Why Democracy Needs Aristocracy Luke C. Sheahan Duquesne University

Aristocratic Souls in Democratic Times. Edited by Richard Avramenko and Ethan Alexander-Davey. Lexington Books, 2018. 324 pp. $120 hardback.

The concept of a trifunctional so- is all to say that for most of human ciety, a society composed of three history there were clear distinctions orders or three estates, is very old. It among classes, each with its own was even old when Plato famously purpose in society and each with organized his ideal polity into the its own strengths and weaknesses. philosopher-kings, guardians, and Their respective strengths were ex- producers in The Republic. This three- pected to counteract the deficiencies fold division was present in Athe- of other classes with the result that nian law from the earliest days; and, there was an interdependent and according to one philologist, it can complementary relationship among be traced deep into the traditions various orders in society. and cultures of prehistoric man.1 This hierarchy of virtues and roles Medieval society was likewise or- is obscured in democratic societies ganized into those who pray, those which insist upon the dogma of one who fight, and those who labor. This social class with no inherent distinc- Luke C. Sheahan is Assistant Professor of tions among persons, certainly not Political Science at Duquesne University and of birth and station. Whatever the a Non-Resident Fellow at the Program for benefits of this modern conception of Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society order (and there are many), there are at the University of Pennsylvania. also a multitude of drawbacks, not 1 Georges Dumezil, L’ideologie Tripartie Des Indo-Europeens (Brussels: Latomus, 1958), cited least the shroud cast over the con- by Ethan Alexander-Davey on pp. xvi. tinuing and inescapable benefit of 132 • Volume XXXIII, Nos. 1 & 2, 2020 Luke C. Sheahan birth and wealth (consider, by way pressive array of essays on various of contrast, the influence of unelect- aristocratic thinkers in the modern ed technocrats such as Bill Gates and era. These include those who, like Elon Musk or the political success of Burke, lacked aristocratic status but middling members of the Bush and nonetheless defended the role of Clinton families). Other flaws—such an aristocracy, and also those who, as the lack of standards characteris- like Tocqueville, were themselves tic of consumerism and the appeal aristocrats. All of the thinkers the es- to the lowest common denominator says address wrote in the context of in entertainment rampant in demo- an emerging democratic society and cratic societies—have been noted thought deeply about the role of an and criticized since Plato. Other so- aristocracy, or at least of the aristo- ciological critiques of mass demo- cratic virtues, in such a society. This cratic society have been common in volume avoids the common trap of recent times, many noting that the many discussions of aristocracy—or, poison of envy is more and not less indeed, of traditional institutions in evident as equality increases.2 Rather general—that dismiss them as mere than forging brotherhood, the demo- precursors to the institutions of the cratic polity of purportedly free and present order. According to this line equal citizens produces individuals of thinking, whatever value is to be alienated from their fellows. Casual found in previous political orders is defenses of an aristocracy as a class found in such of their institutions as separate unto itself have generally presage in some way what we value made these points. But inquiries into in our democratic age. This volume the implications of aristocracy for explicitly eschews what C. S. Lewis political theory are much less com- called “chronological snobbery.” mon. Fortunately, Aristocratic Souls Rather, these essays explore the pos- in Democratic Times remedies this sibility that what those institutions deficit in the scholarly literature. of a bygone era may contribute are Richard Avramenko (University precisely what our era lacks because of Wisconsin-Madison) and Ethan it is democratic. Enamored of demo- Alexander-Davey (Campbell Uni- cratic values and well aware of the versity) have assembled an im- benefits of democratic virtues, our democratic minds struggle to discern 2 See p. xxii, note 4. Alexander-Davey cites the benefit of the aristocratic. This is a number of critiques including C. Wright a time when an “open mind” is most Mills, The Power Elite (Oxford: Oxford Uni- needed. The democratic mind must versity Press, 2000); Sheldon S. Wolin, Democ- consider that the democratic age has racy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the its own foibles. Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism (Princeton, The book is divided into three sec- NJ: Princeton University Press, 2010); Jeffrey Edward Green, The Shadow of Unfairness: A tions, each devoted to thinkers in the Plebeian Theory of Liberal Democracy (Oxford: continental, British, and American Oxford University Press, 2016). traditions respectively. The first is

Why Democracy Needs Aristocracy Humanitas • 133 the largest section containing es- such as prudence, moderation, re- says by Andrew Fear, Brian Sand- sponsibility, and the like. Living this berg, Jay Smith, Jerry Salyer, Ethan way ennobles men, allowing them to Alexander-Davey, Jeffrey Church, rise above the mass. But the masses and Pedro Blas Gonzalez. While do not like that, so they revolt. the essays are well written and im- The continental section is weight- pressive in both their variety and ed toward an examination of French cogency, certain themes emerge. For aristocrats. Sandberg, Smith, and example, the role of the reactionary Salyer tackle this particular topic. aristocrat in the chaos of a post- Sandberg argues that French nobles aristocratic society arises in several viewed and used credit in the same essays. Fear discusses Tacitus’ depic- way merchants did. This was true tion of the aristocracy in the early during the wars of religion until imperial age. Its role there was not to 1800. And it was true of both Prot- rule again—it could not do that—but estants and Catholics. Aristocratic to sacrifice itself in defense of the practices of credit in war-making old republic for the good of Rome. were the precursors of the use of Theirs was an “aristocracy of sacri- credit today in the economies of our fice.” In a similar manner, Church’s liberal democracies. Smith’s essay on essay on Nietzsche challenges the the work and influence of Henri de traditional view that Nietzsche’s Boulainvilliers depicts a man who aristocracy is predatory. Rather, Ni- wrote perceptively on the rights of etzsche’s “Über-Mensch” is a sort of aristocrats. In a time when rights self-overcoming man who redeems were increasingly accorded on the liberal society rather than rules it. He basis of equality and merit, this aris- provides spiritual value in a world tocrat argued for rights based on lin- that has lost meaning. Nietzsche’s eage. The reason that lineage could aristocrat is one who can live in the be a source of rights was that it could modern world and even improve it, be a source of meritocratic value. while escaping its flaws. But there is Smith writes of the views of Alès de a sacrificial element in Nietzsche’s Corbet, who was heavily influenced aristocrat. He strives for greatness by Boulainvilliers: “True nobility is in a world that is suspicious of hi- created only when moral qualities erarchical ranking, even while he is have become such an unconscious showing the way to a more spiritu- habit in some families that the pos- ally meaningful existence for every- terity of those families comes to be one. A similar spiritual aristocracy recognized, respected, and honored is present in Gonzalez’s essay on by their fellow citizens” (64). Salyer’s Ortega y Gasset’s The Revolt of the essay on the French reactionary Louis Masses. The problem of mass man, de Bonald’s “theory of a Christian Gonzalez writes, is that he resents elite” points out that Bonald antici- the freedom that comes from the pated the rise of the liberal elites and cultivation of a multitude of virtues the criticisms of Christopher Lasch.

134 • Volume XXXIII, Nos. 1 & 2, 2020 Luke C. Sheahan Bonald argued that a society that Burke’s relationship with four aris- hews to hierarchy and tradition is tocrats of his day and how that af- more humane than a liberal society fected his broader political views of “equals,” which is ultimately ruled of permanence and change. Crowe by a self-serving elite. sees in Burke’s relationship with Ethan Alexander-Davey discusses these men a tempered view of the the thought of Konstantin Leon- caricature of Burke’s noble aristo- tiev, the “Russian Nietzsche.” Like crat. These men had their failings. Bonald, Leontiev emphasized the Some engaged in the very financial importance of a ruling class that em- speculations that Burke condemned, bodied as well as promoted beauty impoverishing themselves in the and greatness. Aesthetics and reli- process. That wasn’t the point. The gion were the highest ends of man, point was that the best members and their most strident and capable of the aristocratic class brought to defenders were the Church and the political order virtues buttressed by aristocracy. The role of the aristocrat property and religion, which in turn is to uphold standards for everyone restrained the radical urges of the across a variety of spheres. This democratic age. includes aesthetics and greatness of In the spirit of Crowe’s discus- character, but also national cultural sion of specific aristocrats in Burke’s distinctiveness. social circle, Wales considers the The section on English political life and writings of Alan Ian Percy, thought features essays from Geof- the Eighth Duke of Northumber- frey Vaughn, Ian Crowe, and Jona- land, perhaps one of the last of the than Wales. Vaughn’s examination aristocrats, dying in 1930. He came of Thomas Hobbes’s view of the from a nearly thousand-year line of “aristocracy of pride” provides an virtuous nobles; and he defended idiosyncratic reading of Hobbes. the classic aristocratic view that a While Hobbes is known for famous- humane society would be best pre- ly touting the summum malum as served not by a liberal democratic the primary motivator for keeping order, but by the rule of an elite en- the social contract, he admitted that sconced in the monarchy, aristocracy, some people are driven by pride. and established church, and charac- Hobbes does not reject the aristo- terized by noblesse oblige. cratic anthropology that holds that The third section considers three some people are better than others aristocratic thinkers in the American and that they should rule. Rather, he context: John Randolph of Roanoke, argues that so few are motivated by Alexis de Tocqueville, and Richard aristocratic pride that it is an unreli- Weaver. John Devanny describes able basis for the social contract. John Randolph as the sine qua non of Crowe has long been writing the Virginia aristocracy. Rather than about and promoting Burke’s work. echoing Jefferson’s ideal of the yeo- In his contribution he considers man farmer, Randolph insisted on

Why Democracy Needs Aristocracy Humanitas • 135 the necessity of the rule of a landed the concrete social order. Manners elite. Randolph’s preferred aristoc- that do not accord with the social racy was not legally established, reality create ill-will and resentment but one preserved through primo- among citizens. But when forms of geniture and entails that retained social etiquette accord with present land in a particular family through social reality, whether aristocratic or a specific lineage. Like the Eighth democratic, they increase good will Duke of Northumberland, Randolph among citizens and social stability saw individuals from these families overall. ruling the state through example, Finally, Jay Langdale considers suffusing society with virtues that Richard Weaver’s defense of the can only be cultivated through long, southern aristocracy. For Weaver the multi-generational practice. aristocratic patterns of the southern Avramenko and Noah Stengl’s gentlemen include chivalry, devo- essay on Tocqueville makes an im- tion to religion that eschews social portant contribution to an under- activism, and feudal economic ar- standing of the latter’s sociological rangements, especially concerning method. Though not an American, land. Weaver saw in the southern Tocqueville was certainly one of culture a defense of these things and the most astute nineteenth-century thus a guide to a new aristocracy students of American democracy. that might redeem the politics of the Tocqueville utilized a sociological modern world. This essay fittingly hermeneutic to understand how so- closes the volume as Weaver was cial forms characterized democratic specifically looking to provide a way and aristocratic societies. Aristocrat- to think about what a future aristoc- ic etiquette differs from democratic racy might look like in the turmoil of manners, but each corresponds to the mid-twentieth century. a respective concrete social reality. Every work is necessarily selec- Democratic forms are not thought tive. Not every aristocratic soul in uncouth as long as everyone sees our democratic times could be in- each other as equals. But if there is a cluded. But a few others are worth divergence between social forms and considering in the context of this social reality, then the result is so- particular discussion. In the con- cial discord, even revolution. Differ- tinental section, a chapter on Erik ences in manners and expectations von Kuehnelt-Leddihn would have of deference between classes in an been eminently fitting. Von Kue- aristocratic society are not resented hnelt-Leddihn’s defense of monar- by the people at large so long as chic liberalism describes how the they accept aristocratic distinctions. qualities of democracy are lethal to Debates over the value of aristocratic a humane freedom. His inclusion etiquette versus democratic man- would also have taken the section ners are largely moot since either deeper into the twentieth century. can be appropriate to the reality of In the American section the works

136 • Volume XXXIII, Nos. 1 & 2, 2020 Luke C. Sheahan of Irving Babbitt, Paul Elmer More, Kelo world.3 Finally, Viereck saw and Peter Viereck might have been aristocracy as central to the early appropriate. Babbitt’s Democracy and conservatives’ view of the world Leadership is a classic on the inevita- and one that conservatism cannot bility of leaders in a society, even a abandon without losing a central democratic one. There is always rule value. These thinkers all understood by the few. Our choice is between an how the complementary potential of aristocracy and an oligarchy: rule by an aristocratic class could contribute the few for the good of all, or rule by to a humane society. They further the few for the good of the few. The understood that the higher things historic aristocracy was predicated would not be secured by the major- upon a notion of rule by the best, ity, but by a noble and well-reared and thus manners and practices en- minority. But to call attention to the couraged generous and responsible absence of these thinkers from con- behavior. Democratic societies pay sideration in the book is not so much little attention to developing the a criticism as the volume already sort of virtues that would qualify runs past three hundred pages. Con- rulers as aristocrats in this sense; sider it instead a list of suggestions they make little provision for the for an Aristocratic Souls in Democratic mechanisms that enable the best to Times, volume two. rule. Democracies can succeed, but 3 Kelo v. New London, 545 U.S. 469 (2005). only if they recognize and cultivate The Supreme Court ruled that the Fifth a humane leadership class. More’s Amendment’s “public use” clause permits classic defense of property is thor- a government to use eminent domain to oughly aristocratic and an argument transfer property from a private homeowner that needs to be recalled in a post- to a corporation if the result serves a “public purpose,” in this case, increased tax revenue.

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