Shays’ Rebellion and Madison’s War Against State-Issued Paper Money. Excerpt form George Mason's America

Robert Hoffert, in The Politics of Tension, describes the national narrative myth as “a homogenized” account of the events surrounding the calling of the Convention. Hoffert writes, “By starting their national story in 1787, American (historians) schooled themselves on a homogenized account of their [American] political identity.” (A Politics of Tensions: The Articles of Confederation and American Political Ideas, University Press of Colorado 1992.). The authentic American political identity emerged on the field of battle, in 1775, not 1787.We argue that Madison replaced the shared cultural value of the “Spirit of ’76, with the cultural value of shared plunder, obtained by the elites in the political corruption of the spoils system, after the Constitution had been implemented