Interpretation: a Journal of Political Philosophy
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Interpretation A JOURNAL J.OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY Fall 1999 Volume 27 Number 1 Clark A. Merrill Spelunking in the Unnatural Cave: Leo Strauss's Ambiguous Tribute to Max Weber William Walker Stanley Fish's Miltonic Interpretation of Martin Luther King Discussion Thomas L. Krannawitter Constitutional Government and Judicial Power: The Political Science of The Federalist Book Reviews Charles E. Butterworth A Cornucopia of Rousseau Translations: The Collected Writings of Rousseau, Edited by Roger D. Masters and Christopher Kelly Rousseau, the Discourses and other early Political Writings, and Rousseau the Social Contract and other later Political Writings, edited and translated by Victor Gourevitch Peter Augustine Lawler Nature, History, and the Human Individual Modern Liberty and Its Discontents, by Pierre Manent Ronald J. Pestritto The Supreme Court and American Constitutionalism, edited by Bradford P. Wilson and Ken Masugi Interpretation Editor-in-Chief Hilail Gildin, Dept. of Philosophy, Queens College Executive Editor Leonard Grey General Editors Seth G. Benardete Charles E. Butterworth Hilail Gildin Robert Horwitz (d. 1987) Howard B. White (d. 1974) Consulting Editors Christopher Bruell Joseph Cropsey Ernest L. Fortin John Hallowell (d. 1992) Harry V. Jaffa David Lowenthal Muhsin Mahdi Harvey C. Mansfield Arnaldo Momigliano (d. 1987) Michael Oakeshott (d. 1990) Ellis Sandoz Leo Strauss (d. 1973) Kenneth W. Thompson International Editors Terence E. Marshall Heinrich Meier Editors Wayne Ambler Maurice Auerbach Fred Baumann Amy Bonnette Patrick Coby Elizabeth C de Baca Eastman Thomas S. Engeman Edward J. Erler Maureen Feder-Marcus Pamela K. Jensen Ken Masugi Will Morrisey Susan Orr Charles T. Rubin Leslie G. Rubin Susan Meld Shell Bradford P. Wilson Martin D. Yaffee Michael P. Zuckert Catherine H. Zuckert Manuscript Editor Lucia B. Prochnow Subscriptions Subscription rates per volume (3 issues): individuals $29 libraries and all other institutions $48 students (four-year limit) $18 Single copies available. Postage outside U.S.: Canada $4.50 extra; elsewhere $5.40 extra by surface mail (8 weeks or longer) or $11.00 by air. Payments: in U.S. dollars and payable by a financial institution located within the U.S.A. (or the U.S. Postal Service). The Journal Welcomes Manuscripts in Political Philosophy as Well as Those in Theology, Literature, and Jurisprudence. contributors should follow The Chicago Manual of Style, 13th ed. or manuals based on double-space their it; manuscripts, including notes; place references in the in endnotes or text, follow current journal style in printing references. Words from not languages rooted in Latin should be transliterated to English. To ensure impartial judgment of their manuscripts, contributors should omit mention of their other on the title page work; put, only, their name, any affiliation desired, address with code in E-Mail and postal/zip full, telephone. Please send four clear copies, which will not be returned. Composition by Eastern Composition A Division of Bytheway Publishing Services Binghamton, N.Y. 13901 U.S.A. Printed by The Sheridan Press, Hanover PA 17331 U.S.A. Inquiries: (Ms.) Joan Walsh, Assistant to the Editor interpretation, Queens College, Flushing N Y 1 1367-1597, U.S.A. (718)997-5542 Fax (718) 997-5565 E Mail: [email protected] Interpretation A JOURNAL _L OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY Fall 1999 Volume 27 Number 1 Clark A. Merrill Spelunking in the Unnatural Cave: Leo Strauss's Ambiguous Tribute to Max Weber 3 William Walker Stanley Fish's Miltonic Interpretation of Martin Luther King 27 Discussion Thomas L. Krannawitter Constitutional Government and Judicial Power: The Political Science of The Federalist 43 Book Reviews Charles E. Butterworth A Cornucopia of Rousseau Translations: The Collected Writings of Rousseau, Edited by Roger D. Masters and Christopher Kelly Rousseau, the Discourses and other early Political Writings, and Rousseau the Social Contract and other later Political Writings, edited and translated by Victor Gourevitch 71 Peter Augustine Lawler Nature, History, and the Human Individual Modern Liberty and Its Discontents, by Pierre Manent 81 Ronald J. Pestritto The Supreme Court and American Constitutionalism, edited by Bradford P. Wilson and Ken Masugi 89 Copyright 1999 interpretation ISSN 0020-9635 Interpretation College Editor-in-Chief Hilail Gildin, Dept. of Philosophy, Queens Executive Editor Leonard Grey General Editors Seth G. Benardete Charles E. Butterworth Hilail Gildin Robert Horwitz (d. 1987) Howard B. White (d. 1974) Consulting Editors Christopher Bruell Joseph Cropsey Emest L. Fortin John Hallowell (d. 1992) Harry V. Jaffa David Lowenthal Muhsin Mahdi Harvey C. Mansfield Arnaldo Momigliano (d. 1987) Michael Oakeshott (d. 1990) Ellis Sandoz Leo Strauss (d. 1973) Kenneth W. Thompson International Editors Terence E. Marshall Heinrich Meier Editors Wayne Ambler Maurice Auerbach Fred Baumann Amy Bonnette Patrick Coby Elizabeth C de Baca Eastman - Thomas S. Engeman Edward J. Erler Maureen Feder-Marcus Pamela K. Jensen Ken Masugi Will Morrisey Susan Orr Charles T. Rubin Leslie G. Rubin Susan Meld Shell Bradford P. Wilson Martin D. Yaffee Michael P. Zuckert Catherine H. Zuckert Manuscript Editor Lucia B. Prochnow Subscriptions Subscription rates per volume (3 issues): individuals $29 libraries and all other institutions $48 students (four-year limit) $18 Single copies available. Postage outside U.S.: Canada $4.50 extra; elsewhere $5.40 extra by surface mail (8 weeks or longer) or $ 1 1 .00 by air. Payments: in U.S. dollars and payable by a financial institution located within the U.S.A. (or the U.S. Postal Service). The Journal Welcomes Manuscripts in Political Philosophy as Well as Those in Theology, Literature, and Jurisprudence. contributors should follow The Chicago Manual of Style, 13th ed. or manuals based on it; double-space their manuscripts, including notes; place references in the text, in endnotes or follow current journal style in printing references. Words from languages not rooted in Latin should be transliterated to English. To ensure impartial judgment of their manuscripts, contributors should omit mention of their other work; put, on the title page only, their name, any affiliation desired, address with postal/zip code in full, E-Mail and telephone. Please send four clear copies, which will not be returned. Composition by Eastern Composition A Division of Bytheway Publishing Services Binghamton, N.Y. 13901 U.S.A. Printed by The Sheridan Press, Hanover PA 17331 U.S.A. Inquiries: (Ms.) Joan Walsh, Assistant to the Editor interpretation, Queens College, Flushing, N.Y 1 1367-1597, U.S.A. (718)997-5542 Fax (718) 997-5565 E Mail: [email protected] Spelunking in the Unnatural Cave: Leo Strauss's Ambiguous Tribute to Max Weber Clark A. Merrill Salve Regina University How then should human beings live? What is the best political order for man? Must social science restrict itself to accumulating knowledge about possi ble means for achieving the ends of policy, whatever those ends may be, without ever venturing to establish or judge the ends themselves? Max Weber's fact- value distinction says precisely that: no Ought can ever be derived from any Is. Why is that? Because the Is, the sensible facts of our existence, do not reveal our proper ends as human beings. In our moral perplexity, the universe remains silent. Yet politics must constantly assert the Ought. Should political candidates accept large financial contributions? Should the law execute murderers? Should the state compensate an individual when it takes his property for the public good? The language of politics is necessarily the language of good and bad, just and unjust, honorable and dishonorable. How are such questions to be answered if we cannot know the end at which we should aim? The question before us is whether Weber was right, whether science or human reason cannot, in fact, make any contribution to political discourse beyond the bare analysis of fact and comparison of means. Since fifth-century Athens, political philosophy has been the science con cerned with the relation between knowledge and action. Within the long tradi tion of political philosophy, the family of teachings that affirm the capacity of human reason to tell us how we should live has gone by the name of natural right or natural law. The greatest and most intriguingly ambiguous exploration of Weber's social science from the viewpoint of political philosophy is that by History.1 Leo Strauss in the second chapter of Natural Right and In this essay, I propose to undertake a detailed analysis of Strauss's argument in that densely written chapter. THE SOCRATIC ANSWER Strauss begins the chapter with a terse series of assertions and distinctions. Historicism claims to have demonstrated that natural right, the teaching that we can derive knowledge of our proper ends from knowledge of what is, is impossi ble because philosophy is impossible. Philosophy, to be possible, requires access interpretation, Fall 1999, Vol. 27, No. 4 Interpretation to an absolute horizon beyond the limited, contingent horizon given us by our particular time and place. Philosophy requires access to what is true without qualification, not simply what appears to be true to us here and now. But the possession of such an absolute horizon actually entails far less than we might at first imagine: philosophy does not require possession of wisdom or knowl edge of the good; it merely requires knowledge of the fundamental problems, the fundamental alternatives, that constitute the permanent horizon of the human condition. Thus, philosophy requires far less than natural right. Natural right implies the possession of wisdom; it requires a solution to the fundamental political problem of how we should live. "[P]hilosophy is only the necessary right" and not the sufficient condition of natural (NRH, p. 35). Yet political philosophy without a solution to the fundamental problem of politics is of no practical value; it cannot tell us how to act. Such a political philosophy would leave the goal of action to blind choice, to arbitrary will.