Three Traditions in American Political Engagement: Finance, Virtue, and Institution

Faculty Contribution

Carey Roberts Online Dean and Professor of History College of Arts and Sciences, Liberty University

THREE TRADITIONS IN AMERICAN POLITICAL ENGAGEMENT: FINANCE, VIRTUE, AND INSTITUTION

Contemplating the ramifications of the 2020 presidential election is serious business. Running up to Election Day, pundits insisted that what followed would be apocalyptic for whichever party loses. It was not the first time that American voters believed their worlds were at stake. Intense partisan division is not new to presidential politics even though things have arguably gotten worse over the past four years. Time will tell if 2020 will be any more eventful than 2016, or 1992, or 1968, or 1932, etc. … That so much is at stake may say more about the fractured and overpowered state of the political system than it does about the mindset of average voters. Pivotal elections can often raise equally pivotal questions about the ongoing success and sustainability of American self-government. This was no less the case in the 19th and 20th centuries or now in the 21st century.

One of the most calamitous elections occurred in 1800, when Republican Thomas Jefferson defeated Federalist John Adams. The election pitted clear choices on how Americans would maintain their self-government. For years, Jefferson insisted that Adams and his followers steered the country off course and derailed key compromises for producing the Constitution and Bill of Rights. To John Adams, Jefferson represented the repugnant rabble of the frontier. But worse, Jefferson’s affinity for the French Revolution and scathing rumors of relationships with his slaves disqualified him from holding high office.1

Three Traditions in American Political Engagement

There are three great political traditions of early America that continue to shape political life today. Historian Forrest McDonald described two of these in early America, typified by the contestants in the presidential election of 1800. He argued that early Americans followed two clear paths to preserve “republicanism,” a term used then to describe selfgovernment. On the one hand were the “puritanical republicans,” who insisted that the virtue of the people guaranteed their freedom, that only the best qualified should hold political office, and that inculcating personal virtue among the population was indispensable to the future of self-government. On the other were “agrarian republicans” committed to properly arranging political institutions so that they best met the needs of the people even if selfinterested sorts gained office. Contemporary words that best describe these two traditions are “virtuous” and “institutionalists,” with Adams representing the former and Jefferson reflecting the latter. A third was the financial tradition where neither virtue nor institutions mattered nearly as much as forging a close partnership between the wealthy (or those most capable of producing wealth) and those who controlled the reins of government.2

Knowing how each unfolded in subsequent centuries goes far in helping us understand the deeply divided political system we face today, and it also helps define important differences in how Americans vote — and perhaps why there are now greater divides among Christians in the political realm than in elections past. It should also be noted that these political cultures may be closely tied to political parties but by no means does any historic party have a monopoly on one or the others. Rarely in the past have party leaders cobbled together electoral victory from only one political culture. While the limited financial tradition is important for context, what matters most for contemporary America is the tension between the more widely felt virtue tradition with its emphasis on the personal character and conviction of leaders and those who insist on striking a proper balance between ruling elites and the interests of ordinary people.

The Financial Tradition Typified by Hamilton

The tradition began when the first companies of Elizabethan England colonized North America and continues to this day. Its approach has been to

combine the interests of both financial and political elites so that those closely connected to financial markets get rich — with the hope that the rest of society will also rise accordingly. One of the best early examples occurred in the first months under the Constitution when Alexander Hamilton proposed a series of financial plans during the Washington administration. But this tradition soon moved through history to include small town boosters scheming for a railroad in antebellum Pennsylvania to industrial lobbyists clamoring for protective tariffs, and more recently culminating in corporate executives demanding bailouts because their companies are “too big to fail.” Given the vast resources of North America, the hopes of the financial tradition as buoying the general population are realistic, and even when their schemes fail, bankruptcy protection and taxpayer bailouts usually keep the economy afloat. From the beginning, theirs is always an effort to politically speed up rather than slow down capitalist progress.3

The Virtue Tradition Typified by Adams

Making sure the right quality of person seeks and gains political office is usually the highest priority for those in the virtue tradition. Even if electoral victory is beyond their grasp, they take comfort in knowing they did the right thing. The view is commonly summarized by a statement attributed to John Adams’s son, John Quincy, who may have stated, “Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.” While the virtuous use different language to describe their principles — often drawing from Scripture, classical antiquity, scientific disciplines, and even faddish self-help movements — whatever definition they choose typically means more than moral rectitude. Rhetorically, it involves self-sacrifice and willingness to put the needs of others above your own. Within a political context, it implies that there is some higher good above the concerns of a given population, and only those with a certain kind of character can ensure it is met. The more people hold these virtues, the more likely self-government and peaceful coexistence will continue. However, determining which virtues matter most takes wildly different approaches over the course of American history. What constituted virtuous behavior to John Adams differed greatly from that of Ralph Waldo Emerson or leading progressive intellectuals like Herbert Croly a century later.4 Yet, the message remained the same. For self-government to function in the United States, the population must hold to a list of ideas and

perceptions and behave a certain way. The nation must be dedicated, at all costs, to putting the right kind of person into a position of political power. This is of supreme importance.

The Institutional Tradition Typified by Jefferson

As a defining term, “institutionalists” can be difficult to understand. The term “federalists” is the apt description, but that term has long been used for other purposes. Most Americans define federalism as the separation of powers in the federal government or perhaps the separation of power between the federal government and the states. However, the term when considered according to the original Latin root, foedus — meaning “covenant” or an “association” or even a “league” of states — comes to signify much more than political institutions. They see human existence, especially of Americans, as composed of countless relationships and associations spanning space and time. The daily habits of life subject a person to obligations and benefits from each relationship in such a way that the typical person lives in an interconnected web of parallel societies each having its own rules. The extent to which persons in a society can freely forge meaningful relationships and associations, rather than their personal character, is most critical. For politics, advocates of this tradition included men like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison who insisted that human freedom and liberty depend upon protecting the sanctity of these relationships, such as churches, schools, or civic leagues, which are often institutionalized in nonpolitical, cultural, and legal means.

For institutionalists, the key to self-government is making sure no one person, institution, or groups thereof gain supremacy over the rest. Therefore, the concept of “separation of powers” is partly correct but involves much more than separating just the executive, judicial, and legislative branches of government. Applied to politics, institutionalists have little faith that virtue has practical use if the institutions are combined to overpower individuals or associations in civil society. Likewise, corrupt institutions will inevitably attract shady people, or otherwise corrupt even the best among us. Personal character plays an important role but is not as consequential as preserving the sanctity and free exercise of forging balanced relationships, free from overriding external pressure.

Traditions and Weaknesses

There are serious downsides to both the virtue and institutionalist traditions. The virtuous can easily become insular, provincial, and even abstract in their thinking. They lose touch with their relationships when they inflexibly insist on universal precepts and principles. There is a tendency to avoid tensions for the sake of virtue — even when people are mired in clear moral compromise. When given multiple leadership roles, responsibilities are not carefully weighed and prioritized. Instead there is a presumption that one set of principles should cover all aspects of life. Centuries of custom and institutions usually mollified demands for such all-absorbing principles. But by the 20th century, the effort to render supreme a single virtue or principle grew into ideological thinking and fomented an infinite array of isms. Too easily drawn to perceiving the world in exclusive ideological terms, the virtuous transitioned matters of character into planks of a political agenda, and they started measuring human worth in terms of how fully people dedicated themselves to those principles. Thus the “personal becomes the political.”5 By the end of the century, this perspective affected the entire range of political and social commitments in the United States. It easily included key cultural figures who reflected diverging religious, moral, and political convictions.

Alternatively, what makes institutionalists successful often becomes their key vice in the eyes of the virtuous. The flexibility to rebalance and constantly reprioritize relationships smacks of an unanchored mind mired in earthly and populist traditions. Building common, everyday relationships or interacting within a traditional institution does not always require highminded virtues, let alone deliberate choice. Matters of culture are rarely so intentional and rely as much on reflexive habit as they do on reflective virtue. It seems those best at living in this complicated, institutional world have a kind of sixth sense that enables them to perceive their intricate and nuanced rules. But at times, they also see the imperfections and may even exploit the rules and weaknesses they discover.

Consequently, the most hazardous aspect of the institutionalist tradition is that its successful adherents may not always gently navigate the country’s cultural mosaic. They can see their world from a bird’s eye view while strategically plotting their next step into a new relationship. But when unable to overcome some impenetrable barrier, they push forward with the sheer power of personality and offer little regard to certain cultural norms and traditions. Despite whatever success they bring to themselves and others, they come across as bad characters, callous, and unrelenting in their pursuit of personal ambition. For people who deeply understand the complex relationships of American life, they are not necessarily good at honoring all their forms and rules. Yet, this