The article defends the proposition that the distinctive diplomatic legacy of John Quincy Adams constitutes an important case study documenting the significance of moral reasoning in the statesman's obligation to uphold the national interest in a universal system of power politics. Recourse to political ethics afforded Adams a vantage point from which to evaluate the volatile problem of intervention—viewed in terms of the moral responsibilities and limits of American power—at a crucial turning point in the diplomatic history of the young republic. Important in this connection is how Adams attempted to reconcile the blessings of liberty with the methods and purposes of American diplomacy within and beyond the Western Hemisphere.An attempt is made to evaluate the sources and meaning of statesmanship for Adams who—as perhaps the nation's most experienced diplomat and accomplished Secretary of State—judged the limits and opportunities of American power from a perspective that considered moral precepts and international law as compatible with the prudent pursuit of American national interest in world affairs.

The surge of national assertion in the USSR, generally unanticipated by American decision-makers, focusses attention on ethnic issues worldwide. But the moral dimension of ethnicity has rarely been examined in a comparative context, especially from the religious point of view. Issues now critical in the Soviet Union, such as justification for educational and occupational quotas for disadvantaged minorities, and the right of vulnerable ethnic collectivities to preserve their cultures by limiting immigration, have major implications for Third World and European countries, which are briefly surveyed. In the United States, concern for producing a united national culture based on the ideal of equal opportunities for individuals has usually precluded attention to preservation of ethnic collectivities distinct from the majority culture. Since most of these collectivities have been traditionally Catholic, their preservation has been especially sensitive to changes in American Catholicism.

This article opens with some general observations on outstanding features of the current literature on political leadership, especially in the United States. It then deals briefly with conceptual problems, level of analysis issues, and counter-factual questions. This is followed by a consideration of major modes of analysis for the comparative study of political leadership. The concluding section points up the principal ways to making comparative generalization about the sources and nature of leadership in politics.

Some interpretations of James Madison tend to treat him as an enemy of “community,” or as indifferent to that concept. These interpretations also tend to base their argument on selected readings from the Federalist Papers. This approach is mistaken because it relies on a part of the Madisonian corpus to define the whole of the Virginian's thought. This mistake leads to a distortion of Madison's treatment of community. Close scrutiny of Madison's life, letters, and essays reveals a theorist-politician committed to building and nurturing community in the new United States, a community linked across time and miles by shared values, common institutions, and ongoing public dialogue.

Alasdair MacIntyre was installed in 1989 as the first occupant of the McMahon/Hank Chair in Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. On April 18, 1990, he delivered his inaugural lecture, “The Privatization of Good,” before a large and appreciative audience in Notre Dame's Center for Continuing Education. He invited three Notre Dame colleagues to comment on his presentation: Donald P. Kommers, Professor of Law and Government, and Editor of The Review of Politics; William David Solomon, Associate Professor of Philosophy; and Richard McCormick, S.J., John A. O'Brien Professor of Christian Ethics. The following pages include the inaugural address, the remarks of two of the three commentators, and Professor Maclntyre's response. The editors wish to thank Professor MacIntyre for his cooperation in publishing his inaugural address.

It has recently been suggested that in Machiavelli's appreciation of what is grave and what is ridiculous “can be recognized … the spirit of modernity in its early phases, when it was fresh, bright, and eager.” This admittedly problematical assertion draws attention to Machiavelli's transformation of the premodern perception of gravity, wherein gravity and piety are closely associated. In this article, we consider how Machiavelli changes men's approach to gravity and piety by examining in particular his treatment of Dante, a representative of the premodern point of view. We find that Machiavelli discards the old view of gravity and piety because of its utility to the church and because Christian gravity is a safeguard against too readlly taking oaths, one of the things critical for Machiavelli's enterprise.

Recent literature on Heidegger concentrates heavily on his (temporary) involvement in or collusion with Nazi ideology and policies. Without belittling the gravity of the issue, this article shifts the focus somewhat by invoking a distinction which recently has emerged (or reemerged) in political thought: namely, the distinction between “politics” and “the political” or between politics viewed as partisan ideology or policy making, on the one hand, and politics seen as regime or paradigmatic framework, on the other. The main thesis of the article is that Heidegger's promising contributions to political theory are located on the level of ontology or paradigmatic framework rather than that of ideological partisanship. While not neglecting the dismal intrusions of the latter plane, the article probes Heideggerian cues for a “rethinking of the political” by placing the accent on four topical areas: first, the status of the subject or individual as political agent; second, the character of the political community, that is, of the polity or (in modern terms) the “state”; thirdly, the issue of cultural and political development or modernization; and finally, the problem of an emerging cosmopolis or world order beyond the confines of Western culture. In discussing these topics, an effort is made to disentangle Heidegger from possible misinterpretations and to indicate how, in each area, his thought pointed in the direction of an “overcoming” of Western political metaphysics.

This article presents an interpretation of Francis Bacon's History of Henry the Seventh. Recently Bacon's History has been described in terms of its role in transmitting paradigms of republican thought to Harrington, whose “classical republicanism” so importantly influenced later English and American political thought. Thus Bacon, who was of course not himself a republican, is now described as having contributed to the classical republican doctrine of civic virtue. I argue that the History in no way fits such republican paradigms, or that it can only insofar as Bacon's essential teaching in that work is misunderstood. Rather than unwittingly pointing to some conception of civic virtue, Bacon's History self-consciously describes modern politics as grounded on the inescapable necessity of material acquisition. I argue that Bacon's politics are modern because they look to the conquest of nature and are critical of all specific political attachments, including republicanism.

The view of Rousseau as a romantic for whom history is a fatal acquisition negating what is most essential and valuable in human nature has been powerfully renewed in many recent interpretations. It remains possible, however, to reinterpret Rousseau's view of history as both the key to the whole of his work and his most important contribution to the tradition of radical political thought. The identification of history with fatality is insufficient and misleading in as much as it misunderstands both the substance and the import of his philosophical anthropology. Rousseau's critique of liberalism and the Enlightenment rests not simply upon an intuitive transcendence of civilized artifice, but upon the first major attempt to construct a historical anthropology which, by undoing the identification of man with bourgeois man, poses the problem of human historicity as a social process entailing increasing alienation and repression.

Locke's doctrine of toleration is best understood in the context of his larger argument about the political significance of Christ. Christ, Locke argues, separated the spiritual and political realm. His argument for separating the two realms, his basis for insisting that magistrates be tolerant of religious heterodoxy, is essentially theological. This claim is further developed by exploring Locke's thoughts of the unconcealment of foundation of moral duty which Christ was purported to have brought about. The bearing this unconcealment has on Locke's thoughts of the necessity of toleration is also explored. Finally, some comparisons between Locke and Hobbes's understanding of the significance of Christ are made, with a view to providing a new theoretical approach to their thought.

Following World War II, survey researchers taught a generation of Americans that ordinary people were not to be trusted on fundamental rights because their attitudes were reactionary, intolerant, and generally bad. The article examines this research and its influence on constitutional politics. It proposes that this attitude perspective fostered elite domination in matters of fundamental right and an orientation away from economic rights. The article also suggests that by turning from public opinion to public knowledge we may reclaim a democratic constitutional practice.

In an oft-neglected section of the Summa Theologiae, Thomas Aquinas undertakes a detailed, point-by-point comparison of the political regime prescribed by the Mosaic law with the teachings of the then recently translated Politics of Aristotle, thereby comparing the perspectives of faith and philosophy on political issues such as rulers, property, citizenship, and families. Because it organizes political affairs in light of the divine, Thomas concludes that the polity of the Old Testament is in fact the answer to the question concerning the best regime. Despite Christianity's view of the Mosaic law as abrogated, Thomas attempts to salvage the political wisdom of the Old Testament by arguing that the Mosaic regime can still serve as a guide for Christian political thinkers.

This article is an attempt to confront the assumptions underpinning rational choice Marxism along with its implications for politics and social theory. That initially calls for setting the new tendency within the Marxian tradition in order to see whether its proponents can deal with the issues deriving from the collapse of the old teleological vision. In this way, the subsequent epistemological critique will be undertaken within a theoretical and practical context. From this critique, it will become apparent that rational choice builds on the utilitarian assumptions of what Marx termed “vulgar materialism” and simply ignores the role of philosophical idealism entirely.

The confusion surrounding the current debates on the nature and scope of judicial review is compounded by the failure of the contending parties to relate their positions to a defensible general theory of law and politics. But these debates may also aid in reconstructing such a theory. After a brief survey of four different stands with regard to judicial review, this article concludes by suggesting how the prevailing interpretations of law and politics need to be revised, if judicial review is to be to the Constitution what the practice of government of law is to its theory.

Yves R. Simon was a French-born philosopher who studied with Jacques Maritain, came to America just before the Second World War, taught at the University of Notre Dame and then at the University of Chicago. He died in 1961. Perhaps his best known work is the Philosophy of Democratic Government, published in 1951 and still in print.