could even nullify national legislation. Abraham LIN-
COLNbegan by respecting the institution of slavery in
the South but restricting its expansion westward. Then
Lincoln proposed ending slavery gradually and finan-
cially compensating slave owners. Finally, with the
outbreak of war and citing Thomas Jefferson’s phrase
in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are
created equal,” Lincoln (in his Gettysburg Address)
proclaimed slavery abolished and all slaves emanci-
pated.
Following the Civil War, the U.S. economy rapidly
industrialized, prompting changes in political thought.
A philosophy favorable to unrestricted free-market
CAPITALISM came to be called SOCIAL DARWINISM.
William Graham SUMNERargued that free competition
among businesses and among individuals allowed the
bright and hardworking to succeed and the foolish
and lazy to die out. So, for Sumner, government taxes
on the rich to assist the poor harmed the good citizens
while encouraging laziness and perpetuation of the
impoverished class. Only free, voluntary charity to the
poor is socially acceptable. This became the philo-
sophical basis of laissez-faire or CONSERVATIVE, probusi-
ness ideology in American political thought, which
continued right up through Ronald REAGAN and the
conservative Republican Party in contemporary Uni-
ted States. The LIBERALresponse to industrial capital-
ism in the United States was the WELFARE STATE, which
used the federal government to regulate business for
the common good and to tax the wealthy at a higher
rate to fund social programs for the poor (educa-
tion, health care, public housing, etc.). This liberal use
of the national government to control business for
the common people was expressed in writing by
Woodrow WILSONin the early 1900s, Franklin Delano
ROOSEVELTin the 1930s, and John F. KENNEDY in the
1960s (the “New Freedom,” the “New Deal,” and the
“New Frontier” respectively).
This Conservative (RIGHT)–Liberal (LEFT) debate
over the proper role and extent of government has
dominated American political thought throughout the
20th century and into the 21st century. The most
recent philosophical writings on this controversy
include John RAWLS’s A Theory of Justice,which pro-
vided a sophisticated case for welfare liberalism called
the “maximum strategy.” According to Rawls, a per-
fectly rational human being would choose a social sys-
tem which “maximized the minimum,” or made living
in the most disadvantaged conditioned preferable in
that society than in any other. Because people don’t
know where they will land in the economy (rich or
poor) or society (prominent or obscure), they would
want a system that takes care of them if they become
sick, poor, or lowly. Rawls allows for variations of
wealth so long as the rich become richer by benefiting
the whole society (e.g., by inventing something that
benefits society, manages resources more efficiently,
etc.), and pay more in taxes to help the disadvantaged
(in education, public health and housing, etc.). An
equally sophisticated philosophy of the Conservative
Right appeared in Robert NOZICK’s book Anarchy, State
and Utopia,which argued for “The minimalist State”—
low taxes, free enterprise, no social services or welfare,
and unrestrained business activity. Despite these ideo-
logical differences of conservative/liberal and Republi-
can Party/Democratic Party, the variations in U.S.
politics and political thought are mild compared with
most Western democracies (which have parties rang-
ing from FASCISTnationalism to COMMUNISM). A general
consensus exists in the United States for a “mixed
economy” with extensive free-market capitalism but
wide-ranging social services, equalizing the population
and providing relative equality of opportunity.
Greater social conflicts occur over ideological CUL-
TURE WARS, as described by James Davison HUNTERin
his classic sociological study Culture Wars(1991). The
book suggests that the issues in U.S. politics are no
longer over Left and Right, liberal or conservative eco-
nomic policies, but over views of reality and morality.
Hunter argues that these cut across economic class,
political party, race, gender, or religion. As the Democ-
ratic Party’s policies helped the social downtrodden, it
increasingly reached out to other social outcasts
(minorities, blacks, women’s liberation groups, gays
and lesbians, animal rights, etc.) and the Republican
Party became the defender of traditional Judeo-Christ-
ian morality. Hunter argues that political ideology in
the United States now divides between “orthodox”
people who adhere to some absolute standard of ethics
(God, church, the Bible, etc.) and “progressive” citi-
zens who make judgments according to relative stan-
dards, personal preference, and historical trends.
The future trends of American political thought are
difficult to predict, but with the Internet and greater
internationalism, it is likely to be more cosmopolitan
and multicultural. A great commentator on American
political culture, Frenchman Alexis de TOCQUEVILLE,in
his book Democracy in America (1835, 1840),stated
that the constants in American culture are equality,
democracy, and a basic Christian ethic. Despite social10 American political thought