The focus of this talk involves a theme that my colleague Aurobinda Mahapatra and I explored in our recent book Sensual Austerity and Moral Leadership.[1] What I want to contend is that—the significant differences in their respective political philosophies notwithstanding—most of America’s Founding Fathers held two contrasting ideological tendencies in dynamic tension: a tendency on one hand to be socially egalitarian, and a tendency on the other hand to be morally elitist. The ways in which they managed to synthesize these apparently opposing views was integral to the fundamental egalitarian and democratic values that have made our government effective through the present day. However, the intellectual-cultural development of U.S. history since their time has engendered a contemporary social and political climate that favors a much more radical egalitarianism than the Founders envisioned, and which is less favorable to elitism of any kind, let alone the kind of moral elitism that they advocated. This intellectual-cultural transformation has resulted in some important social and political changes to the egalitarian-democratic social and political order that the Founders established, and these changes may have significant—indeed perhaps ominous–ramifications for the future course of American political leadership. I won’t be able to account for the numerous and important ideological differences between the various founders, or provide a detailed argument for this paper’s claims in the time we have here, but I will attempt to outline a general synopsis of it.
The populist social and political ethos ascendent in America right now tends –at least in its rhetoric–to valorize egalitarianism and democracy as indispensable to the preservation of our “American way of life”. Its right-wing iteration celebrates this egalitarian spirit as a product of our historical heritage—especially as a tradition handed-down to us from our Founding Fathers. The left often emphasizes its ideological legacy from Thomas Paine’s Essays to the Federalist Papers, to Jefferson’s Statute for Religious Freedom, to the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. It is well-known that the Founding Federalists like Alexander Hamilton and James Madison differed with their anti-Federalist colleagues like Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry regarding the acceptable architecture for our Federal and state governments, and how political and socio-economic power should be dispersed in a democratic and egalitarian society. Federalists were advocates of strong national institutions, centralized government, and a powerful executive branch, while the anti-Federalists championed the state’s autonomy from Federal intervention and protecting individual liberties from government overreach.[i] However, all the Founders were, unanimously, advocates for the principle of democratic representation and political equality for all citizens deemed fit for participation in the life and leadership of the state. Our democratic values, and sacred common commitment to the “self evident’ truth that ‘all men are created equal’, are rooted in this tradition.
Paradoxically though, the Founding Fathers also shared a well-known but not as popularly celebrated strain of elitism, and a suspicion of the very democratic spirit that laid the groundwork for America’s enduring democratic institutions and equal rights. This elitist mindset involved a conviction that certain members of civil society are, by disposition, either more or less suitable for participation in its institutions, and therefor the ideal civic community should recognize a hierarchy of merit (indeed, a sort of aristocracy) among its citizens to determine suitability for social and political leadership. Even though ‘we hold as self-evident that all men are created equal’, some of us are indeed ‘more equal than others’.
Historians have long understood the cultural context of this belief. Much like republics of the ancient world that educated men during the Founder’s era admired, early American society was neither egalitarian nor democratic for most of its citizens. Just as in classical Athens: slaves, indentured servants, landless laborers, and, of course, women, were politically unrepresented and legally disempowered (its no accident that these early American leaders were founding “Fathers”). Wealth, race, gender, and social class determined political status, and social privilege was exclusive to a white, male, landed aristocracy.
Such well-known cultural influences notwithstanding however, the philosophical justification that the Founders offered for their elitism had little to do (at least explicitly) with perpetuating this particular social-class hierarchy. The kind of political hierarchy they advocated was predicated instead on a hierarchical conception of moral psychology, and it was this connection that allowed them to reconcile an elitist sense of moral hierarchy with an egalitarian theory of society. This theory of political elitism emerged from an analogous theory of human nature that combined a legally enfranchised political democracy with a psychologically grounded moral aristocracy.[ii]
Steeped in the classical philosophies of Plato, Pythagorus, Aristotle and the stoics, along with the empirical philosophy of their Scottish Enlightenment contemporaries, the Founders drew on the western tradition of moral psychology depicting a hierarchical order of human nature. In his landmark Republic and elsewhere, Plato had divided the human psyche into three parts: the lowest on this hierarchy being the “appetitive” level of the soul or psyche –responsible for our most basic compulsions for physical pleasure, sensual gratification, and material needs, the next highest being the “spirited” of level of the soul—responsible for our desire for power and worldly accomplishments, and the highest being the wisdom and knowledge-seeking level of the soul—responsible for our attainment of intellectual and moral excellence. Most people, Plato claimed, are driven by the lowest appetitive level and spend their lives attempting to attain physical pleasures and material wealth. Far fewer people are driven by the next highest spirited level and spend their lives in pursuit of professional prestige and public acclaim. Still fewer –a small minority in fact—are driven by a thirst for wisdom and moral perfection. Plato contended that social and political position in a healthy society should correspond to these levels of psychological talent and motivation: the majority (pleasure-driven people) should be laborers and merchants, the fewer but still numerous (ambition and power driven people) should be professionals of various kinds, and the select minority of wisdom-driven people should assume responsibility for scholarship and political leadership.[iii] The Scottish Enlightenment’s ‘faculty psychology’ of the Founding Father’s time reprised Plato’s ancient conception of the soul, using updated empirical-scientific terminology but agreeing with Plato that social and political leadership should be based on a hierarchy in which political authority is the hard-won attainment of wisdom that only a small, morally superior, intellectually capable, and public service-motivated minority are able to achieve.[iv]
Thus, although they held egalitarian and democratic principles, the Founders also acknowledged that these principles must be informed by an appreciation for intellectual and moral excellence, and that progressive levels of political authority should be assigned on this basis. A healthy egalitarian democracy must also be a meritocracy, stratified according to the achievement of superior moral character and intellect. For the Federalists this meant that, as James Madison claimed “The aim of political constitution should be to select as rulers the few men who posses the wisdom to know, and the virtue to pursue, the common good of all.”[v] And even more egalitarian-minded thinkers like Thomas Jefferson envisioned what he called a “natural aristocracy” of superior intellectual and virtuous citizens being recognized as most qualified for leadership by their less virtuous, pleasure-motivated, peers.[vi]
So, Why is it important then, to recall how the Founding Fathers managed to reconcile the ideals of egalitarianism and democratic government on one hand with an elitist moral psychology of political leadership on the other hand? –Perhaps because, as our Founders recognized, maintaining the precarious balance between these two is key to maintaining a healthy political culture, and because this balance has been largely lost in American society and politics since that time. Over the past two centuries the cultural effects of post-modernity have fostered a kind of egalitarianism that the Founders could have hardly imagined: social hierarchies based on ethnicity, gender and class have been toppled. Intellectual hierarchies have been largely eradicated with the advance of literacy, education, and access to information. And most importantly perhaps, the very notion of moral hierarchy itself has been undermined by the influence of secularization, multiculturalism, and a post-modern intellectual ethos that is largely hostile to “meta-narratives” and the idea of universal values. Lacking any objective or universally recognized standards for, or sources of, moral authority, and considering a long history of past injustice from such authority (via oppressive religious ideologies, governments, and social institutions), the notion of “moral superiority”, and indeed objective morality itself, are now regarded as rightly-rejected relics of a dark archaic past. As a result, popular opinion in western democracies has viewed ideas like “moral character” or “virtuous Republics” with increasing suspicion and cynicism. The Founding Father’s idea of “morally superior” citizens as political leaders seems quaint at best and dangerously elitist at worst.
All this has led, in turn, to an America that is now morally adrift and perpetually searching for a lost identity and a renewed sense of social and political purpose. This quest seems futile though, because our cynicism about the very possibility of virtue in either private or public life has led to the abandonment of virtue as a requirement for responsible citizenship or leadership. Civic communities are now regarded as merely collections of self-interested individuals, devoid of moral obligation to anything other than self-enrichment and personal pleasure, while political leaders are regarded as merely efficient administrators, bureaucrats, and popular figureheads –rather than the statesmen and moral exemplars that our Founding fathers envisioned. The public now simply expects its political leaders to be dishonest, self-interested, and insincere, and doesn’t seem to think this matters, so long as these leaders deliver on popular policy initiatives that a morally bankrupt citizenry believes will serve its self-interest. The Clinton and Trump Presidencies, involving political leaders who received high levels of popular support from their respective Democratic and Republican constituencies, even though these same constituencies considered them to be immoral people, provide good illustrations of this phenomenon.[vii]
Indeed, at the outset of yet another such era of Presidential leadership, we would do well to revisit the moral psychology and theory of virtuous government envisioned by our founders. They warned us that healthy republics and functional democracies don’t thrive with morally corrupt leaders and uninformed citizens. Considering the possible social and political trajectory in which we are now headed, we ignore their wisdom at our peril.
[i] Mahapatra, A., Grego, R. Sensual Austerity and Moral Leadership: Cross-cultural Perspectives from Plato, Confucius, and Gandhi. (Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021)
[ii] Howe D.W., Making the American Self: Jonathan Edwards to Abrahan Lincoln. (Oxford: University Press, 1997)
[iii] Plato. The Republic. Ed. Allan Bloom (New York: Basic Books, 1968)
[iv] Goetzmann, W. Beyond the Revolution: A History of American Thought from Paine to Pragmatism (New York: Basic Books, 2009)
[v] Hamilton A., Madison, J. Jay, J. The Federalist Papers Full Text of The Federalist Papers – Federalist Papers: Primary Documents in American History – Research Guides at Library of Congress
[vi] Howe, D. Making the American Self
[vii] https://news.gallup.com/poll/235022/presidential-moral-leadership-less-important-republicans.aspx
