Despite its imbalance, Fleming's book remains moderately enlightening in its impassioned defense of Washington's presidency, and more entertaining for its interest in the pettiness and foibles of our oft-lionized founders. The Great Divide: The Conflict between Washington and Jefferson that. Fleming's blatant bias for the Federalists does a great disservice to the issues at hand, reducing a critical disagreement about American governance to a one-sided rant. Thomas Fleming is a longtime contributor to American Heritage and former president. The Great Divide by Thomas Fleming Hachette UK The Great Divide by Thomas Fleming On sale 10th March 2015 Price: £21. The same cannot be said for Jefferson the author misses no opportunity to illustrate Jefferson's hypocrisy, arrogance, paranoia, duplicity, and self-pity. Fleming has nothing but praise for Washington, whom he sees as a flexible, shrewd, and selfless chief executive. History tends to cast the early years of America in a glow of camaraderie when there were, in fact ,many conflicts between the Founding Fathers - none more important than the one between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Fleming (A Disease in the Public Mind) finds this divide at the heart of every subsequent American political battle, but his book about this era is more polemic than analysis. Check out this great listen on Audible.ca. Caught between these two men was James Madison, a confidant of Washington who co-wrote The Federalist with Alexander Hamilton before becoming Jefferson's most brilliant ally%E2%80%94though Madison returned to his Federalist convictions at the end of his life. The Great Divide: The Conflict between Washington and Jefferson that Defined a Nation - Ebook written by Thomas Fleming. Thomas Jefferson's distrust of monarchical tendencies led him to oppose the more pragmatic and Federalist George Washington. The much younger Madison was his opposite in many ways. The tall, self confident Jefferson was already famous as the author of the Declaration. Madison was deeply grateful to Governor Jefferson for making him his chief councilor. At the dawn of the American republic, the Founding Fathers, once united in their common pursuit of freedom, split ideologically. Thomas Fleming: The psychological component of history is very hard to grasp with any certainty.