FIRST PRINCIPLES FOUNDATIONAL CONCEPTS TO GUIDE POLITICS AND POLICY

MAKERS OF AMERICAN POLITICAL THOUGHT NO. 01 | July 31, 2012

Woodrow : Godfather of Liberalism Ronald J. Pestritto

t has become fashionable today for tank on the Left today is called the two decades; he was, in fact, the only Ithose who once called themselves Center for American Progress, which professional political scientist ever “liberals” to refer to themselves has an entire project dedicated to to become President of the United instead as “progressives.” This is a preserving and protecting the legacy States. And while Wilson’s presi- phenomenon evident both among of America’s original Progressive dency certainly helped to launch a our politicians and among our intel- Movement. variety of landmark revisions in the lectual class. Citizens who are concerned with framework of American government In the 2008 presidential primary the battle of ideas today must there- (the Federal Reserve and the income campaign, was asked fore endeavor to come to terms both tax, to name just two), the ideas that whether she was a “liberal”; she dis- with contemporary progressivism came from his academic work were tanced herself from that term (which and with its foundational principles even more influential on future still seems toxic to much of the elec- from the original turn-of-the-centu- waves of liberalism in the course torate) and described herself instead ry movement. In order to understand of 20th and 21st century American as a “progressive.” When pressed, she both the Progressive Movement itself politics. made clear that she meant by this and its influence on politics today, term to connect herself to the origi- there is no more important figure to Life nal Progressives from the turn of engage than . Born Thomas Woodrow Wilson in the 20th century. Similarly, what is Most are familiar with Wilson Staunton, Virginia, on December 28, arguably the most prominent think because he was the 28th President 1856, Wilson moved with his fam- of the United States, a presidency ily several times during his youth as most known for its stewardship his father was a minister in Augusta,

This paper, in its entirety, can be found at of American involvement in the Georgia, Columbia, South Carolina, http://report.heritage.org/MAPT-01 First World War and for Wilson’s and Wilmington, North Carolina. Produced by the B. Kenneth Simon Center failed attempt to sign America on Wilson attended Davidson College, for Principles and Politics to the . Wilson studied at home for a time, and The Heritage Foundation also served a partial term as gover- finally attended Princeton, where he 214 Massachusetts Avenue, NE Washington, DC 20002 nor of New Jersey before becoming earned his bachelor’s degree in 1879. (202) 546-4400 | heritage.org President in 1913. He also attended law school for a year Nothing written here is to be construed as necessarily Prior to his political life, how- at the University of Virginia; and reflecting the views of The Heritage Foundation or as an attempt to aid or hinder the passage of any bill ever, Wilson was a prolific scholar though he studied there only a year, before Congress. and successful academic for over he moved to Atlanta after completing FIRST PRINCIPLES | NO. 01 July 31, 2012

new German science of politics was Born imported into American politics December 28, 1856, in Staunton, Virginia, to Rev. with profound effect, and Wilson was and Jessie Janet Woodrow [Wilson]. among the most important figures in Education this movement. Graduated from Princeton University in 1879, studied law for a year at the While a student at Hopkins, University of Virginia, and went on to get his Ph.D. in History and Political Wilson wrote his first book, Science from Johns Hopkins University in 1886. Congressional Government, which is Religion still his best known academic work. Presbyterian Wilson’s professors subsequently Family allowed the book to count as his doc- Married Ellen Louise Axson in 1885, with whom he had three daughters: toral dissertation, as he soon learned , Jessie Woodrow Wilson Sayre, and Eleanor that he needed the completed Ph.D. Randolph Wilson. Ellen died in 1914, and Wilson married Edith Bolling Galt in order to advance in the Academy. a year later. They remained married until his death. Wilson landed his first aca- Highlights demic job, at Bryn Mawr College in Professor at Bryn Mawr College, Wesleyan University, and Princeton Pennsylvania, in 1885, the same year University (1885–1902). he married the former Ellen Axson, Author, Congressional Government (1885), The State (1889), Constitutional with whom he would have three Government of the United States (1908), (1912), and three daughters. He quickly became dissat- histories. isfied at Bryn Mawr—his salary was President of Princeton University (1902–1910). insufficient, and he regarded his posi- Governor of New Jersey (1911–1913). tion as less than prestigious because President of the United States (1913–1921). all of his students were women—and Leads the United States into (1917). moved on to Wesleyan University in Negotiates the , which formally ends the war (1919). Middletown, Connecticut, in 1888. Nobel Peace Prize (1919). Wesleyan was regarded as a better Campaigns unsuccessfully for American membership in the League of school; it encouraged scholarship Nations (1919). by its professors, and while there, Died Wilson produced The State, his most February 3, 1924, in his Washington, D.C., home; buried at the Washington comprehensive and penetrating National Cathedral. treatment of the theory of govern- Notable Quote ment, in addition to several other “The Declaration of Independence did not mention the questions of our day. important articles and essays on gov- It is of no consequence to us….” ernment and public administration. This scholarship helped Wilson to establish something of a reputa- his studies at home, passed the bar at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, tion in the fledgling discipline of exam, and set up a law practice. Maryland. political science, and he positioned Wilson, however, was most Hopkins had just been founded in himself to be appointed a professor interested in public service, and the 1876 for the express purpose of bring- at Princeton in 1890. He was eventu- legal profession had simply been the ing German education and principles ally elected president of Princeton means most obvious to him for a to the United States. In the decades in 1902, propelled partly by a speech career in public service. This is why before its founding, most Americans titled “Princeton in the Nation’s the actual practice of law quickly who wanted an advanced degree Service,” which outlined his vision soured him on the profession. He was were going to Europe—and espe- for university-educated men to lead more interested, he said, in the ideas cially to Germany—to get it. Johns a newly empowered national admin- and principles behind the law, and so Hopkins quickly became influential istration. Wilson was given credit for he entered the new graduate pro- in American higher education. It also modernizing Princeton; he estab- gram in history and political science became one of the ways in which the lished a graduate school and set up

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the preceptorial system—“a method best-known expressions of Wilson’s Charles Evans Hughes. Shortly of study whereby a small group of brand of Progressivism. thereafter, Wilson led America into students meets in regular confer- that war, launching the effort with ences with a faculty member”—that ONCE ELECTED PRESIDENT, his “war message” in 1917 and laying is still a distinguishing feature of the WILSON HELPED TO USHER IN THE the basis for peace in the “Fourteen university. Points” a year later. It was also while he was presi- FIRST WAVE OF PROGRESSIVE Wilson himself traveled to Europe dent of Princeton that Wilson began REFORMS THAT WOULD LATER to negotiate the Treaty of Versailles, going on solo vacations to Bermuda. TAKE FULL FLOWER UNDER THE and the end of his presidency was Initially taken for health reasons, ADMINISTRATION OF FRANKLIN marked by his desperate attempt to these vacations soon became occa- secure ratification of the treaty and ROOSEVELT. sions for Wilson to spend time with what he considered to be its cen- Mary Peck. The exact nature of the tral accomplishment: the League relationship between Wilson and Once elected President, Wilson of Nations. It was on an exhausting Mrs. Peck has never been demon- helped to usher in the first wave speaking campaign on behalf of the strated definitively, though we do of Progressive reforms that League that Wilson suffered a stroke know that they had a long and affec- would later take full flower under in September of 1919, becoming tionate correspondence and that the Administration of Franklin largely debilitated for the remainder their relationship was the cause of a Roosevelt. While some assert that of his presidency. His second wife, rebuke from Wilson’s wife. the expansion of the federal admin- Edith Bolling Wilson, whom he had Wilson’s political career began istrative state that originated in married in 1915 after Ellen’s death to take shape toward the end of his the Wilson Administration was a year earlier, managed presidential Princeton presidency. He became due to the war mobilization effort, affairs for the remainder of his term, known in Progressive circles as a several key expansions came well and Wilson died in Washington, D.C., reformer—he gave a series of lec- before war mobilization was even on February 3, 1924. tures at Columbia University in on the horizon. Wilson, for instance, 1907, which were published in 1908 signed the national income tax into Critique of the Founding as Constitutional Government in the law in 1913 at the very outset of his While volumes of biographies United States, that helped with this Administration. In the same year, have been filled with details of reputation—and was recruited by the he pushed the Wilson’s life—and especially of New Jersey Democratic Party to run through Congress; early plans for his time in public service—it was for governor in 1910. this Act had envisioned a private Wilson’s political ideas that made The machine bosses in New board, but under Wilson’s leadership, the most lasting mark on American Jersey clearly sought to use Wilson in the Federal Reserve was created as a political life. These are ideas that order to curry favor with the grow- government enterprise. helped to shape the profound chal- ing reform element in the electorate Furthermore, while Wilson had lenge offered by the Progressive and calculated (quite mistakenly, it criticized Theodore Roosevelt in Movement to the basic political prin- turns out) that Wilson could easily the 1912 campaign for the latter’s ciples that undergirded the American be controlled once in office. Instead, adventurous approach to foreign constitutional order. upon his election, Wilson stuck to policy, Wilson himself certainly did Progressivism—certainly as his Progressive ideas and helped to not shrink from American mili- expounded by Wilson—understood enact a legislative agenda in 1911 that tary intervention. He intervened in itself as presenting a rationale for was a model for Progressives around Vera Cruz in 1914 and ordered the moving beyond the political think- the country. This record in turn American occupation of Haiti in 1915. ing of the American Founding. A vaulted Wilson into the 1912 race for In spite of this willingness to use prerequisite for national prog- the presidency, where both parties the military as a tool of American ress, Wilson believed, was that the were looking to win over Progressive foreign policy, Wilson campaigned Founding be understood in its proper voters. The New Freedom, an edited for re-election in 1916 on the theme historical context. Its principles, in collection of Wilson’s speeches from of keeping America out of the First spite of their timeless claims, were the campaign, remains one of the World War, narrowly defeating intended to deal with the unique

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circumstances of that day. of Independence, do not repeat the brought about a fundamental unity This interpretation of the preface.”1 in the public mind and that the prob- Founding ran up against the It was this assertion of histori- lem of faction had been overcome due Founders’ own self-understanding, cal contingency over the permanent to an historical evolution in human as Wilson well knew. This is why principles of American constitution- nature. As a result of history’s much of his scholarship is devoted alism that animated the main tenets achievement, he reasoned, govern- to a radical reinterpretation and of Wilson’s political thought. It is ment will not be a threat to the indi- critique of the political theory of also the view that today pervades vidual that has to be checked; rather, the Founding. Wilson understood academia, where the idea of a per- the state ought to be an organ of the that the limits placed upon the manent standard of right has been individuals in society—“beneficent power of the national government replaced by the ideologies of mul- and indispensable.”2 It makes no by the Constitution—limits that ticulturalism and “value-neutral” sense, Wilson wrote, to limit gov- Progressives wanted to see relaxed positivism. ernment in an effort to protect the if not removed—were grounded in people from the very manifestation the natural-rights principles of the FOR WILSON, BOTH THE of their own organic will. This need Declaration of Independence. This DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE to unfetter the state so that its scope meant, for Wilson, that both the can become whatever the current Declaration and the Constitution AND THE CONSTITUTION HAD TO BE historical spirit demands means had to be understood anew through a UNDERSTOOD ANEW THROUGH A undoing the various institutional Progressive lens. PROGRESSIVE LENS. HE THEREFORE limits that early American constitu- Wilson therefore sought a rein- SOUGHT A REINTERPRETATION tionalism had placed on state power. terpretation of the Founding—a Wilson’s affinity for an histori- OF THE FOUNDING—A reinterpretation grounded in histori- cally contingent perspective on cal contingency. To the Founding’s REINTERPRETATION GROUNDED IN American government—one in which ahistorical notion that government HISTORICAL CONTINGENCY. government was not grounded on is rooted in an understanding of certain unchanging truths about unchanging human nature, Wilson Briefly put, those tenets rest on human nature but would instead opposed the historical argument that a coupling of historical contingency evolve to fit ever-changing historical the ends, scope, and role of just gov- with a faith in progress. Wilson circumstances—can be seen from his ernment must be defined by the dif- believed that the human condition earliest days of thinking about poli- ferent principles of different epochs improves as history marches for- tics. During his legal education and and that, therefore, it is impossible to ward and that protections built into then as a professor of jurisprudence, speak of a single form of just govern- government against the danger of Wilson applied his evolutionary view ment for all ages. This was a self-con- problems such as faction therefore to the question of how the law should scious reinterpretation, as Wilson became less necessary and increas- be taught, adopting the approach of even suggested that the Declaration ingly unjust. Ultimately, the problem what is now called legal realism. Law, ought to be understood by exclud- of faction is solved not by perma- under this approach, is not so much a ing from it the foundational state- nently limited government, as it had study of forms as it is a study of how ments on equality and natural rights been for the Founders, but by history the law evolves in response to chang- contained in its first two paragraphs. itself. ing historical realities. In a 1911 address, Wilson remarked In contrast to the permanent self- This approach also helps to that “the rhetorical introduction of interestedness that the authors of explain Wilson’s love for the British the Declaration of Independence The Federalist, for instance, believed constitutional system, in which the is the least part of it…. If you want to be at the heart of human nature, role of government is not laid out in a to understand the real Declaration Wilson believed that history had single written document but instead

1. Woodrow Wilson, “An Address to the Jefferson Club in Los Angeles,” May 12, 1911, inThe Papers of Woodrow Wilson, 69 vols., ed. Arthur S. Link (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1966–1993), Vol. 23, pp. 33–34. 2. Woodrow Wilson, The State (Boston: D.C. Heath, 1889), pp. 658–659.

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comes from an ever-evolving set of very much like a prime minister in instead, the various organs of gov- laws and judicial precedents that moving key pieces of Progressive ernment were busy attacking and are contingent on historical prog- legislation through the New Jersey struggling against one another. It ress. It is not an exaggeration to say legislature. was irresponsible because the sys- that Wilson was infatuated with the For Wilson, the separation of pow- tem made it difficult for the gov- British system of government, and ers was the source of much of what ernment to implement new public it is clear that he was deeply influ- was wrong with American govern- policy, even when the new policy enced by the celebration of Britain’s ment. As opposed to a democratic reflected a clear new direction in flexible constitutionalism offered in system that would efficiently trans- public opinion. Unlike parliamentary The English Constitution by Walter late the current public mind into government, where changes in public Bagehot, a leading liberal realist of government action, the separation opinion could very quickly effect a the second half of the 19th century. of powers system, as Wilson under- change in government and a change As a teenager and then in college, stood it, was designed to protect the in policy, the separation-of-powers Wilson loved to read and remark people from themselves by throw- system prevented just that kind of upon the biographies and essays ing up as many obstacles as pos- responsiveness. of great parliamentary statesmen, sible to the implementation of their and he particularly enjoyed the will. Such a system served only to Progressive Political Ideas speeches of Edmund Burke and impede genuine democracy, which Based on his objection to the John Bright. This experience is what Wilson wanted to restore by break- separation of powers and his general seems to have led him, as a college ing down the walls between the objection to the Founders’ under- senior, to write an article, “Cabinet branches, allowing them to work in standing of government, Wilson put Government in the United States,” close coordination for the purpose of forth a series of institutional propos- proposing that the American sepa- constantly adjusting public policy to als designed in one way or another ration-of-powers system be replaced the current public mind. to overcome the fixed notion of by a parliamentary model. It was politics that is at the heart of limited published in a prominent journal, AFTER THE FASHION OF TODAY’S government. and its ideas later found a place in COMPLAINTS ABOUT “GRIDLOCK” Wilson’s institutional substitute Congressional Government, which for the Founders’ separation of pow- excoriated the American Congress IN WASHINGTON, WILSON ARGUED ers is best understood as the separa- for its shortcomings when compared THAT THE SEPARATION-OF-POWERS tion of politics and administration. with the British parliament. SYSTEM WAS BOTH INEFFICIENT AND The idea of separating politics and When Wilson himself entered IRRESPONSIBLE. administration broadly defines the government, he brought his cyni- different institutional arrangements cism about the separation of powers suggested by Wilson in his schol- with him, seeing the chief executive Wilson’s animosity toward the arship, although the specific insti- (whether governor or President) as separation of powers was at the heart tutional means for achieving this a kind of prime minister—not just of his various proposals not only for separation changed as his thought an executive, but a legislative leader a cabinet or parliamentary form of developed from his earlier to his too. This is a perspective, of course, government in the United States, but more mature intellectual works. that is the standard view among also for energetic popular leadership Wilson’s separation of politics American political scientists today. and broad administrative discretion. and administration also brings us During his campaign for governor In general, he saw the separation of to a fundamental paradox in his of New Jersey, Wilson even raised powers as fundamentally contrary thought. His vision of government eyebrows by pledging to become an to his understanding of government seems to be one in which the unified “unconstitutional governor,” by which as a living, organic extension of the will of the public has a much more he meant that he had no intention of people’s own will. direct role to play in politics than keeping to the role outlined for the Separation of powers was inef- the Founders had envisioned. Yet chief executive under the separation ficient because it prevented govern- politics, while increasingly democ- of powers. This was a pledge that he ment from solving the problems of ratized in Wilson’s thought, also kept as Governor Wilson behaved modern life in a coordinated way; becomes much less authoritative.

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The emphasis in government shifts The presidency became for role as popular leader means that to administration. Wilson a principal means by which he must, as the embodiment of the The implications of this shift are the limits placed on government by national will, move Congress and the profound: Consent of the governed the separation of powers could be other parts of government to act in a comes in the realm of traditional transcended. His new institutional coordinated way. politics. The disparagement of poli- vision for the presidency required The President’s new role in tics in favor of administration moves the President to look beyond his Wilson’s institutional plan is based the focal point in government away constitutionally defined powers and on the President’s connection to from popular consent and into the duties. Instead, Wilson urged that public opinion. It is the duty of each hands of unelected “experts.” Such a the President concentrate on his role President to adapt himself to the shift marks the origin of American as the embodiment of the nation’s needs and interests of the day. The government today, where more popular will. In modern times, it was President is uniquely situated to policy is made by bureaucracies than more important for the President to adapt himself to changes in the by elected representatives. be leader of the whole nation than it public mood because he is the only The key to Wilson’s separation was for him to be the chief officer of official with a true national man- of politics and administration was the executive branch. date through a nationwide election. to keep the former out of the lat- The President “is at once the choice ter’s way. Administration is properly THE DISPARAGEMENT OF POLITICS IN of the party and of the nation.” The the province of scientific experts FAVOR OF ADMINISTRATION MOVES President “is the only party nominee in the bureaucracy. The compe- for whom the whole nation votes…. tence of these experts in the specific THE FOCAL POINT IN GOVERNMENT No one else represents the people as technological means required to AWAY FROM POPULAR CONSENT AND a whole, exercising a national choice.” achieve those ends on which we are INTO THE HANDS OF UNELECTED The President is the “spokesman for all agreed gives them the authority “EXPERTS” AND MARKS THE ORIGIN the real sentiment and purpose of to administer or regulate progress the country.”4 OF AMERICAN GOVERNMENT TODAY, unhindered by those within the Wilson emphasized the person realm of politics. Persons or institu- WHERE MORE POLICY IS MADE BY of the President, not his office. It is tions within politics can claim no BUREAUCRACIES THAN BY ELECTED the man himself and his personal- such expertise. REPRESENTATIVES. ity that come to embody the national Wilson’s understanding of poli- will. “Governments are what the tics and its separation from admin- politicians make them,” Wilson istration requires a transformation Wilson contrasted the President’s wrote, “and it is easier to write of the in traditional American thinking duties as “legal executive” to his President than of the presidency.”5 on legislative and executive power. “political powers,” advocating an This is why a President’s expertise in Wilson proposed such a transforma- emphasis on the latter as a means of public affairs is not as important as tion, which can be seen in his com- using popular opinion to transcend his having a forceful personality and mentaries on many different facets the rigid separation-of-powers struc- other qualities of popular leadership. of American government. While a ture of the old “Newtonian” consti- What America needs, Wilson short essay precludes a discussion of tutional framework.3 As opposed to wrote, is “a man who will be and who most of these, the best example can remaining confined to the constitu- will seem to the country in some sort be found in Wilson’s vision for trans- tionally defined powers and duties an embodiment of the character and forming the American presidency. of his own branch, the President’s purpose it wishes its government to

3. Woodrow Wilson, Constitutional Government in the United States (New York: Columbia University Press, 1908), pp. 66–67. 4. Ibid., pp. 67–68. 5. Ibid., p. 54.

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have—a man who understands his of persuasion, of course, was his new kind of national administra- own day and the needs of the coun- failed attempt to secure ratification tion—largely removed from popular try.”6 As an embodiment of the public of the Treaty of Versailles. Seemingly consent and charged with making will, the President can transcend unconcerned with the constitutional the policy requisite for national prog- the government and coordinate its necessity of winning over the Senate, ress—that could be staffed by univer- activities. This is why it is wrong to Wilson embarked on a desper- sity men like himself, as opposed to limit the President with the tradi- ate attempt to go over the heads of the political operators of low charac- tional checks of the Constitution. Senators on a national speaking tour ter who populated the back rooms of The President is “the unifying force once it became evident that the con- Congress. in our complex system” and must not stitutional requirement for ratifica- Because administration some- be relegated to managing only one tion was going to be more than a sim- how had to be liberated from the branch of it.7 ple formality. It is not unreasonable constraints of politics if national Many instances throughout to speculate that the stress of this government were ever to become Wilson’s academic and political effort contributed to the President’s an instrument of progress, Wilson’s careers demonstrate this focus on stroke and subsequent incapacity at most serious academic work focused popular leadership. He was, as a the conclusion of his second term. on developing a new approach to young man, obsessed with nothing so Democratized political leadership administration. It is, in fact, fair to much as the art of rhetoric. Not only was, however, only part of Wilson’s say that Wilson is in no small mea- did he delight in reading the speech- vision for reforming American gov- sure responsible for launching the es of great parliamentary orators, ernment. He had great faith, as has discipline of public administration in but he was also trained in rhetoric been said, in the possibilities for the United States and for articulat- by his father, a minister who would national administration. He wrote ing the principles behind the modern put young Woodrow in the pulpit of enthusiastically as a young man administrative state with its sprawl- his church when empty and have him about the contribution to national ing web of agencies. practice delivering speeches. He par- affairs that could be made by himself In doing so, Wilson relied heavily ticipated in many debating activities and others who, like him, had elite on European sources for his study while a student at Princeton and later, university educations. of administration, precisely because when he became president there, his desire to liberate administration became increasingly convinced AS AN EMBODIMENT OF THE from politics and give it robust pow- that leadership meant both having a PUBLIC WILL, THE PRESIDENT CAN ers over the details of legislation was unique ability to see the path of his- a novelty to American constitution- tory and possessing the rhetorical TRANSCEND THE GOVERNMENT AND alism. Wilson placed administrative art to convince others to follow this COORDINATE ITS ACTIVITIES. THIS power and constitutional power on vision. Such a belief helped launch IS WHY IT IS WRONG TO LIMIT THE entirely different planes, and it is this him into the presidency at Princeton, PRESIDENT WITH THE TRADITIONAL sharp distinction between consti- but it also caused him much trouble tutional politics and administrative CHECKS OF THE CONSTITUTION. at the end of his tenure when he per- discretion that differentiates him sisted in several plans—the abolition from those earlier American think- of the eating clubs, which still flour- Yet the political corruption of the ers who had also placed great impor- ish at Princeton today, to cite just one day caused Wilson to revolt against tance on national administration. example—for which there was insuf- institutions such as Congress, which Wilson explained that adminis- ficient support. seemed incapable of legislating for tration “stands apart even from the The most famous instance of the national good due to its being debatable ground for constitutional Wilson’s overconfidence in his own mired in self-interested electoral study…. Administrative questions righteousness and rhetorical powers politics. Wilson thus envisioned a are not political questions.” This is

6. Ibid., p. 65. 7. Ibid., pp. 59–60.

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why he had to admit that it is diffi- with the primary responsibility health insurance plans have been cult to conceive how one might place for legislating. In Congressional fought not primarily in Congress, but administrative discretion of the sort Government, Wilson even com- in or against administrative agencies he had in mind within the traditional plained that the greatest problem that are exercising the power given to constitutional order: “One cannot with Congress was that it spent too them by Congress. easily make clear to every one just much of its energy on the details of This reality leaves us to pon- where administration resides in the legislation when it should instead der the legacy of Wilson and the various departments.”8 He made a delegate the bulk of legislating to the Progressive Movement: If their great effort to explain that his vision administrative agencies that were aim was to democratize American of administration was very different, expert at it. politics—to bring political institu- because he believed that the quality It is in this way that we can see tions closer to the people whom the of administration had been degraded the influence of Wilson—and of Founders had allegedly distrusted— by those who had conceived of it too Progressivism generally—on yet then how can this be squared with narrowly—that is, conceived of it another central feature of American their argument that most decision- within the confines of the constitu- political life: Policymaking today, in making in government ought to tional executive. many areas of national concern such be done not by the people’s elected Wilson’s entire claim to charting as the environment, health care, and representatives on the basis of con- new territory in his famous “Study financial regulation, is done primar- sent, but rather by administrators of Administration” essay rests on ily by agencies within the bureaucra- shielded from electoral influence this difference with the traditional cy to which Congress has delegated who govern instead on the basis of a understanding of administration. broad swaths of legislative authority. claim to expertise? The problem with the old under- Recent battles ranging from rules for —Ronald J. Pestritto is Graduate standing, from a Wilsonian perspec- greenhouse gas emissions to ben- Dean and Professor of Politics at tive, was that it still left Congress efits that must be covered by private Hillsdale College.

8. Woodrow Wilson, “The Study of Administration,” November 1, 1886, in The Papers of Woodrow Wilson, Vol. 5, p. 371.

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