raison d’etre.” And: “[Nothing] innStimson’s long experience — from thenaffair of General Ainsworth by way ofnthe Versailles Treaty and the foreignnpolicy of the Hoover administration tonhis own recent confirmation hearingsn[at which the Senate isolationists hadngiven him a rough time] — [had] imbuednhim with any very high regard fornCongress’s prerogatives in foreign affairs.”nHenry Stimson was a greatnpatriot surely, but was he a great republicannas well?nIt is unsurprising to find Mr. Hodgson—na citizen of a country that hasnbeen so great a beneficiary of ColonelnStimson’s anti-isolationist policies —nheartily approving of the interventionistnprogram. However, the facility withnwhich he fudges the nature of thatnprogram is dismaying, and finally offensive.nHodgson explains that, “Of allnthe men who helped to steer thenUnited States from the real isolation ofn1867 or even 1911, through the unsustainedncommitment of 1917-19 andnthe delusion of isolationism, to the firmncommitment to support the ideologynof democracy by global political andnmilitary involvement. Colonel Stimsonnwas one of the half-dozen most importantnand perhaps the most representative.”nThis is emphatically not thensame thing with which he credits Stimsonnin the 30’s, when “he had stood upnto the tempting appeals of the isolationistsnand insisted that the UnitednStates could never avoid the world’snquarrels.” Yet Hodgson seems either tonconfuse the two policies or else tonassume that the first one is necessarilynderivative of the second.nMr. Hodgson’s line on ColonelnStimson is that he was the link betweennthe New Nationalism of TheodorenRoosevelt, compounded with the NewnInternationalism of Woodrow Wilson,nand the “liberal internationalism” ofnthe American foreign policy “Establishment”nbetween 1945 and 1965nwhose fundamental assumptions werenHenry Stimson’s legacy to his country.nStimson in his youth was a friend, innfact a protege, of Roosevelt’s; accordingnto Hodgson he “fully shared thenimperialists’ world view and attitudes,”nhaving like them come to manhood innthe period when the United Statesn”was acquiring the strength to be anworld power, without having acquirednthe intention to be one.” Stimson’snlifelong effort was to help his countrynto attain that status, though he wasnfinally ambivalent enough about empirento be unwilling in the 40’s to fightnto save the British Empire, while strivingnto rescue from the holocaust Britainnherself. He was essentially,nHodgson argues, a liberal imperialist ofnthe kind represented in England bynJoseph Chamberlain; from liberal imperialismndeveloped the liberal internationalismnof post-war America, whosenproponents’ aim, writes Hodgson admiringly,n”was quite simply the moralnand political leadership of the worid.”nStimson himself in his retirementnwrote in Foreign Affairs that, “Hownsoon this nation will fully understandnthe size and nature of its present mission,nI dare not say. But I venture tonassert that in very large degree thenfuture of mankind depends on thenanswer to this question.” In years toncome, his former deputies and assistantsnrefined the doctrines of “liberalninternationalism” from positions ofnpower within the Truman administrationnand subsequent ones; aroundn•1965, so runs Hodgson’s story, thisnconsensual legacy was shattered by thenVietnam War and in the 1980’s finallynreplaced by what Hodgson callsnRonald Reagan’s “new conservatives,”nwhom he believes had a lot more inncommon with the isolationist Republicansnof the 20’s and 30’s than with theninternationalist ones of the 50’s andnearly 60’s. (To this peculiar reading ofnrecent American history, I shall return.)nFor as long as the Americannforeign policy establishment lasted,nhow.ever, “Its history was [Henry Stimson’s]nhistory,” in Hodgson’s bluntnformulation.nSo be it. Now, however, I want tontake up again Hodgson’s throwawaynremark concerning isolationism havingnbeen about American, not world, politics,nand to juxtapose it with a phrasenthat appears on the immediately precedingnpage, “the enigma of isolationism.”nThese two need to be consideredntogether, because American politics andnthe “enigma” that strikes CodfreynHodgson as unfathomable are reallynone and the same thing.nIt is perhaps true that the case fornAmerican isolationism was for the mostnpart not stated with great thoughtfulness,ngreat learning, or profundity. Butnnnwhile “America First!” was a slogan, itnwas also — rather it ought to havenbeen — a truism, at the heart of bothnAmerican polity in particular and of thenprinciple of national sovereignty in general.nIn order to express what he callsn”the pure milk of ‘liberal imperialism,'”nHodgson relies on Anchises’ lines in thenAeneid:nRoman, do not forget to rulenthe people in your sway;nthose will be your arts, tonimpose the habit of peace;nto spare the subject, and beatndown the proud.nThat these sentiments are noble andnhigh-minded cannot be denied, but thatnthey necessarily justify the burdens ofnimperialism may be questioned by recallingnthe fate of the Roman Empiren— or, for that matter, of the British.nWhile the example of Rome has been anhackneyed one for many centuries, thentruth is that the United States at the endnof the 20th century, with its own imperialnproblems of race and ethnicity, “diversity,”n”multiculturalism,” uncontrollednimmigration, and the generalnweakening and fragmentation of its culture,nof its morals, and of its belief, findsnitself in circumstances alarmingly similarnto those in which its precursor in thenancient world perished.nThe United States of America’ hasnnever been suited either to “liberalninternationalism” or to imperialism fornthe obvious and simple reason that itnwas designed not for, but rather against,nthem. Probably the American zenithnwas reached at the Constitutional Conventionnof 1787; probably also the eariyndecades of the Republic, when it was innterms of power and influence (thoughnnot of course in terms of culture) thenequivalent of a modern Third Worldncountry, were its happiest and mostnprosperous, if not its most affluent;nperhaps, finally, the Civil War, whichncaused the destruction of the federalnsystem as it was originally intended andnthe unqualified victory of industrialismnand nationalism, leading in turn tonimperialism and internationalism,nmarked the beginning of the end of thenFounders’ handiwork and of the societynthat had made them possible. It isnarguable that these developments togethernwith the price they entailed —nthe damage done to the fabric of Americannsociety and to the stmcture andnMAY 1991/29n