Book Reviews : Men of Good Hope: A Story of American Progressives. By DANIEL AARON. (New York: Oxford University Press. 1951. Pp. xiv, 329. $4.00.)

• Author: Currin V. Shields
• DOI: 10.1177/106591295100400330
• Published date: 01 September 1951
• Date: 01 September 1951
• Subject Matter: Articles

519

liberal

faith,

he

points

out,

rests

on

the

assumption

that

there

is

such

a

thing

as

a

liberal

state

distinct

from

a

totalitarian

state.

While

it

is

easy

to

make

such

a

distinction

analytically,

books

such

as

those

here

reviewed

raise

increasing

doubts

as

to

its

operational

validity.

Mr.

Barth’s

evidence

all

points

in

the

opposite

direction

from

his

desire.

Operationally,

the

Un-American

Activities

Committee

has

achieved

a

number

of

constitutional

innovations.

It

has

behaved

as

and

referred

to

itself

as

a

trial

jury,

a

grand

jury,

&dquo;the

greatest

open

court

in

this

country,&dquo;

&dquo;the

best

court

of

this

country,

which

is

the

court

of

public

opinion&dquo;

(pp.

?9-85).

In

interpreting

its

role

of

public

censor,

it

has

writ-

,

ten

indelibly

into

the

minds

of

its

victims

a

new

clause

for

Article

I

of

the

Constitution:

an

&dquo;unnecessary

and

improper&dquo;

clause.

We

are

in

a

period

of

open-season

on

opinions.

Those

of

us

who

re-

tain

the

faith

of

liberalism

are

confronted

with

a

problem

we

can

no

longer

evade:

Is

it,

pragmatically,

as

Alan

Barth

will

have

it,

we

who

are

wrong

and

they

who

are

right?

Can

constitutionalism

exist

only

so

long

as

it is

not

put

to

the

test?

Must

the

struggle

always

be

decided

in

favor

of

.._~-_.-

.J’.!.._.&dquo;)

HARVEY

WHEELER.

Johns

Hopkins

University.

Men

of

Good

Hope:

A

Story

of

American

Progressives.

By

DANIEL AARON.

(New

York:

Oxford

University

Press.

1951.

Pp.

xiv,

329.

$4.00.)

The

purpose

of

Daniel

Aaron

in

this

book

is

to

narrate

the

story

of

that

tradition

of

middle-class

protest

which

in

the

first

decade

of

our

cen-

tury

culminated

in

the

Progressive

movement.

This

story,

he

declares,

contains

a

lesson

which

all

contemporary

&dquo;liberals&dquo;

should

heed.

In

be-

half

of

the

purpose,

the

author

writes

of

Ralph

Waldo

Emerson

and

Theodore

Parker

as

&dquo;precursors&dquo;

of

progressivism;

he

treats

of

Henry

George,

Edward

Bellamy,

Henry

Demarest

Lloyd,

William

Dean

Howells,

and

Thorstein

Veblen

as

intellectual

leaders

of

the

progressives;

and

he

portrays

Theodore

Roosevelt

and

Brooks

Adams

as

&dquo;pseudo-progressives.&dquo;

Yet,

when

the

reader

reaches

the

last

chapter

(which

is

a

catchall

com-

mentary

on

various

&dquo;liberal&dquo;

movements

of

recent

vintage),

it

is

appar-

ent

that

Mr.

Aaron’s

purpose

remains

to

be

fulfilled.

If

the

author

tells

a

story

in

this

book,

certainly

it is

not

the

story

of

American

progressives.

Too

much

of

that

story

he

has

omitted,

and

too

much

that

is

not

germane

he

has

included.

Indeed,

to

appraise

his

book

in

terms

of

its

unfortunate

subtitle

would

be

a

distasteful

and

disheartening

undertaking.

What

is

worse,

it

would

be

unfair

to

this

fine

book.

What

Mr.

Aaron

has

written

is

a

collection

of

biographical

essays.

As

subjects

for

his

vignettes,

he

has

selected

Americans

whose

political

eminence