Volume 6, Number 5 · March 31, 1966
The Colossus of Johnson City
By Hans J. Morgenthau
Presidential Government: The Crucible of Leadership
by James MacGregor Burns
Houghton Mifflin, 366 pp., $5.95
'Someone has said,' wrote Lord Bryce in The American Commonwealth, 'that the American Government and Constitution are based on the theology of Calvin and the philosophy of Hobbes. This at least is true, that there is a hearty Puritanism in the view of human nature which pervades the instrument of 1787. It is the work of men who believed in original sin, and were resolved to leave open for transgressors no door which they could possibly shut. Compare this spirit with the enthusiastic optimism of the Frenchmen of 1789.' And compare it with the spirit and the political practices of the Americans of 1966!
Review, 3186 words
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