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PARTISAN REVIEW
To those of us brought up on the promise that truth shall make us free,
pragmatism seems an insipid proposition, a "technique" for avoiding what
must be confronted. For all pragmatism's emphasis on getting along with–
out truth, it was the natural rights truths of the Declaration of
Independence that came to be incorporated into the Constitution, and,
through the equal protection of the laws, that served to promote the cause
of civil rights, women's rights, and gay and lesbian rights. Pragmatism dis–
misses the whole foundation of natural rights as "fictions" as mythical as
the state of nature.
But it may be the case that what pragmatism dismisses the public wants
to have taught. Every opinion poll indicates that parents want their children
to learn something about truth, however defined, and to have reverence for
the sacred and a patriotic respect for their country. And, as Alan Wolfe has
discovered in the research put forth in his valuable book,
One Nation, After
All,
Americans subscribe to a "sacred trinity" involving God, family, and
country. But when we enter the world of politics such principles seem less
demanding and seldom are they applied to those holding office or running
for it.
It
would be comforting to think the moral indifference with which
Americans regard their political leaders is a sign of tolerance and maturity.
But it may have more to do with a political culture that has become so
pragmatic that it lusts after what James himself once denounced as the
"bitch-goddess of success." There can be no doubt that the older critics of
pragmatism foresaw the corning of this squalid scenario.
Today we can readily know what Lippmann meant when he warned
that the modern philosophy of pragmatism could provide no check on pol–
itics since it refused to submit to "something outside ourselves." Politics,
too, defers to nothing outside of its own drive to power and office.
Philosophy and politics have this in conunon: neither need make them–
selves consonant with any preexisting principle; they only need to make
happen what the will desires to happen. Hence the disjunction of the
realms. For while we continue to want our students to be moral in order
that they be responsible, we allow our politicians to be pragmatic to assure
that they be successful. While in politics everything is not only local but
relative, and hence behavior cannot possibly be judged by a single standard
of ethical conduct, in school we expect honesty from our students and do
not allow lying and cheating, or, it should be added, sexual misconduct.
It
seems that America has a philosophy of politics that comes close to
pornography-meant for adults only.
