Montesquieu

Charles Louis de Secondat, baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu, was a French judge, intellectual, historian, and political philosopher born 18 January 1689. In 1748 he published The Spirit of Law anonymously, a work that laid out the theory of separation of powers and secured "despotism" in the political lexicon. The book found eager readers in Great Britain and the American colonies; Thomas Nugent's 1750 English translation reached the men who would draft the U.S. Constitution, and they lifted the framework whole. Montesquieu died 10 February 1755, having sketched the architecture most democr…