| Resumo: | This essay makes a comparative analysis between Mexico and the United States, regarding the problems, challenges and uncertainties faced by the members of the political classes at the beginning of their life as independent States. When the old assumptions that sustained public authority collapsed, these men had to invent new “fictions” in order to legitimate the dominance of a minority over the majority, such as “national sovereignty”, “constitutionalism” and “representative government”. Through an analysis of federal and state constitutions, parlamentary discourse and printed matter, this paper explores the difficult process that would decide, although never definitely, what citizens and political representation should be like.
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