Bar Mitzvah andnmother-daughter reunions. All of thisnwandering away from topics or themesnof any significance makes Ghost Waltzna flawed and limited work. Rather thanna reflection on history, human valuesnor human motivations. Ghost Waltznbecomes instead only a chatty book, ofninterest, perhaps, to Day’s friends, whonmay find descriptions of her life andnmusings of value. The reader who seeksnfrom Ghost Waltz an understanding ofnthe topics the book purports to investi­ngate will be severely disappointed by itsnlack of focus and design and severelynfrustrated by its aimless rambling fromntopic to topic. Had Day desired to writena diary of her thoughts over the yearsnon her family and her life. Ghost Waltznwould be an effective, though uninteresting,nmeans to accomplish that end.nAs a book which lays claim to somenmeasure of authenticity and some measurenof concern with significant issues.nGhost Waltz is a failure. Day is not anphilosopher, neither is she an historian;nwhy she would endeavor to write a worknrequiring skills she does not possess onencan only wonder. nnSubverting History & TraditionnGarry Wills: Explaining America:nThe Federalist; Doubleday & Co.;nNew York.nHarry C. Boyte: The BackyardnRevolution: Understanding the NewnCitizen Movement; Temple UniversitynPress; Philadelphia.nMichael Walzer: Radical Principles:nReflections of an UnreconstructednDemocrat; Basic Books; New York.nby Edward J. LynchnAmerican politics is commonlyncharacterized as nontheoretical politics.nOur national debates lack the contributionsnof a Plato, an Aristotle, a Hobbesnor a Rousseau. Many of our scholarsnactually revel in the absence of this theoreticalndimension, claiming that itnenables us to avoid much of the turmoilnassociated with such fundamentalnthinking. The only book that appears tonchallenge this stand is The Federalist,nand most Americans avoid the theoreticalnquestions tackled there by ignoringnthe book. Garry Wills’s interpretationnDr. Lynch did his doctoral dissertationnon The Federalist.n18nChronicles of Culturenof the eighty-five essays comprising thatnvolume is one of the handful of booksnpublished in this country devoted tonthis defense of the Philadelphia Constitution.nAlthough the Wills essay hasnsome merit, one can still say that wenare awaiting the first accurate interpretationnof The Federalist, one that takesnthe book on its own terms, using it tonargue against those elements of the philosophicntradition that it rejects, buildingnon the blocks that it provides andnseeing the profundity of the actual work.nTo date, no one seems to have read thenbook whole.nThe absence of an accurate understandingnof The Federalist to informnour political discussion is one indicationnof the extent to which the Americannpeople have become divorced from theirnheritage. Each of the volumes discussednin this review contributes to this separationnin its own way. Nonetheless,neach of these volumes reflects powerfulntrends in current political thinking, andnthe distance between them and ThenFederalist demonstrates the degree tonwhich “We the People” have lost vitalnparts of our tradition of liberty.nWne can properly appreciate the revolutionaryncharacter of Publius’s worknnnonly by placing The Federalist back intonthe context in which its authors wrote.nThe modern world assumes the desirabilitynof the democratic form of government.nUntil the completion of thenAmerican Revolution, however, democracynwas a form of government thatnlived in a state of disrepute. Athens hadnindeed provided a model of democracy,nas had many other Greek city-states.nThese ancient models had hardly providedna shining example to others whonwould institute democratic government,nhowever. To read the popular impressionnof democracy reflected in ThenFederalist reminds one of a rathernHobbesian world. Democracies had providednlittle stability and no security tonhuman rights. The history of democracynon the Hellenic peninsula was a storynof petty strife and continuous struggle,nwith the regimes being as short in theirnlives as they were violent in their deaths.nFollowing these experiments, few socienties prided themselves on their democraticncharacter for nearly two thousandnyears. The tradition of political philosophynthat developed in the interimncontended that democracy was a formnof government suitable only for smallncities isolated from neighbors and composednof homogeneous groupings of virtuousncitizens. The larger nations ofnEurope were content to develop stablenmonarchies to maintain order amongntheir peoples and themselves.nIn striking contrast to this historicalnlesson, the American founders believednthat they could reconcile the republicann(i.e., democratic) form of governmentnwith the security of rights that had beenncentral to the principles of the Revolution.nMoreover, they rejected the historicalnlessons that argued for a smallnregime and a homogeneous people, hincontrast to the bloody foundings thatnhad characterized other great nations,nthe American founders sought to institutengood government by “reflectionnand choice,” a form of government thatnrequired the perpetual involvement ofnits people, that promoted the idea ofngovernment by “the deliberate sense ofn