Stanford Humanities Center
Novia is a senior studying the history of the American Founding, particularly the era’s legal and intellectual developments. Thus far, her scholarship has focused on how different conceptions of government shaped the creation and early interpretation of the United States Constitution. Currently, Novia is serving as a History Peer Advisor, a Stanford Constitutional Law Center Undergraduate Fellow, and the editor-in-chief of Herodotus, Stanford’s undergraduate history journal. Her honors thesis builds on her previous research endeavors, which include coauthoring the entry “Ratification of the Constitution” for Oxford Bibliographies and completing the Gilder Lehrman College Fellowship in American History. While home in the suburbs of Seattle, Novia volunteered in the municipal archives. On campus, she can be found at the Red Barn riding for the Stanford Equestrian Team. After college, she hopes to pursue both a JD and a PhD in History in preparation for a career in academia.
SHC Project
Constituting a Republic: Mixed Government in the American Founding Era, 1776–1795
Advisors: Jonathan Gienapp, Anne Twitty
What is the focus of your current research?
As they constructed their first constitutions, Founding-era Americans adapted their ideological heritage to the conditions of independence. One piece of this inheritance, mixed constitutionalism, prescribed a one-to-one relationship between the basic forms of government, their corresponding institutions, and the alleged orders of society. A monarchical Crown for the king, aristocratic upper house for the nobles, and democratic lower house for the people were thought to hold one another in balance. The American Revolution, however, shattered the foundations of this theory. Political writers noted that, in the absence of a monarch and hereditary nobility, Americans retained just one social order: the people. By tracing how the Founding generation engaged with mixed constitutionalism from independence to the beginnings of the First Party System, my work will explore what ideas of government arose in the early republic.
What drew you to this topic?
I stumbled upon mixed constitutionalism owing to a misunderstanding. During my freshman fall quarter, I took History 150A, Colonial and Revolutionary America, with Professor Caroline Winterer. The course culminated in a final research paper based on an analysis of early American primary sources. I was and remain interested in the creation of the United States Constitution, so I sought to explore a political tract that may have influenced the Constitutional Convention. After perusing Stanford’s Special Collections, I decided on John Adams’s A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America. At first, Adams’s arguments seemed familiar. His support for a three-part government appeared to echo the separation of powers. As I continued reading, however, I discovered that these similarities were superficial. Adams called for a mixed government based on a far older idea of society divided into the one, the few, and the many. I have spent the remainder of my undergraduate career parsing through this deceptive familiarity.
How are you conducting your research?
My research entails sifting out fragments of mixed constitutionalism from a range of late eighteenth-century writings. Beyond political treatises, I draw on pseudonymous newspaper essays, convention debates, personal correspondence, and the records of local political societies. I owe a great debt to the historians, archivists, and curators who have published these materials both in print and online. Likewise, scholars have produced a wealth of research on Founding era political thought. I seek to build on these accounts while grounding my exploration in the historical record. Finally, I return to the classical and British sources that made up the Founding generation’s ideological heritage. To analyze how mixed constitutionalism broke down, I aim to understand what late eighteenth-century Americans initially received.
What would people be surprised to learn about the topic you are working on?
The prior dominance of mixed constitutionalism is often overlooked. Today, we value the Constitution for instituting a democracy, or a government of the people. Within this government, we recognize three distinct branches: legislative, executive, and judicial. Consequently, when we read a Founding era argument for a republic of three branches, we assume that the writer supported our familiar system. Yet, in the late eighteenth century, the standard was neither pure democracy nor a separation of functional powers. Instead, the ideal government was mixed and grounded in social orders. Writers held that the people needed to be counterbalanced, so the legislature required a democratic, aristocratic, and monarchical branch. Founding era Americans contended with this conceptual framework, and even by the early 1790s, not every writer had abandoned its tenants.
In your view, why is it valuable to study this topic?
The confusion surrounding mixed constitutionalism is indicative of a broader challenge to understanding the American Founding. In the eyes of many Americans, the Revolution marked the birth of the United States’s political identity. This modern resonance fuels anachronism. We reason that if our fundamental maxims trace back to the Founding, then the Founding generation must have understood those maxims on our terms. Yet, eighteenth-century Americans did not share our mindsets. Instead, they operated within a web of older, now-abandoned ideas, including mixed constitutionalism. To recover their political thought, we need to set aside our preconceptions in favor of their conceptual world. In tracing the influence of mixed constitutionalism, I seek to reconstruct this unfamiliar landscape. My research offers insight into what kind of government emerged in the Revolution’s wake while also challenging interpretations that muddle the past with our present.
How is your honors thesis impacting you academically and/or personally?
Thoughts of my honors thesis have accompanied me throughout my undergraduate career. I remember that, towards the end of freshman winter quarter, a History graduate student kindly signed off her email with a request that I invite her to my final thesis presentation. Even then, I could barely contain my excitement at the prospect of producing this work. Both academically and personally, this project gives me the opportunity to bring together the past three years of my life. As an account of mixed constitutionalism’s influence between 1776 and 1795, my thesis combines and extends my earlier research on this subject. As a marker in my personal development, it brings together the tremendous support I have received from mentors, family, and friends.
How do you anticipate the fellowship will be able to support your research?
I am immensely grateful for this opportunity to engage with the Humanities Center’s intellectual community. Within the Hume Honors cohort, I have the pleasure of conversing with a group of undergraduate scholars who are equally committed to their research. I look forward to trading ideas and words of encouragement as we navigate the thesis writing process, as I believe the greatest works emerge through thoughtful conversations. The broader Center is likewise an incredible source of support. This intellectual hub has been and continues to be home to groundbreaking thinkers, and it is both humbling and inspiring to share a space with them.
