Some Second Thoughts on Progressivism and Rights

Summary

Twenty years ago I wrote my first paper on the Progressives, in which I argued that the Progressives did not take rights seriously. Most of my research and writing on the Progressives since then has extended and deepened that initial argument. In this essay, I want to summarize the main reasons why I held that position and to introduce some second thoughts on those reasons. I conclude with some reflections on contemporary American discourse on constitutionalism and rights.

First Thoughts

The overriding reason that Progressives were so often dismissive of rights claims and arguments is that they wanted to create a national democracy and they saw a rigid adherence to the prevailing norms of the U.S. Constitution standing in the way. Political philosopher Herbert Croly (1869–1930) was the most forceful advocate of this tension and what might follow from it.

Public opinion can no longer be hypnotized and scared into accepting the traditional constitutionalism, as the final word in politics….

The Law in the shape of the Federal Constitution really came to be a monarchy of the Word…. The Constitution was really king. Once the kingdom of the Word had been ordained, it was almost as seditious to question the Word as it was to plot against the kingdom. A monarch exists to be obeyed. In the United States, as in other monarchies, unquestioning obedience was erected into the highest of political virtues.