DOCSLIB.ORG

Herbert Croly, from Progressive Democracy (1914)

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Herbert Croly, from Progressive Democracy (1914) Herbert Croly, from Progressive Democracy (1914) Herbert Croly was the first editor of the New Republic, and his ideas influenced such politicians as Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt. An ardent Progressive, Croly’s book, The Promise of America Life, is generally cited as the clearest expression of the goals of Progressivism in the early 20th century. In the excerpt below, Croly describes the impact of Progressive ideas on U.S. politics. [W]hile fully admitting that the transition may not be as abrupt as it seems, we have apparently been witnessing during the past year or two the end of one epoch and the beginning of another. A movement of public opinion, which believes itself to be and calls itself essentially progressive, has become the dominant formative influence in American political life. The best evidence of the power of progressivism is the effect which its advent has had upon the prestige and the fortunes of political leaders of both parties. For the first time attractions and repulsions born of the progressive idea, are determining lines of political association. Until recently a man who wished actively and effectively to participate in political life had to be either a Democrat or a Republican; but now, although Republicanism and Democracy are still powerful political forces, the standing of a politician is determined quite as much by his relation to the progressive movement. The line of cleavage between progressives and non-progressives is fully as important as that between Democrats and Republicans. Political leaders, who have deserved well of their own party but who have offended the progressives, are retiring or are being retired from public life. Precisely what the outcome will be, no one can predict with any confidence; but one result seems tolerably certain. If the classification of the great majority of American voters into Democrats and Republicans is to endure, the significance of both Democracy and Republicanism is bound to be profoundly modified by the new loyalties and the new enmities created by the aggressive progressive intruder. [T]he complexion, and to a certain extent even the features, of the American political countenance have profoundly altered. Political leaders still pride themselves upon their conservatism, but candid conservatives, in case they come from any other part of the country but the South, often pay for their candor by their early retirement. Conservatism has come to imply reaction. Its substantial utility is almost as much undervalued as that of radicalism formerly was. The whole group of prevailing political values has changed. Proposals for the regulation of public utility companies, which would then have been condemned as examples of administrative autocracy, are now accepted without serious public controversy. Plans of social legislation, which formerly would have been considered culpably "paternal," and, if passed at the solicitation of the labor unions, would have been declared unconstitutional by the courts, are now considered to be a normal and necessary exercise of the police power. Proposed alterations in our political mechanism, which would then have been appraised as utterly extravagant and extremely 2 dangerous, are now being placed on the headlines of political programs and are being incorporated in state constitutions. In certain important respects the radicals of 1904 do not differ in their practical proposals from the conservatives of 1914. Thus by almost imperceptible degrees reform became insurgent and insurgency progressive. For the first time in four generations American conservatism was confronted by a pervasive progressivism, which began by being dangerously indignant and ended by being far more dangerously inquisitive. Just resentment is useful and indispensable while it lasts; but it cannot last long. If it is to persist, it must be transformed into a thoroughgoing curiosity which will not rest until it has discovered what the abuses mean, how they best can be remedied, and how intimately they are associated with temples and doctrines of the traditional political creed. The conservatives themselves have provoked this curiosity, and they must abide by its results. Just here lies the difference between modern progressivism and the old reform. The former is coming to be remorselessly inquisitive and unscrupulously thorough. The latter never knew any need of being either inquisitive or thorough. The early political reformers confined their attention to local or to special abuses. Civil service reform furnishes a good example of their methods and their purposes. The spoils system was a very grave evil, which was a fair object of assault; but it could not be successfully attacked and really uprooted merely by placing subordinate public officials under the protection of civil service laws and boards. Such laws and boards might do something to prevent politicians from appropriating the minor offices; but as long as the major offices were the gifts of the political machines, and as long as no attempt was made to perfect expert administrative organization as a necessary instrument of democracy, the agitation for civil service reform remained fundamentally sterile. It was sterile, because it was negative and timid, and because its supporters were content with their early successes and did not grow with the growing needs of their own agitation. In an analogous way the movement towards municipal reform attained a sufficient following in certain places to be embarrassing to local political bosses; but as long as it was a non-partisan movement for "good government" its successes were fugitive and sterile. It did not become really effective until it became frankly partisan, and associated good municipal government with all sorts of changes in economic and political organization which might well be obnoxious to many excellent citizens. In these and other cases the early political reformers were not sufficiently thorough. They failed to carry their analysis of the prevailing evils far or deep enough, and in their choice of remedies they never got beyond the illusions that moral exhortation, legal prohibitions and independent voting constituted a sufficient cure for American political abuses. All this disconnected political and economic agitation had, however, a value of which the agitators themselves were not wholly conscious. Not only was the attitude of national self-satisfaction being broken down in spots, but the ineffectiveness of these local, 3 spasmodic and restricted agitations had its effect on public opinion and prepared the way for a synthesis of the various phases of reform. When the wave of political "muck- raking" broke over the country, it provided a common bond, which tied reformers together. This bond consisted at first of the indignation which was aroused by the process of exposure; but it did not remain for long merely a feeling. As soon as public opinion began to realize that business exploitation had been allied with political corruption, and that the reformers were confronted, not by disconnected abuses, but by a perverted system, the inevitable and salutary inference began to be drawn. Just as business exploitation was allied with political corruption, so business reorganization must be allied with political reorganization. The old system must be confronted and superseded by a new system-the result of an alert social intelligence as well as an aroused individual conscience. Document Analysis 1. According to Croly, how had Progressivism impacted “American conservatism”? 2. How did Croly distinguish Progressivism from earlier U.S. reform movements? 3. What role did the muckrakers perform in the Progressive reform movement? .
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Learned Hand: the Jurisprudential Trajectory of an Old Progressive
    Buffalo Law Review Volume 43 Number 3 Article 7 12-1-1995 Learned Hand: The Jurisprudential Trajectory of an Old Progressive Edward A. Purcell Jr. New York Law School Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.law.buffalo.edu/buffalolawreview Part of the Legal History Commons Recommended Citation Edward A. Purcell Jr., Learned Hand: The Jurisprudential Trajectory of an Old Progressive, 43 Buff. L. Rev. 873 (1995). Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.buffalo.edu/buffalolawreview/vol43/iss3/7 This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Journals at Digital Commons @ University at Buffalo School of Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in Buffalo Law Review by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ University at Buffalo School of Law. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BOOK REVIEW Learned Hand: The Jurisprudential Trajectory of an Old Progressive EDWARD A. PURCELL, JR.t For more than half a century Learned Hand sat on the federal bench, and he is still widely considered the greatest American judge never to sit on the United States Supreme Court.1 For two decades Gerald Gunther, a distinguished authority on constitu- tional law, has labored faithfully on his biography. Such an excep- tional combination of author and subject promises a weighty and stimulating result, and Learned Hand: The Man and the Judge2 amply fulfills the expectation. It is massive in scope, elegant in style, insightful in analysis, and sensitive in characterization. Gunther examines the noteworthy events that marked Hand's public career and explores the fears, beliefs, aspirations, and inse- curities that shaped his private reality.
    [Show full text]
  • Here the Largely Disjointed Progressive Movement Began to Coalesce Around a Set of Policy Directions That Eventually Evolved Into Modern American Liberalism
    Cambridge University Press 978-1-107-03831-8 - Political Ideologies and Political Parties in America Hans Noel Excerpt More information 1 Introduction Distilling Their Frenzy from Some Academic Scribbler The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual infl uence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. John Maynard Keynes “The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money” 1936 First, the shaping of belief systems of any range into apparently logical wholes that are credible to large numbers of people is an act of creative synthesis characteristic of only a miniscule proportion of any population. Second, to the extent that multiple idea- elements of a belief system are socially diffused from such creative sources, they tend to be diffused as “packages,” which consumers come to see as “natural” wholes, for they are presented in such terms (“If you believe this, then you will also believe that, for it follows in such- and- such ways”). Philip Converse “The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics” 1964 Herbert Croly was not a man of action . Croly’s life was spent thinking. In 1909, Croly published The Promise of American Life , in which he argued, in short, that a strong central government might intervene in the economy in ways that could improve the lot of dis- advantaged citizens.
    [Show full text]
  • In Praise of Liberalism: an Assessment of Liberal Political Thought from the 17Th Century to Today
    Review of Contemporary Philosophy Vol. 14, 2015, pp. 11–36, ISSN 1841-5261 IN PRAISE OF LIBERALISM: AN ASSESSMENT OF LIBERAL POLITICAL THOUGHT FROM THE 17TH CENTURY TO TODAY MICHAEL B. FRIEDMAN [email protected] School of Social Work, Columbia University ABSTRACT. The author of this essay maintains that liberalism has been the primary source of progressive change in the United States since its earliest history. To support his claim, he traces the philosophical and political history of liberalism in England and the United States. The specific forms of liberalism have varied in different periods of history; but, he maintains, there is an underlying spirit of liberalism that has persisted throughout the past 350 years and can be the source of dynamic progressive social change in the 21st century. Throughout history, he maintains, liberalism has been committed to social progress and has sought to improve the lives of populations that are economically and politically disadvantaged. This underlying spirit, the author argues, can be the source for an energized liberal agenda for the 21st century. Keywords: liberalism; political philosophy; political history 1. Introduction Conservative – and even centrist – opponents of liberalism reject it because they identify it with cumbersome government; reckless spending; high tax- ation; naiveté about economics, crime, and world power; and lack of moral values. What a mistake! In fact, liberalism has been the source of social and political progress in the Western world since the 17th century. The idea that rights set a limit on the legitimate power of government is a liberal idea. The idea that govern- ment must respect the liberty of individuals is a liberal idea.
    [Show full text]
  • Herbert D. Croly: Apostle of Progressivism
    FIRST PRINCIPLES FOUNDATIONAL CONCEPTS TO GUIDE POLITICS AND POLICY MAKERS OF AMERICAN POLITICAL THOUGHT NO. 07 | MARCH 14, 2013 Herbert Croly: Progressive Apostle Sidney A. Pearson Jr. erbert David Croly (1869–1930) “brain trust” that helped to launch to be baptized in Comte’s atheist Hwas one of the most infl u- modern liberalism.1 “religion of humanity.” how much ential public intellectuals of the Yet Croly is scarcely known today of Comte stuck to Croly as he left Progressive movement in the early outside of the academic community. home and matured has always been 20th century, but his infl uence was This is a most unfortunate gap in our a matter of conjecture, but there is not limited to his own era. Croly’s collective understanding of modern no doubt that the young Croly found ideas were also instrumental in shap- liberalism. In order to clarify why philosophic ideas stimulating at a ing President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s we are where we are and how we got formative time in his life. Comte New Deal. here, it is important that we recover thought some sort of perfection was Following the 1932 election, there an understanding of Croly’s role in the future of humanity, and, details was widespread consensus that the unfolding of this drama. of that perfection aside, Croly clearly Croly’s ideas had been a midwife thought in those terms. to the new political order. Liberal Life Herbert Croly originally attended historians, such as Eric Goldman, Croly was born to live a life in City College in New York for one who routinely describe the triumph Progressive journalism as a race- year before transferring to Harvard of New Deal liberalism and Lyndon horse is born to run.
    [Show full text]
  • Gov 2230 Spring 2018 1 READING ASSIGNMENTS
    AMERICAN POLITICAL THOUGHT Spring 2018 Government 2230 Professor Yarbrough Hubbard Tower ext. 3296 Office Hours: Tu-Th 4-5:30 pm and by appointment [email protected] This course focuses on the political thought of American statesmen, writers, and prominent citizens from the Founding up to the twentieth century, with special emphasis on three critical “moments”: 1) the Founding, 2) the Crisis of the House Divided, meaning the battle over slavery and the nature of the Union, and 3) the impact of evolutionary biology (in the forms of social Darwinism and pragmatism), historicism, and idealism on the development of American political thought and practice from the late 19th century to the present. The course concludes with a brief examination of contemporary liberalism and conservatism after 2016 and their place in the American political tradition. The following books are required and are available for purchase or rent through Bowdoin’s textbook partner, Chegg, at www.chegg.com/bookstore/bowdoin: *Hamilton, Madison, Jay, The Federalist Papers, ed. Rossiter, with introduction by Charles R. Kesler (Mentor) *The Anti-Federalist Papers, ed. Herbert Storing (Chicago) *The Essential Jefferson, ed. Jean M. Yarbrough (Hackett) *Steven B. Smith, The Writings of Abraham Lincoln (Yale) *Herbert Croly, The Promise of American Life (Northeastern) In addition, I have placed a number of short essays on electronic reserve and/or paper reserve in the library. Note: these are on the LIBRARY reserves (not Blackboard). They are marked on your syllabus. COURSE REQUIREMENTS: Students are required to write three three-page thought papers. The first will be on the Anti- federalist-Federalist debates.
    [Show full text]
  • AMERICAN POLITICAL THOUGHT Spring 2020
    AMERICAN POLITICAL THOUGHT Spring 2020 Government 2230 Professor Yarbrough Hubbard Tower ext. 3296 Office Hours: TBD [email protected] This course focuses on the political thought of American statesmen, writers, and prominent citizens from the Founding up to the twentieth century, with special emphasis on three critical “moments”: 1) the Founding, 2) the crisis of the house divided and the civil war, and 3) the impact of evolutionary biology (in the forms of social Darwinism and pragmatism), historicism, and idealism on the development of American political thought and practice from the late 19th century to the present. The course concludes with a brief examination of contemporary liberalism and conservatism and their place in the American political tradition. The following books are required and are available from our virtual partner, eCampus at http://bowdoin.ecampus.com/ or from Amazon or other online booksellers such as Barnes and Noble. *Hamilton, Madison, Jay, The Federalist Papers, ed. Rossiter, with introduction by Charles R. Kesler (Mentor) *The Anti-Federalist Papers, ed. Herbert Storing (Chicago) *The Essential Jefferson, ed. Jean M. Yarbrough (Hackett) *Steven B. Smith, The Writings of Abraham Lincoln (Yale) *Herbert Croly, The Promise of American Life (Northeastern) In addition, I have placed a number of short essays on electronic reserve and/or paper reserve in the library. Note: these are on the LIBRARY reserves (not Blackboard). They are marked on your syllabus. COURSE REQUIREMENTS: Students are required to write three three-page thought papers. For the first, students will write on The Federalist Papers and the Anti-federalists. The second paper will be on Abraham Lincoln, and the third on Herbert Croly.
    [Show full text]
  • Viewed Essentially As Servants
    ESSAYS IN PRAISE OF LIBERALISM by Michael Belais Friedman THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF AMERICAN LIBERALISM Liberalism has taken different forms at different times, but there is, I believe, an underlying spirit of liberalism that has persisted and evolved through various historical incarnations. This is not an original observation. I first came across it in a book by John Dewey called Liberalism and Social Action. Dewey observed that both he and John Stuart Mill were liberals but that he was a socialist while John Stuart Mill was a free market capitalist. Had the word "liberalism" simply been distorted as it traversed the century from Mill to Dewey or was there something that the two of them had in common which was more important than their difference about the best economic system? Dewey answered that there were three enduring values that he shared with Mill and that found their roots in John Locke and the makers of the American Revolution--liberty, individuality, and a commitment to progressive social action. He argued further that the specific forms these values took had had to change over time as the awareness of social injustice spread from a concern about the subjugation of economically successful non-aristocrats to the oppression of the working class. More recently Douglas MacLean and Claudia Mills brought together a number of impressive contemporary thinkers in a book entitled Liberalism Reconsidered. Their working premise is that there are two fundamental strands of liberalism--equality and liberty. They are struck by the inherent tension between the two values and the high wire act that is required to balance the two in a coherent political theory.
    [Show full text]
  • History of American Political Thought
    History of American Political Thought Edited by Bryan-Paul Frost and Jeffrey Sikkenga II LEXINGTON BOOKS Lanham • Boulder • New York • Oxford CONTENTS Preface and Acknowledgments xi Bryan-Paul Frost and Jeffrey Sikkenga Introduction: Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America 1 Harvey C. Mansfield and Delta Winthrop PART ONE: FROM COLONY TO NA TION (1608-1776) John Winthrop, John Cotton, and Nathaniel Niles: The Basic Principles of Puritan Political Thought 25 MichaelJ. Rosano Thomas Hutchinson and James Otis on Sovereignty, Obedience, and Rebellion 44 Howard L. Lubert Thomas Paine: The American Radical 63 John Koritansky Benjamin Franklin: A Model American and an American Model 80 Steven Forde PART TWO: THE NEW REPUBLIC (1776-1820) 5 Liberty, Constitutionalism, and Moderation: The Political Thought of George Washington 95 Paul O. Carrese 6 John Adams and the Republic of Laws 114 Richard Samuelson 7 Legitimate Government, Religion, and Education: The Political Philosophy of Thomas Jefferson 132 Aristide Tessitore 8 The Political Science of James Madison 149 Michael P. Zuckert 9 Alexander Hamilton on the Strategy of American Free Government 167 Karl-Friedrich Walling 10 America's Modernity: James Wilson on Natural Law and Natural Rights 192 Eduardo A. Velasquez vn 11 Anti-Federalist Political Thought: Brutus and The Federal Farmer 216 Murray Dry 12 The New Constitutionalism of Publius 230 James R. Stoner, Jr. 13 Union, Constitutionalism, and the Judicial Defense of Rights: John Marshall 248 Matthew J. Franck PART THREE: A DIVIDED NATION (1820-1865) 14 John Quincy Adams on Principle and Practice 271 David Tucker 15 Union and Liberty: The Political Thought of Daniel Webster 287 Sean Mattie 16 Henry Clay and the Statesmanship of Compromise 302 Kimberly C.
    [Show full text]
  • THE HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE of JUDGE LEARNED HAND: What Endures and Why?
    digitalcommons.nyls.edu Faculty Scholarship Articles & Chapters 2018 The iH storical Significance of Judge Learned Hand: What Endures and Why Edward A. Purcell Jr. Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/fac_articles_chapters Part of the Judges Commons, and the Legal History Commons THE HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF JUDGE LEARNED HAND: What Endures and Why? Edward A. Purcell, Jr.* The 100th anniversary of Judge Learned Hand's opinion in Masses Publishing Co. v. Patten' invites us to look back on its author's long career and to consider his contributions to American law and his significance in the nation's history. Spanning more than fifty years from the presidency of William Howard Taft to the presidency of John F. Kennedy, Hand's judicial career presents an exceptionally rich subject for such reflection. INTRODUCTION As Gerald Gunther's massive biography2 and Constance Jordan's edition of his letters3 make clear, Learned Hand's life merits scholarly attention for any number of reasons. An unusual personal psychology, friendships with major historical figures, social and political involvements, extensive law reform efforts, highly regarded essays and speeches, insightful and controversial ideas about democracy, and valuable contemporaneous commentaries on the people and events of his day all warrant general interest.4 In revealing ways Hand's life and activities track the course of the nation's history through the first half of the twentieth century. Richard Posner surely betrayed the narrowest of professional, and perhaps judicial, * Joseph Solomon Distinguished Professor, New York Law School. I thank the participants in this symposium for comments on a shorter oral presentation and my colleagues at the New York Law School Faculty Colloquium for comments on an earlier and much longer version of this paper.
    [Show full text]
  • Lightning Round (20 Seconds to Answer) What Does It Mean to Be a Progressive?
    Pode_9780307382559_4p_01_r1.qxp 6/26/08 1:27 PM Page 15 Lightning Round (20 Seconds to Answer) What Does It Mean to Be a Progressive? do not intend to write another historical account of the Populist, IProgressive, New Deal, and Great Society eras. I am neither a historian nor a social theorist, and many others before me have pro- duced important and compelling accounts of these times. But I am a student of politics and intensely curious about how our progressive past—the men, women, leaders, ideas, and movements of previous years—shapes our understanding of progressivism today. Whenever I’m invited to speak with activists and groups across the country, someone invariably asks, “What is progressivism?” Is it an ideology? Is it a political theory? Is it a disposition? Or is it just a political label with no real meaning? A second related question usu- ally follows: “Isn’t a progressive the same thing as a liberal?” My answer to the first question is straightforward (and serves as the mission of the institution I founded): “Progressives believe that America should be a country of boundless opportunity, where all people can better themselves through education, hard work, fair pay, and the freedom to pursue their dreams. We believe that this will be achieved only with an open and effective government that champions the common good over narrow self-interest while secur- ing the rights and safety of its people.” Pode_9780307382559_4p_01_r1.qxp 6/26/08 1:27 PM Page 16 16 the power of progress My usual response to the second question is, “Call me whatever you want.” A less flippant and more historically accurate response is that liberalism and progressivism are distinct but complementary sets of ideas.
    [Show full text]
  • 1912 and 2012: the Tide of Progressivism in American Presidential Politics
    1912 and 2012: The Tide of Progressivism in American Presidential Politics John A. Moore, Jr. California State Polytechnic University, Pomona On December 6, 2011, Barack Obama traveled to Osawatomie, Kansas, where he delivered remarks to students and guests at Osawatomie High School. Encouraged by a handful of eminent historians with whom he had dined during his first years in office, Obama quite obviously was channeling Theodore Roosevelt, who, almost 100 years prior, had given a celebrated address in Osawatomie declaring his commitment to something called the “New Nationalism.”1 The term derived from a book written by Herbert Croly and published in 1909.2 Roosevelt, a Republican and popular former president, was setting the stage for his political restoration in the forthcoming presidential campaign. His New Nationalism speech called for increased government activism in American social and economic life and a stronger executive office than recent tradition had provided. 1 “The New Nationalism,” The Works of Theodore Roosevelt: National Edition, vol. 27, ed. Hermann Hagedorn (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1926), 5-22. For each of president Obama’s first three years in office he met at dinner annually with the historians. They included Michael Beschloss, H. W. Brands, Douglas Brinkley, Robert Caro, Robert Dallek, Doris Kearns Goodwin, David Kennedy, Kenneth Mack, and Garry Wills. See Jodi Kantor, “Now, a Chance to Catch Up to His Epochal Vision,” The New York Times, November 7, 2012, <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/07/us/politics/now-a-chance-to-catch- up-to-his-epochal-vision.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0>; and Kenneth T.
    [Show full text]
  • The Progressive Intellectual Tradition in America Part One of the Progressive Tradition Series
    LIBRARY OF CONGRESS The Progressive Intellectual Tradition in America Part One of the Progressive Tradition Series John Halpin and Conor P. Williams April 2010 WWW.AMERICANPROGRESS.ORG The Progressive Intellectual Tradition in America Part One of the Progressive Tradition Series John Halpin and Conor P. Williams April 2010 Contents 1 Introduction 4 The rise of progressivism 15 Conclusion 17 Endnotes With the rise of the contemporary progressive movement and the election of President Barack Obama in 2008, there is extensive public interest in better understanding the origins, values, and intellectual strands of progressivism. Who were the original progressive thinkers and activists? Where did their ideas come from and what motivated their beliefs and actions? What were their main goals for society and government? How did their ideas influence or diverge from alternative social doctrines? How do their ideas and beliefs relate to contemporary progressivism? The new Progressive Tradition Series from the Center for American Progress traces the develop- ment of progressivism as a social and political tradition stretching from the late 19th century reform efforts to the current day. The series is designed primarily for educational and leadership development purposes to help students and activists better understand the foundations of pro- gressive thought and its relationship to politics and social movements. Although the Progressive Studies Program has its own views about the relative merit of the various values, ideas, and actors discussed within the progressive tradition, the essays included in the series are descriptive and analytical rather than opinion-based. We envision the essays serving as primers for exploring progressivism and liberalism in more depth through core texts—and in contrast to the conserva- tive intellectual tradition and canon.
    [Show full text]