West's Founding XII: Which Virtues Should America Teach?

West's book has a pretty good structure. For the most part, with only small deviations, I've divided my review of it as he divided his own argument. Thus, today I'm on the twelfth part of my review, which is of his twelfth and thirteenth chapters. This is also the end of his Part II, leaving only the last (and shortest) part of his work. 

In today's section West gives a list of the particular virtues the Founders sought to encourage, and then examines other virtues they definitely did encourage but didn't add to their lists. The listed virtues are what West calls 'social' virtues; he gives lists from five early state constitutions that all included justice, moderation, temperance, industry, and frugality. There are minor variations in the additional ones included by state, but those appear to be the big five that make the lists. West deduces this may be because of a famous (at the time) magazine article called "Social Virtue" that lists these five and gives definitions of them. (272-4) 

West points out that industry and frugality are not only social virtues, but republican virtues as well. By this he means that no government of the people can survive if most of the people aren't pretty industrious and frugal, because otherwise the people will vote themselves access to others' wealth rather than earning their own. As a result (and this is exactly Aristotle's conclusion about democracies in the Politics), a government by the people absent those virtues will become unstable and overthrown. (274)

Two virtues that only appear in Massachusetts and New Hampshire are "piety and religion." Yet we know that the states of the era generally had state churches; likely the government thought that those virtues were less a matter for government than for the churches themselves.

The same two states add "wisdom and knowledge." Georgia's state seal to this day declares for "Wisdom, Justice, and Moderation," thus combining one of these rarer virtues with two of the famous social ones. West adds that "responsibility" has to be added to the list even though, he admits, the Founders don't seem to have used the term. 

Now he begins to defend the list against various critics, beginning with Nietzsche. Nietzsche complained that the aforementioned list of virtues makes up a "herd animal morality," which leads to men being degraded into unobjectionable members of the herd -- but not great, powerful, or noble warriors. (This is parallel to the argument Chesterton is frequently at pains to defeat from Nietzsche, that Christianity leads men to be too peaceful; odd, Chesterton notes, given that Christianity is also said to have led to war that smokes to the moon. So too here.) "This concern is not unreasonable," West says. (279) 

However, he points out that other writings show that Nietzsche has a wider understanding of 'herd morality' that does embrace the martial (West often says 'manly,' and sometimes 'strong') virtues. He gives a long quote that I shall partly reproduce:

Liberal institutions... make men small, cowardly, and hedonistic... These same institutions produce quite different effects while they are still being fought for; then they really promote freedom in a powerful way.... the war for liberal institutions... educates for freedom. For what is freedom? ... That one becomes more indifferent to difficulties, hardships, privation, even to life itself.... Freedom means that the manly instincts which delight in war and victory dominate.... Danger alone acquaints us with our own resources, our virtues, our armor and weapons, our spirit -- and forces us to be strong. (281)

West goes on to show numerous Founding era documents that argue for these strong, martial, manly virtues. These include Congress' 1775 Declaration on Taking up Arms (pre-declaring for independence, note), proclamations on the heroic spirit necessary for resistance, and especially Washington's General Orders of 1776: 

The fate of unborn millions will now depend, under God, on the courage and conduct of this army -- Our cruel and unrelenting enemy leaves us no choice but to resolve to conquer or die; Our own country's honor, all call upon us for a vigorous and manly exertion, and if we now shamefully fail, we shall become infamous to the whole world. (283)

The Founder's cry of 'Liberty or Death' was also echoed in their wartime usage of the Bedford flag, which translates as "Victory or Death." The rattlesnake flag was an emblem of vigilance and danger to one's foes. (285-6)

So why do these martial virtues not make the list? West says that the Founders believed -- as Plato and Aristotle did -- that not everyone is capable of them. The social virtues are things everyone must be asked to do, and can be expected to do; courage, prudence, and wisdom are not going to be things of which every man is capable (and certainly not equally capable). Like the ancient philosophers, the Founders wanted a society that was virtuous throughout insofar as all are capable of virtue; also like them, West argues, they attended to finding the very best for leadership positions out of a recognition that not all were worthy. (288, 294-6)

West defends this proposition also with quotations from Machiavelli and Hobbes, although he repeats that he does not think the Founders held Hobbes in much regard. (296)

He closes his Part II with a further examination of the difference between the Founders and Classical theorists on the role of society as regards virtue. "In Plato's Republic, virtue may be said to be the purpose of political life," he says (299, and correctly, as in the Laws). The ancients are not concerned with individual rights; whereas the natural rights of individuals -- rather than their virtues -- is the purpose of government for the Founders. 

Likewise a virtue for the Founders but not Plato is vigilance against their own government. It is part of the duty of the good citizen to keep an eye on the government, hold it within its limits, and abolish it when it grows destructive to the proper end of defending natural rights. (299-300) Plato hoped to put the wise so firmly in charge that the less-competent people would necessarily be helping themselves by being guided by the state; the Founders recognized that the powerful, however wise, can become corrupt. 

He also concludes that the Founders held "humanity" to be a virtue, in something like Kant's sense (though again he never mentions Kant), i.e., a general benevolence to mankind. This is more Christian than ancient, but West says that it is obvious in Plutarch and therefore not as strong a departure as some believe. (300)

West notes a matter I have mentioned here and elsewhere, which is that there is a kind of proto-pragmatism in Aristotle's approach to virtue. Virtue is good not merely for being noble, but for being useful. Courage is good because it is noble, but it is a virtue because it brings success in wars and therefore freedom from oppression. (302)

Finally West defends the Founders against those who think that their approach 'eclipses the higher virtues,' such as intellectual contemplation. He points out that Jefferson's founding of the University of Virginia (and there were parallel projects across the early nation, including the University of Georgia in 1785) suggests that this concern is greatly overstated. (303-4) He gives examples also from Washington, Adams, and James Wilson to show that the Founders also appreciated these 'higher' virtues in great measure. (304-6)

Nevertheless he agrees that they were not themselves philosopher kings of the sort Plato had hoped to find. 

They were statesmen and gentlemen, admiring from afar, just as Aristotle's gentleman looks up to the philosopher in the Ethics, and Plato's Glaucon learns to admire philosophy in the Republic. Political life cannot and should not attempt to produce philosophers or poets, but a well-governed polity can provide a place for the life of the mind[,] (306)

Philosophers in my experience are very keen on defending the idea that the vita contemplativa is higher than the vita activa of action, war, and political life. My own life having embraced both at turns, I am not sure that this is true; the eudaimonia of being fully engaged in all your vital powers in working the good is sometimes more evident at war than at peace, as are the deep and powerful friendships that are the subject of the end of Aristotle's Ethics. War, for one thing, does much to level the social inequality that Aristotle thinks will make friendship difficult; but under fire together, there is a true equality in that you and the man beside you are in equal danger of death. There is good to be had in both lives, and one may not in fact be higher than the other except for those whose contemplation truly allows them to approach the divine. 

But West is writing about what the Founders thought, and of the worth of their thought, and he has given a defensible account of both.

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