Aquinas the Augustinian, ed. Michael Dauphinais, Barry David, and Matthew Levering (September, paper $39.95, 978-0-8132-1492-4)
The Perspective of the Acting Person: Essays in the Renewal of Thomistic Moral Philosophy by Martin Rhonheimer, ed. William F. Murphy, Jr. (February, paper $39.95, 978-0-8132-1551-2)
No doubt there will be a lot of discussion of the essays in this book among "traditional" Thomists.
The Age of Strict Construction: A History of the Growth of Federal Power, 1789-1861 by Peter Zavodnyik (October, cloth $59.95, 978-0-8132-1504-4)
The book focuses on the dispute over the spending power of Congress, the Supreme Court's expansion fo the Contract Clause, and the centralizing effects of the Jacksonian spoils system. The book also surveys the conflict over constitutional interpretation--originalism v. textualism--that has divided Americans from the time of the dispute over the first Bank of the United States until the present day.
The standard interpretation of American history holds that the federal government remained a weak and passive creature until the New Deal. The Age of Strict Construction argues that this interpretation is not valid--if measured against the original understanding of the powers of Congress and the Supreme Court, federal authority grew rapidly during the antebellum period. The most stunning aspect of centralization occured with the rise of a party system heavily dependent on federal largesse for patronage.
The book also details how the federal government quickly came to play an unexpectedly prominent role in the lives of citizens, as its policies in areas such as land sales and tariffs had a huge effect on the fortunes of individual Americans. It also explains how the Founders' classical ideas of a rural electorate immune to pecuniary considerations quickly succumbed to the changes brought on by the arrival of a market economy and the growth of cities.
The relationship between centralization and the sectional crisis of the 1850s is also explored. The book turns the long-running argument over the cause of secession--slave v. the growth of federal power--on its head by revealing how the two combined to cause southern states to leave the Union.
Widsom's Apprentice: Thomistic Essays in Honor of Lawrence Dewan, O.P. ed. by Peter A. Kwasniewski (September, cloth $49.95, 978-0-8132-1495-5)
A second edition of Joseph Ratzinger's Eschatology: Death and Eternal Life. (October, paper, $19.95, 978-0-8132-1516-7).
And there's a new series coming out: The Library of Early Christianity
A new series of texts and translations featuring the early Christian literature of both the Eastern and Western churches (A.D. 150-800)The first two volumes are from Theodoret of Cyrus, The Questions on the Octateuch.
The Library of Early Christianity will be a permanent enterprise that publishes one new volume approximately every other year. The Library will publish texts in the original ancient languages of both East and West--Greek, Latin, Arabic, Syriac, Coptic, Ethiopic, Armenian, and Georgian--accompanied by contemporary English translations printed on the facing pages. In order to make the texs more accesible to the nonspecialist and to aid readers in comprehending the thought of ht influential thinkers of the early church, each volume will include an introduction,
notes, and a bibliography.
Editorial Director John F. Petruccione is associate professor in the Department of Greek and Latin at the Catholic University of America.
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