the compatibility of philosophy with the agrarian ideal. And using the“Rural Socrates”as an ideal,
Jefferson could help set an example for others. He could study farming himself, without the ghost of
a Platonic Socrates nagging him that the study of natural man was in reality a study of the souls of
the lowly. The Socratic method could be extracted, in other words, to dignify the agrarian social
creed. In 1819, Jefferson wrote to William Short with an argument to this point; namely, that“of
Socrates, we have nothing genuine but in theMemorabiliaof Xenophon.”^21
The significance of Socratic method, for Jefferson, is relevant, not because it provided a technique
for self-realization, but because it provided an example of a deep commitment to a questioning way
of life.^22 While it is arguable whether Jefferson’s view of Socrates–through Xenophon–was
influential in changing attitudes toward the Socratic method, what is clear is that there has always
been an uneasy relationship between the ideal of Socrates and the ideals of the American character,
whether they are best represented by the urbane Franklin or Jefferson’s virtuous farmer.
Clearly there were elements of the Socratic method that were compatible with either vision of the
American character. The Socratic method displaces or makes redundant divine explanations in
favor of natural or rational accounts of things.^23 Second, the Socratic method seeks logical con-
sistency as a touchstone for the truth, even if it means questioning the moral consistency with
respect to the gods. Third, the Socratic method assumes a fundamental equality among human
beings with respect to the possibility of self-knowledge.^24
These elements were not incompatible with American liberal democracy. In regard to favoring
natural explanation over divine ones, Jefferson frequently makes note of his consternation with
Plato and his“misrepresentations”of Socrates. Jefferson said that Plato’s dialogs were“in truth”
“libels on Socrates,”^25 meaning that Plato had attributed to Socrates a transcendent meaning to his
investigations that were at the least misleading. Jefferson saw the philosopher in hindsight as a
proponent of secular rationalism: the Socratic method was not merely an aid to philosophical
wisdom; the method itself was primary. Woodruff has explained that primacy as“Socrates accepted
a belief-system that is defined under theelenchus.”^26 The truth is what is left behind after the
method: Socrates accepts only“what is left of traditional beliefs afterelenchus.”^27
The Socratic emphasis on the equal human capacity for self-knowledge is also clearly com-
patible with both Jefferson and Franklin’s democratic educational vision. In theGorgias(508d–
509a), for example, Socrates takes the position that each individual has the intellectual capacity to
make a good judgment on basic human questions. Most individuals are capable of self-knowledge,
and therefore, good judgment, if the process by which they arrive at knowledge is sound. Practical
wisdom is the result not of rote learning, but conversation, dialectic, and with the guidance or under
the pressure of a Socratic questioner.
Yet it is easy to overlook the profound difficulties of a true recovery of Socrates’method of
disputation in democratic America. As applied to moral questions, the method encourages doubt, if
not skepticism or incredulity. In the context of republican government, the method can produce
distrust in tradition, such as Socrates’critique of the goodness of democracy (Apology, 29d;
Protagoras, 319d) or the greatness of political or military heroes (Gorgias, 514a). Considering
justice, Socrates’relentless probing leads to confusion or suspicion. In relation to the gods, the
method aims at hypothesis elimination–but with no promise or guarantee that any better
hypothesis will be found.
The problem of the Socratic method, in other words, is not limited only to pedagogical means and
aims; it touches on the greatest questions of politics and of being. It is this recognition that is the basis
of the worst accusations of Socrates–that he was good only at confounding his enemies, or that he
would say anything to win an argument, or that he was guilty of introducing new gods or corrupting
the youth. The trial of Socrates is an example of the stakes involved, a point often lost on modern
educators. That is, Socrates viewed his method as inseparable from a life of philosophy, and that life
he considered to be worthy of great sacrifice, even death. The city’s laws, in short, have no real claim
over his inquiring way of life. Socrates will“obeythe god”rather than the city. There willbe noend to
The Americanization of the Socratic Method 77