Sanford Levinson, Melissa Williams, and Joel Parker (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479812370
- eISBN:
- 9781479852697
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479812370.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory
The topic of American conservatism is especially timely, and perhaps volatile. Is there what might be termed an “exceptional” form of conservatism that is characteristically American, in contrast to ...
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The topic of American conservatism is especially timely, and perhaps volatile. Is there what might be termed an “exceptional” form of conservatism that is characteristically American, in contrast to conservatisms found in other countries? Are views that are identified in the United States as conservative necessarily congruent with what political theorists might classify under that label? Or does much American conservatism almost necessarily reflect the distinctly liberal background of American political thought? This book reflects on these crucial questions, unpacking the very nature and development of American conservative thought. It examines both the historical and contemporary realities of arguments offered by self-conscious conservatives in the United States, offering a well-rounded view of the state of this field. In addition to synoptic overviews of the various dimensions of American conservative thought, specific attention is paid to such topics as American constitutionalism, the role of religion and religious institutions, and the particular impact of the late Leo Strauss on American thought and thinkers. Just as American conservatism includes a wide, and sometimes conflicting, group of thinkers, the chapters themselves reflect differing and sometimes controversial assessments of the theorists under discussion.Less
The topic of American conservatism is especially timely, and perhaps volatile. Is there what might be termed an “exceptional” form of conservatism that is characteristically American, in contrast to conservatisms found in other countries? Are views that are identified in the United States as conservative necessarily congruent with what political theorists might classify under that label? Or does much American conservatism almost necessarily reflect the distinctly liberal background of American political thought? This book reflects on these crucial questions, unpacking the very nature and development of American conservative thought. It examines both the historical and contemporary realities of arguments offered by self-conscious conservatives in the United States, offering a well-rounded view of the state of this field. In addition to synoptic overviews of the various dimensions of American conservative thought, specific attention is paid to such topics as American constitutionalism, the role of religion and religious institutions, and the particular impact of the late Leo Strauss on American thought and thinkers. Just as American conservatism includes a wide, and sometimes conflicting, group of thinkers, the chapters themselves reflect differing and sometimes controversial assessments of the theorists under discussion.
Elvin T. Lim
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- February 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780199812189
- eISBN:
- 9780199382606
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199812189.003.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
This chapter discusses the Two Foundings of America. It covers the two foundational strands in American political thought; federalism vs. anti-federalism; connecting American political thought with ...
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This chapter discusses the Two Foundings of America. It covers the two foundational strands in American political thought; federalism vs. anti-federalism; connecting American political thought with American political development; the search for American exceptionalism; Publius’ new federalism; and iterations of the Two Foundings. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.Less
This chapter discusses the Two Foundings of America. It covers the two foundational strands in American political thought; federalism vs. anti-federalism; connecting American political thought with American political development; the search for American exceptionalism; Publius’ new federalism; and iterations of the Two Foundings. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.
Jonathan McKenzie
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780813166308
- eISBN:
- 9780813166384
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University Press of Kentucky
- DOI:
- 10.5810/kentucky/9780813166308.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory
This book provides a fresh interpretation of Henry Thoreau’s political theory through a comprehensive interpretation of public and private writings. While recent critics have opened new vistas in ...
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This book provides a fresh interpretation of Henry Thoreau’s political theory through a comprehensive interpretation of public and private writings. While recent critics have opened new vistas in Thoreau interpretation, little attention has been paid to Thoreau’s journals and correspondence. This book argues that these private sources enhance our understanding of Thoreau’s political theory by highlighting its place within his overall philosophical mission. In particular, this book attends to the resonances between Thoreau’s overall political-theoretical mission of privatism and the Socratic practice of philosophy as a way of life. Through analyses of Thoreau’s reflective simplification, his philosophy of time, his place in the reform movements of the nineteenth century, his understanding of wildness as freedom, and his virtue-making of political indifference, this book rethinks the basic structure of Thoreau’s overall project.Less
This book provides a fresh interpretation of Henry Thoreau’s political theory through a comprehensive interpretation of public and private writings. While recent critics have opened new vistas in Thoreau interpretation, little attention has been paid to Thoreau’s journals and correspondence. This book argues that these private sources enhance our understanding of Thoreau’s political theory by highlighting its place within his overall philosophical mission. In particular, this book attends to the resonances between Thoreau’s overall political-theoretical mission of privatism and the Socratic practice of philosophy as a way of life. Through analyses of Thoreau’s reflective simplification, his philosophy of time, his place in the reform movements of the nineteenth century, his understanding of wildness as freedom, and his virtue-making of political indifference, this book rethinks the basic structure of Thoreau’s overall project.
Lee Drutman
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- March 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780190913854
- eISBN:
- 9780197516980
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190913854.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics, Comparative Politics
This chapter examines the paradox of partisanship. In 1950, the American Political Science Association put out a major report arguing for a “more responsible two-party system.” The two parties—the ...
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This chapter examines the paradox of partisanship. In 1950, the American Political Science Association put out a major report arguing for a “more responsible two-party system.” The two parties—the Democratic Party and the Republican Party—were then largely indistinguishable coalitions of parochial local parties, and the political scientists argued that too little, rather than too much polarization, was the problem. This sets up a paradox: Some party division is necessary, but too much can be deadly. Various traditions in American political thought have tried to resolve this paradox. Antipartisans have urged consensus above all. Responsible partisans have urged competition above all. Meanwhile, bipartisans have urged compromise above all. Consensus is impossible. However, both compromise and competition are essential to democracy. Only the neglected multiparty tradition can solve the paradox with the right balance of competition and compromise.Less
This chapter examines the paradox of partisanship. In 1950, the American Political Science Association put out a major report arguing for a “more responsible two-party system.” The two parties—the Democratic Party and the Republican Party—were then largely indistinguishable coalitions of parochial local parties, and the political scientists argued that too little, rather than too much polarization, was the problem. This sets up a paradox: Some party division is necessary, but too much can be deadly. Various traditions in American political thought have tried to resolve this paradox. Antipartisans have urged consensus above all. Responsible partisans have urged competition above all. Meanwhile, bipartisans have urged compromise above all. Consensus is impossible. However, both compromise and competition are essential to democracy. Only the neglected multiparty tradition can solve the paradox with the right balance of competition and compromise.
Damion L. Thomas
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252037177
- eISBN:
- 9780252094293
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252037177.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
This chapter argues that the integration of baseball had a direct relationship with a core American foreign policy objective: manipulating international perception of American race relations. Hence, ...
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This chapter argues that the integration of baseball had a direct relationship with a core American foreign policy objective: manipulating international perception of American race relations. Hence, it explores the relationship between Cold War repression and racial integration after the articulation of the Truman Doctrine. By examining the historical context of Jackie Robinson's testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), this chapter examines the processes through which the U.S. government resolved to alter international opinions of American race relations rather than provide substantive changes to the segregated racial order in the early days of the Cold War, as well as the transformations in American political thought that allowed for those changes.Less
This chapter argues that the integration of baseball had a direct relationship with a core American foreign policy objective: manipulating international perception of American race relations. Hence, it explores the relationship between Cold War repression and racial integration after the articulation of the Truman Doctrine. By examining the historical context of Jackie Robinson's testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), this chapter examines the processes through which the U.S. government resolved to alter international opinions of American race relations rather than provide substantive changes to the segregated racial order in the early days of the Cold War, as well as the transformations in American political thought that allowed for those changes.
Juliet Hooker
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781479810512
- eISBN:
- 9781479837564
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479810512.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory
Philosophical and political questions about the legitimacy of uncivil disobedience have been a core preoccupation of African American political thought since its inception. Additionally, a systematic ...
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Philosophical and political questions about the legitimacy of uncivil disobedience have been a core preoccupation of African American political thought since its inception. Additionally, a systematic misreading of black protest movements, particularly the US Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, has been a fundamental referent for philosophical defenses of a right to civil disobedience. This essay takes Candice Delmas’s defense of uncivil disobedience as a point of departure to reflect on how African American political thought challenges dominant liberal understandings of dissent, and to consider the conceptions of political obligation that should accompany accounts of principled lawbreaking.Less
Philosophical and political questions about the legitimacy of uncivil disobedience have been a core preoccupation of African American political thought since its inception. Additionally, a systematic misreading of black protest movements, particularly the US Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, has been a fundamental referent for philosophical defenses of a right to civil disobedience. This essay takes Candice Delmas’s defense of uncivil disobedience as a point of departure to reflect on how African American political thought challenges dominant liberal understandings of dissent, and to consider the conceptions of political obligation that should accompany accounts of principled lawbreaking.
Sean Beienburg
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226631943
- eISBN:
- 9780226632278
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226632278.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
This book tells the story of the states’ fight against national prohibition from before the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment through its repeal. It offers the most comprehensive treatment of the ...
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This book tells the story of the states’ fight against national prohibition from before the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment through its repeal. It offers the most comprehensive treatment of the constitutional debate over prohibition ever assembled, incorporating not just Congress, the presidents, and the Supreme Court but political activity throughout the states of the Union. Unlike the present, where constitutional matters are largely ceded to the courts, prohibition involved active discussions among elected officials who took their constitutional oaths and obligations seriously. This discourse was serious, subtle, and widespread, drawing on deep roots in American political thought and modeling the extrajudicial constitutionalism called for by many scholars. Even in the wake of an ostensibly settling constitutional amendment, the logic of states’ rights structured most of the era’s debate. Understanding the constitutional thought of figures like Calvin Coolidge and Al Smith, as well as previously lesser-known state officials, shows how deeply Americans engaged in governance cared about federalism, jockeying with one another to claim fidelity to the Tenth Amendment and enumerated powers while reviling nationalism and nullification alike. Debates over federalism have become tied to and indeed almost reduced to southern opposition to civil rights. Prohibition demonstrates that states’ rights was not primarily a southern Democratic story; by way of contrast, northerners, Republicans, and progressives were committed to constitutional decentralization. After reconstructing these debates, the book concludes with a coda discussing the constitutional parallels and differences between the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s and marijuana today.Less
This book tells the story of the states’ fight against national prohibition from before the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment through its repeal. It offers the most comprehensive treatment of the constitutional debate over prohibition ever assembled, incorporating not just Congress, the presidents, and the Supreme Court but political activity throughout the states of the Union. Unlike the present, where constitutional matters are largely ceded to the courts, prohibition involved active discussions among elected officials who took their constitutional oaths and obligations seriously. This discourse was serious, subtle, and widespread, drawing on deep roots in American political thought and modeling the extrajudicial constitutionalism called for by many scholars. Even in the wake of an ostensibly settling constitutional amendment, the logic of states’ rights structured most of the era’s debate. Understanding the constitutional thought of figures like Calvin Coolidge and Al Smith, as well as previously lesser-known state officials, shows how deeply Americans engaged in governance cared about federalism, jockeying with one another to claim fidelity to the Tenth Amendment and enumerated powers while reviling nationalism and nullification alike. Debates over federalism have become tied to and indeed almost reduced to southern opposition to civil rights. Prohibition demonstrates that states’ rights was not primarily a southern Democratic story; by way of contrast, northerners, Republicans, and progressives were committed to constitutional decentralization. After reconstructing these debates, the book concludes with a coda discussing the constitutional parallels and differences between the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s and marijuana today.
Sean Beienburg
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226631943
- eISBN:
- 9780226632278
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226632278.003.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
The recent trend of state legalization of marijuana (for medical and recreational purposes) has renewed long-standing debates about federalism and prohibition. Over fierce dissents arguing federal ...
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The recent trend of state legalization of marijuana (for medical and recreational purposes) has renewed long-standing debates about federalism and prohibition. Over fierce dissents arguing federal suppression of in-state marijuana exceeded the enumerated powers of the Constitution, in 2005 the Supreme Court case of Gonzales v. Raich upheld the exercise of federal power, setting the states and Washington on a collision course. Using the marijuana case to briefly illustrate the relevant legal controversies, such as the non-commandeering doctrine, this chapter frames the subsequent chapters on prohibition. It briefly previews the book’s major arguments and shows how reconstructing these debates helps us better understand American Political Thought, American Political Development, and legal debates on extrajudicial constitutional interpretation and popular constitutionalism.Less
The recent trend of state legalization of marijuana (for medical and recreational purposes) has renewed long-standing debates about federalism and prohibition. Over fierce dissents arguing federal suppression of in-state marijuana exceeded the enumerated powers of the Constitution, in 2005 the Supreme Court case of Gonzales v. Raich upheld the exercise of federal power, setting the states and Washington on a collision course. Using the marijuana case to briefly illustrate the relevant legal controversies, such as the non-commandeering doctrine, this chapter frames the subsequent chapters on prohibition. It briefly previews the book’s major arguments and shows how reconstructing these debates helps us better understand American Political Thought, American Political Development, and legal debates on extrajudicial constitutional interpretation and popular constitutionalism.
Sean Beienburg
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226631943
- eISBN:
- 9780226632278
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226632278.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
Before national prohibition could be implemented, completing the evolution from voluntary temperance to nationwide policy, its defenders had to reconcile the restriction of alcohol with some of the ...
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Before national prohibition could be implemented, completing the evolution from voluntary temperance to nationwide policy, its defenders had to reconcile the restriction of alcohol with some of the key ideological elements of American political thought. This meant that, although John Stuart Mill had long ago derided the "Maine Law" establishing prohibition, prohibitionists justified the suppression of alcohol as compatible with freedom as understood within both liberalism and progressivism. Prohibition, far from being a narrow movement imposed by rural fundamentalists, drew on a wide base of support from a variety of reform movements, including urban anti-poverty opponents, black intellectuals seeking moral uplift and the enforcement of Reconstruction, and women’s and Christian (especially Protestant) activists, to say nothing of reinforcement from business and the commitment to white supremacy anchoring Southern politics.Less
Before national prohibition could be implemented, completing the evolution from voluntary temperance to nationwide policy, its defenders had to reconcile the restriction of alcohol with some of the key ideological elements of American political thought. This meant that, although John Stuart Mill had long ago derided the "Maine Law" establishing prohibition, prohibitionists justified the suppression of alcohol as compatible with freedom as understood within both liberalism and progressivism. Prohibition, far from being a narrow movement imposed by rural fundamentalists, drew on a wide base of support from a variety of reform movements, including urban anti-poverty opponents, black intellectuals seeking moral uplift and the enforcement of Reconstruction, and women’s and Christian (especially Protestant) activists, to say nothing of reinforcement from business and the commitment to white supremacy anchoring Southern politics.
Nolan Bennett
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780190060695
- eISBN:
- 9780190060725
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190060695.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory, American Politics
Chapter 2 shows how Frederick Douglass issued two claims across two antebellum narratives. In his 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, he both challenged the ...
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Chapter 2 shows how Frederick Douglass issued two claims across two antebellum narratives. In his 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, he both challenged the diminished legal and moral authority of black Americans and analyzed what of the plantation had oppressed him. Yet after his political ideas and ties developed in the following decade, Douglass wrote his 1855 My Bondage and My Freedom not as mere narrative but as denunciation. Whereas to narrate wrongs encouraged readers to judge Douglass’s story alongside moral criteria of justice, to denounce wrongs in Bondage implicated readers within the structures that create antebellum subjects on and off the plantation. This claim depended on Douglass’s renewed authority to analyze his life and on an analysis that revealed how the conditions of slavery implicate abolitionists and readers. Douglass’s book reached outward to demand his audience join him in solidarity for racial justice.Less
Chapter 2 shows how Frederick Douglass issued two claims across two antebellum narratives. In his 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, he both challenged the diminished legal and moral authority of black Americans and analyzed what of the plantation had oppressed him. Yet after his political ideas and ties developed in the following decade, Douglass wrote his 1855 My Bondage and My Freedom not as mere narrative but as denunciation. Whereas to narrate wrongs encouraged readers to judge Douglass’s story alongside moral criteria of justice, to denounce wrongs in Bondage implicated readers within the structures that create antebellum subjects on and off the plantation. This claim depended on Douglass’s renewed authority to analyze his life and on an analysis that revealed how the conditions of slavery implicate abolitionists and readers. Douglass’s book reached outward to demand his audience join him in solidarity for racial justice.