JOHN P. DIGGINS
257
Lincoln saw some of the tensions that Weber would later analyze in his
famous "Politics as a Vocation," especially the conflicts between intention
and outcome, between duty to conscience and responsibility for conse–
quences , between integrity and success. In Weber and Lincoln, the ethi–
cally anguished politician deserves to lead almost as a tragic hero.
Today in Am.erican politics, one finds neither tragedy nor heroism.
Curiously, the right and the left think almost alike in their dismissal of
leadership. Conservatives assume that what stands in the way of the good
society of free individuals is government itself, with its controls and sup–
posedly crippling regulations. Radicals assume that what stands in the way
of self-realized individuals are the distortions of the media, pollsters asking
the wrong questions, and the power of corporate capitalism to influence
and coopt. Conservatives assume that if complete, unregulated freedom
prevails, money will "trickle down" from the virtuous market; radicals
assume that if corporate wealth can be eliminated, morality will flow up
from the virtuous masses. Neither want to consider the possibility that the
paralysis of politics today may be the result of popular democracy itself.
Although the right and the left are both susceptible to the temptation
of the possibility that a charismatic figure could mean electoral success,
each share a common disregard for leadership. Traditionally, conservatives
have distrusted a dynamic president as not only threatening to property
but also to the old Whig notion that executive authority must be subor–
dinated to the legislative branch. Radicals, although not immune to hero–
worship, regard leadership as inherently elitist. Both assume that politics is
not an autonomous activity but that it will, given the proper environ–
ment, yield to the larger forces of the market or of democracy itself, nei–
ther of which requires direction or regulation. The mystique of the spon–
taneous free market and its "invisible hand" is familiar enough, but a simi–
lar mystique of "participatory democracy" promises a Woodstock nation
where no one lies and no one leads.
Who should lead? The question troubles students of American poli–
tics. A passage from the
Federalist
reads as though the American people
were left without any guidance on the subject. When the anti-Federalists
asked why intelligent leadership couldn't mediate the class of interest and
render it subservient to the public good, Madison replied: "Enlightened
statesmen will not always be at the helm." Yet, as Harvey Mansfield and
Arthur Schlesinger,
Jr.
have pointed out, Hamilton looked to the execu–
tive office for enlightened statesmanship. Both Mansfield and Schlesinger
are pleased to note that the New Deal and the "Reagan Revolution" had
their origins in the Executive branch. Hamilton informed Americans that
they must reject the idea that "a vigorous executive is inconsistent with
the genius of republican government." Here Hamilton tried to challenge
