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The Basic Symbols of the American Political Tradition Review "It's probably the best thing George Carey ever worked on." "It's one of the most important books I ever read." "It changed the way I think about America."
Willmoore Kendall's classic work, The Basic Symbols of the American Political Tradition, provides an understanding which can only be described as refreshing of the political and cultural tradition out of which the Philadelphia Constitution was forged, and The United States of America was founded. Basic Symbols seeks to determine what propositions and ideals America was founded upon, and is thus committed to, and whether these are the ideals currently accepted as true, and often presented as neatly summed up in the Bill of Rights and in that well worn understanding of that passage of the Declaration of Independence: "...all men are created equal... ." Basic Symbols warns that the true tradition may seem anathema to some modern historians and Americans alike who wished it weren't so, but Basic Symbols sets out to present the truth anyway.
This single volume of political science and historical inquiry handily challenges the traditional orthodoxy, or the ignorance, that surrounds the founding in a novel manner: by a close inspection of the facts, and more importantly, the application of the analytical method-the hermeneutic-of Erik Voegelin, to the facts. Kendall's book is almost worth the read just to see the theories and teachings of Erik Voegelin briefly explicated and then put into fruitful action, and if nothing else, Basic Symbols can serve as a spring board for further study not into debates about America's founding, but into the works of this important yet often overlooked historian.
Kendall starts with the Mayflower Compact of (1620), and then examines the General Orders of Connecticut(1638), the Body of Liberties of Massachusetts Bay(1641), the Virginia Declaration of Rights(1776), our own Declaration of Independence(1776), the Constitution(1787-1789) and finally the Bill of Rights(1789). Kendall slowly teases out a common thread--our tradition--that runs its course, unfolds, and develops over this stretch of time and through these early experiences and experiments in self-government on this side of the Atlantic. Basic Symbols also tackles in this time span, and in the history of America since, a problem common to all political traditions: derailment.
Basic Symbols identifies the Gettysburg address as a watershed in the political tradition of America, made possible by a partial derailment in the years preceding the Civil War. Today, the two incompatible traditions are still with us and their friction is at the root of much of our present day political discord; so much so that to ask and seek the answer to the question, "What is the tradition amongst us?" is the very reason why Basic Symbols was written.
Rather than the rights-speak and emphasis upon rights that has grown out of the elevation of the Bill of Rights, and the tortured understanding of 'equality' that has sprung from the Declaration, Basic Symbols instead proffers a formidable, and well supported, alternative; the true tradition amongst us holds (or held) the supremacy of the general political will of the community; the legislature through which this is expressed in a very slow, careful, and deliberative fashion; a virtuous people from which these governing bodies are elected, and the concomitant conviction of a virtuous people in a higher law than that of any secular government.
Basic Symbols notes that any mention of rights, any ethos of equality, etc., are nowhere to be found in our tradition as founding symbols; they were understood as only the possible concerns for the deliberations of a political community after the establishment of its aims and purposes. Thus, they are not the starting points from which the uniquely American order and tradition is defined. This explains why all forms of variants on "the common good," "better ordering...and preservation," were the starting points for, and of paramount importance to, the drafters of everything from the Mayflower Compact to our own Constitution. Kendall does well to further point out why the Bill of Rights was opposed to a man by the framers of the Constitution, lending only more support to his thesis. His analysis of the Declaration and the true meaning of "...all men are created equal..." places the Declaration and the Founding in a whole new light: the light of the American political tradition he identifies which provides a better explication and understanding of these documents, much like a better fitting solution to a puzzle. And this is just to name a few of the most important points. Kendall does well to document and explain the meaning, significance, and importance of all the symbols he identifies as having a place in the American political tradition.
The loss of many of the qualities the framers and the Federalist Papers thought necessary for the preservation of the republic and our liberty can leave some readers of Basic Symbols feeling as though the framers were not as wise as they are often made out to be; perhaps their underlying premises were wrong or have since been perverted, and the American experiment has proven to be a failure.
Maybe you'll disagree with the tradition Kendall portrays, or deem it no longer relevant, but if you do read it, one thing is certain; you will come away from this book as Gary Wills describes how the crowd walked off from the Gettysburg Address: "...under a changed sky, into a different America."
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