The Virtues of Liberalism

An important book. With great learning, clarity, and passion, Kloppenberg has given us a fresh and richer understanding of the historical meanings of liberalism, and he has done so in a manner that exemplifies the very virtues he so effectively elucidates. --Thomas Bender, New York University These essays on the history of political argument in the United States constitute both a scholarly contribution and a distinctive political intervention in contemporary discussions of liberalism. Kloppenberg's liberalism is much closer to European social democracy than to what is attacked or defended in most of today's disputes about the 'l-word.' Kloppenberg is one of the best historians now working on any aspect of the intellectual history of the United States. --David A. Hollinger, University of California at Berkeley Everyone interested in the past, present, and potential of liberalism should read this passionate book. It sparkles. --Laura Kalman, University of California at Santa Barbara This book is indispensable for lawyers, political theorists, and others who look to history to uncover cultural resources for reviving progressive politics. Kloppenberg's nuanced readings of the interrelationships of republican, religious, and liberal themes in American politics are never schematic; yet they are framed with an eye towards the future as well as the past. Subtle, thorough, engaged: this book offers a pragmatism more chastened than Dewey's but still hopeful for the future. --Joan Williams, Washington College of Law, American University James Kloppenberg has written a scholarly book at odds with the temper of the times...Kloppenberg has crafted his essays on American political thought in clear, self-contained, unpretentious prose...Kloppenberg, who does not hesitate to proclaim in the opening pages his devotion to a principled liberalism, a prudent progressivism, and a non-doctrinaire pragmatism, provides in their name an intelligent and learne