'As In Duty Bound': The Early American Petition and its Graeco-Roman Generic Antecedents

• In Event: Expanding Civic Rhetoric: Moving Beyond Rhetorical Democracy to the Speculum Principis Tradition

Abstract

Recent scholars of American public address have paid considerable attention to
the petition as an exemplar of American political (democratic) exceptionalism.
By examining the function of the early Graeco-Roman petitioning and rescript
system and its influence on American petition, we argue that more analysis of
generic history suggests the petition to function as part of a system of
benevolent hierarchial authority based on bonds of reciprocal personal
obligation between ruler and ruled. The rhetoric of the petition is grounded in
the notion of the just magistrate and loyal subject, tempering impersonal
systems of justice with personal responsibility.

In the paper, we perform close rhetorical analysis of two small groups of
petitions, one Graeco-Egyptian and one American, to show how their rhetorical
conventions reveal shared underlying assumptions about the nature of justice
and community.

Authors

• Carol Poster, York University

• Karen Whedbee, Northern Illinois Univ