跨大西洋的宪制思索——詹姆斯·布赖斯与《美利坚共和国》

Transatlantic Constitutional Thought-James Bryce and The American Commonwealth

作为托克维尔《论美国的民主》之后最为重要的美国宪制研究之一,詹姆斯·布赖斯所著《美利坚共和国》一书长期以来都没有得到国内学界的充分重视。通过对19世纪英国思想史的细致梳理,可以发现,《美利坚共和国》是一部带有鲜明英国问题意识的美国宪制研究。布赖斯在其著作中对于美国宪制的种种观察,无一不与其对当时英国宪制走向激进民主化的忧虑有关。而《美利坚共和国》一书在20世纪初传播到中国以后,则又成为中国近现代思想家解读美国宪制的一种重要思想资源。

As one of the most important studies on American constitutionalism after Tocqueville’s Democracy in America,James Bryce’s The American Commonwealth has not drawn enough academic attention in China.Through a close review of 19th-Century British intellectual history,this paper argues that The American Commonwealth is a study on American constitutionalism with a distinct Victorian perspective.All of Bryce’s observations were deeply related to his concern over Britain’s leap toward radical democratization at that time.Besides its transatlantic influences,The American Commonwealth was also translated into Chinese in the early 20th Century and became a significant intellectual resource for Chinese elites’interpretations of American constitutionalism.