Comment on McCloskey.

TL;DR: McCloskey's essay as discussed by the authors offers a justification for and an approach to the study of American political thought, arguing that second-rate political thought cannot be justified on the first ground; the student of political thought must stand on the leg of relevance if he is to stand at all.

Abstract: McCloskey's essay offers a justification for and an approach to the study of American political thought. Justification is needed, as he puts it bluntly and persuasively, because American political thought is second-rate. His proposed approach to its study constitutes a solution to the problem posed by that second-rateness. That is, he offers not just one possible valuable way to consider American political thought but, rather, the way which justifies the study. The justification for studying second-rate thought, he tells us, cannot be the same as that for first-rate political thought. To use his example, the study of Plato can be defended on the ground that it is somehow "intrinsically selfwarranting." He distinguishes another major justification for the study of firstrate thought, namely, its relevance to the understanding of politics, that is, presumably, to the understanding of politics regardless of time or place. But the study of American political thought, because it is second-rate, cannot be justified on the first ground; the student of American political thought "must stand on the leg of relevance if he is to stand at all." But just what is his view of the relevance of the study of American political thought to the understanding of politics? The study of our best political thinkers is relevant, not to the understanding of politics as such, but to understanding "the government of the United States as it has been and is." "They can teach . .. [us] more about America" than can even the first-rate political thinkers. This might at first seem to mean that although American thinkers have been inferior in wisdom to first-rate thinkers (who like Plato can teach us about political matters generally), they can instruct us particularly about American politics, with which they were so directly concerned. However, I am not sure McCloskey is at all interested in the wisdom, second-rate or not, of our thinkers. He conceives of American politics and institutions as being strikingly the product of "the American political mind." While there is some correspondence between the politics of any nation and its national mind, this correspondence is especially close in America. The relevance of the study of American political thought to the study of politics, for him, is achieved via that American political mind. Our political thinkers helped create and, especially, mirrored the American political mind; that mind decisively produces and informs our institutions; therefore, the study of American political thought will yield valuable information for the study of American political institutions. McCloskey's suggestion, then, is to focus the study of American political thought on what it can tell us about the American political mind; he proposes to read our thinkers for "an understanding of the operative political mind of America and of the governmental institutions which that mind has created."