Why was there such a significant shift in American political thought? What reasons did progressives give for their changed views of the founding? An oft-repeated theme was that the American Industrial Revolution of the late 1800’s generated significant economic problems marked by a significant shift from agrarian economies to industrialized ones. During this period, the number of factory workers and wage earners increased dramatically accompanied by a substantial rise in corporate monopolies connected to railroads, crude oil, electricity, banking, and other industries. The social dichotomy, both real and perceived, between capital and labor, rich and poor, gained momentum. Academics and politicians argued that the founding ideas were insufficient to deal with these more modern economic and social challenges. New and better ideas were needed – we needed to progress!
Another factor in the tension and change in thinking, was the fact that the Progressive Era’s political scientists and newly minted PhD’s were either educated in universities and educational institutions in Europe and Germany, or were often heavily influenced by them. Among the prominent influences during the Progressive Era were the writings of Karl Marx, particularly his ideas on class struggle between capital and labor. Marx was heavily influenced by G.W.F. Hegel, particularly Hegel's dialectical method (i.e., ideas and reality evolving from opposing forces), or way of viewing history. A companion theory among progressives, as well as another significant influence upon their political philosophy, was Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution of life and populations over the course of generations. Applied to nations and society, “Social Darwinism” became a way to view political life as evolving and progressing, especially away from and beyond the 18th century founding ideals. The tension and disparity between these two ideologies and theories of political thought became very apparent and distinct.
The basic principles that progressives focused on, and essentially opposed, in the Declaration of Independence were Thomas Jefferson’s phrase in the Declaration,“The Laws of Nature and of Nature's God” –based on the writings of John Locke, Algernon Sidney, and others. “Natural law” essentially means that nature has immutable laws by which each individual has free will, a conscience, accountability for one’s actions, and a duty to not harm others or their property. As Jefferson also affirmed in the Declaration, men “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Natural rights include the right to govern one’s life and property, and these rights are inherent to all humans and are not bestowed by the government. For example, the first President of the American Political Science Association, Frank Goodnow, wrote at the turn of the century in 1900: “The rights which [man] possesses are … conferred upon him, not by his Creator, but rather the society to which he belongs.”
The Progressive movement not only disregarded innate human liberty and “natural rights” and as a worthwhile political theory, but most often rejected the notion altogether. In Recent Tendencies by Charles Merriam, he surveyed the History of American Political Theories (1903). After mentioning Francis Lieber, Theodore Woolsey, and John W. Burgess (all from the German schools), he states, “The individualistic ideas of the “natural right” school of political theory, endorsed in the [American] Revolution, are discredited and repudiated.” Merriam then quotes the progressive political scientist John Burgess: “There never was, and there never can be any liberty upon this earth and among human beings, outside of state organization.” Merriam concludes that “these alleged [natural] rights have no political force whatsoever, unless recognized and enforced by the state.” And he adds that “Liberty…is not a right equally enjoyed by all. It is dependent upon the degree of civilization reached by a given people, and increases as this advances.” Another progressive political scientist, Frank Johnson Goodnow, first president of the American Political Science Association, in “The American Conception of Liberty,” wrote that, “The rights which [man] possesses are … conferred upon him, not by his Creator, but rather by the society to which he belongs.” This progressive theory of rights is based upon the inverse of the Declaration – i.e., man must have the state or a government first before he can be accorded rights including liberty. You can’t delegate what you don’t possess.
Another tension or departure from the Founding may be found in the progressives’ overall dismissal of the Federalist Papers, both in regard to its approach to human nature, as well as its arguments for the separation of powers and “checks and balances” in the Constitutional republic. In “What is Progress?” (1913) Woodrow Wilson argues that the Federalist speaks of checks and balances in terms of Issac Newton and the solar system: “the laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” is a mechanical form, and “they [the founders] constructed a government as they would have constructed an orrery, –to display the laws of nature. Politics in their thought was a variety of mechanics.” Wilson continues, “The trouble with that theory is that government is not a machine, but a living thing…under the theory of organic life…It is accountable to Darwin, not to Newton. It is modified by its environment….” He concludes that, “Living political constitutions must be Darwinian in structure and in practice.” For Wilson and other progressives, the Founders’ (and the Federalist’s) concern with tyranny, especially majority tyranny (see Federalist 10 and 51), was misplaced.
Progressives felt that minority tyranny was a greater threat in their times, particularly in the economic forms of corporate greed and monopoly power. They defined these as “special interests” that could only be controlled by more aggressive “law, legislation and adjudication (courts).” Theodore Roosevelt in The Right of the People to Rule (1912) exclaims, “I have scant patience with this talk of the tyranny of the majority. Wherever there is tyranny of the majority, I shall protest against it with all my heart and soul. But we are today suffering from the tyranny of minorities. It is a small minority that is grabbing our coal deposits, our water powers, and our harbor fronts…[it] is a small minority that lies behind monopolies and trusts.” The progressives’ focus was more on economic inequality and the rights of labor and less on individual equality (such as racial inequality). Quoting Abraham Lincoln, they emphasized the superiority of labor over capital (See, Roosevelt’s The New Nationalism). This, among other things, led to their fixation over economic rights over natural rights. As a result, the separation of powers and checks and balances as set forth in the Federalist were seen as obstacles to their agenda and policies of an expansion of federal power and administration to correct economic problems caused by industrialization and wage labor. Additionally, progressives didn’t want their agenda of needed changes to be delayed by the wheels of “separations” and “checks,” or result in a “clog [in] the administration” (Federalist 10) of desirable legislation, impeding and hampering their improved, “more democratic” order.
The Progressive movement stands not only in tension with, but generally in opposition to, the political principles and institutions of the American Founding. No progressive academic, political leader or President seemed to ever defended the concept of “natural rights,” or the idea that our rights are inherent at birth bestowed by a divine Creator, as set forth in the Declaration. While they often referred to, and quoted, the Founders, such as Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln, they substituted “equality of opportunity”[1] for equal, natural rights and “effective liberty”[2] for natural or inherent freedom. Not one defended the Federalist Papers, nor its assumptions of human nature and the need for “auxiliary precautions” (No. 51), as laid out in the separation of powers and the checks and balances of the three branches of government. To some degree, progressives diminished the notion that America is a constitutional republic and elevated “democracy” in its place. Yet, as they generally supported representative government, they effectively exalted majority rule over individual and minority rights. As James Madison warned, “It is in vain to say, that enlightened statesmen will be able to adjust these clashing interests [of capital and labor, and of minority and majority factions], and render them all subservient to the public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm…[and] democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property.” (Federalist No. 10). Finally, to progressives the Founding was out of date, and inapplicable to their more complex times and difficulties. They firmly believed and felt that American society had evolved and progressed beyond the need for the fundamental ideas and principles of 1776 and 1787.
__________________________
[1] Teddy Roosevelt, The New Nationalism, pp. 214-215.
[2] John Dewey, The Crisis in Liberalism, CP., p. 70).
