Abstract

By employing a mixture of qualitative and quantitative data analysis techniques, the present research explores the linguistic presuppositions and implicatures of the Founding Fathers in three major American historical texts: the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederacy, and the Constitution of the United States. The major question of the present study is: What salient linguistic presuppositions and implicatures are embedded in the three historical texts that suggest the dominant belief held by the Founding Fathers in terms of how people act? In evaluating the three views on the Founding Fathers' belief as they set out to shape the American polity, the substantive findings from both the qualitative and quantitative analyses suggest that the Founding Fathers' belief about how people act was eclectic. Even though a relatively larger number of the Founders' presuppositions and implicatures about how people act are Hobbesian, their dominance is not statistically significant