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of any major instance where the Western governments during the war
paid much attention to what their publics might want.
Mr. Kennan of course is dealing with a more specific problem–
the influence of Congress upon American policy-making. On this topic
the non-American can only say that it seems to represent an unsolved
problem, but not an insoluble one. The more general issue of making
sovereign legislatures renounce some of their authority in favor of supra–
national organizations entails practical problems of the most hair-raising
kind, but none, so far as this reviewer is aware, that can be dignified by
terms appropriate to political philosophy. There seems to be no principle
that would forbid democrats to recognize the limitations of democracy,
just as patriots may be brought to admit that the nation-state must sur–
render some of its sovereignty to a world organization. Anyone can
point to legislatures-the French Assembly is only the most notorious
example-which clearly would be much happier if left to debate such
topics as the school-leaving age, with more important issues turned over
to an elected, but relatively pressure-proof, supranational body. Since
the whole trend of affairs in the Western world is in this direction, we
may assume that discussion of the principles involved will become in–
creasingly vigorous. One must hope that it will not become entangled
with arguments from the sphere of metaphysics, for people who differ
altogether on the substance of natural law--or even on whether there is
such a thing- may yet be brought to agree on the steps necessary to make
democracy work under modern conditions.
On the general attitude appropriate to a pluralist society Mr. Ken–
nan is sounder than Mr. Lippmann:
Let us, by all means, conduct ourselves at all times in such a way as to
satisfy our own ideas of morality. ... But let us not assume that our
moral values, based as they are on the specifics of our national tradition
and the various religious outlooks represented in our country, necessarily
have validity for people everywhere.
Now it is arguable that values are inherently objective and consequently
universal; but there is something pedantic about this contention, since
everyone knows that a particular culture can only "realize" some specific
values at the expense of others, which may be equally important to dif–
ferent people. Mr. Lippmann for example would like the Western world
to believe in a natural law grounded in God; but if such a belief once
more became general it would certainly acquire exclusive and dogmatic
features, and probably need a universal church to uphold it. This con–
clusion need not frighten a Thomist, but it is not one that liberals can
afford to toy with. For better or worse, the society we live in is dis-
