imply that "Kant's categorical
imperative should be the basis of
politics." Rather, I alluded to a
Kantian bias on Arendt's part
towards transcending merely in–
strumental considerations in
judging action. Jay misreads
Arendt's discussion of Kant in
The Human Condition.
Arendt
recognizes Kant's effort to tran–
scend the means-end category, to
"relegate it
to
its proper place"
and prevent its use in the field of
"political action." She distin–
guishes Kant's effort from prior
"unhampered and unguided"
efforts, and from comparable
pre-Kantian "platitudes." Kant's
effort to effect a lasting critique
of instrumentality and utilitari–
anism is precisely the one Arendt
takes up later in the book. Like
Kant, Arendt seeks
to
merge or
rather abolish facile means-ends
distinctions in her concept of
action so that the ultimate ends
of politics and public life be–
come integrated in man's capac–
ity to act.
Furthermore,
Arendt,
through her entire work, dis–
played an admiration for Kant. I
mentioned the impact of his
historical vision, and Arendt's
mention of his work on the na–
ture and limits of reason. As to
the quote from "Truth and Poli–
tics" about Kant that Jay in–
vokes, he is simply wrong. All
Arendt does is credit Kant as a
major figure in developing the
315
criterion of internal consistency
for rational truth. Again, truth,
for Arendt, is necessary as a chal–
lenge in politics precisely for the
tension truth creates for the po–
litical process. That the truth–
teller cannot and should not be
the possessor of political power
and stands apart from political
processes' is a functional, some–
what psychological perception
which hardly confirms Jay's
view that for Arendt, the search
for truth has no place in the
public realm. The inherent
qualities of truth, which Kant
did much to clarify, justify the
vital role of truth in providing a
sustained corrective to normal
political discourse.
That Arendt did not view
the categorical imperative as a
political category, but rather as
the result of a philosophical
consideration of the normative
possibilities in ethics merely re–
flected her correct reading of
Kant. But that still leaves the fact
that Kantian ethical concerns
help explain her association of
freedom and action. Finally,
Jay's quote from
Eichmann in
Jerusalem
refers to the discus–
sion of justice and the demands
of law in which Kant explores
the inherent
logic~l
require–
ments of the concept of law.
Arendt is ironic, for Jay's quote
comes at the end of a long two–
page discussion of Kant in the
Eichmann trial. Arendt clearly
