The Age of Strict Construction

"This work serves as a challenge to the traditional interpretation of the growth of federal power. It also provides another explanation for the secession of the southern states, a topic on which scholars will no doubt be weighing in. This interesting and provocative study, which depends heavily on secondary work, has a place in the collections of all four-year academic institutions... Highly recommended."—Choice

"[A]n important addition to the literature on antebellum federalism."—Journal of Southern History

"[A] provocative new book. . . . In addition to his detailed portrait of the federal spoils system, the greatest strength of Zavodnyik's work is its broad accessibility to historians, legal scholars, and the average reader. The book is well written and engaging, successfully weaving complex legal doctrine into a broader story of American political, economic and cultural history. Zavodnyik's approach will particularly appeal to scholars who stress the growth and power of the federal government in early America."—Virginia Magazine of History and Biography

"Any student of American constitutionalism will find this work useful if only for his extensive documentation of Congressional speeches highlighting the bitter contest over the Constitution's meaning. The result is a study that challenges many of historians' preconceived notions about who advocated strict construction and why."—The Historian

"The scope of Peter Zavodnyik's book is greater than his title may suggest... Zavodnyik gives us a chronological survey of federal policy in the light of constitutional power in interaction with the politics surrounding the use of the powers. He thus gives us a very nice account of the relation between constitutional and political factors, an account often missing in studies that focus on one factor or the other... Zavodnyik has produced a provocative book that not only highlights often-neglected features of the era, but supplies intriguing insights into the coming of the Civil War."—Journal of American History