Herbert Croly - Progressive Democracy

In Progressive Democracy, published in 1915, Croly picked up where The Promise of American Life left off, shifting his focus to economic democracy and the issue of power for workers in large corporations. He wrote that his goal was to explain “the needs and requirements of a genuinely popular system of representative government.” For Croly, those needs and requirements included information on major political issues available to the public, energetic public debate and discussion, and the pursuit of a common voice in society.

A main concern of Croly’s in Progressive Democracy was that the United States Constitution was fundamentally inconsistent with American democratic aspirations. He perceived the Constitution as a “living Constitution,” capable in his mind of becoming something other than the Founding Fathers intended.

Croly’s alternative to interpreting the Constitution as “living” was to eliminate it and start over, or at least substantially alter it. The basis for his argument was the belief that for progressive democracy to be successful it needed to move quickly, and the Constitution did not accommodate that. Reforms were needed that could not wait for the approval of Congress or state legislatures.

In Progressive Democracy, Croly expressed hope that reformers in 1915 were different enough from reformers of the past that they could make real differences in American politics. His call for a more progressive democracy hinged on reforming social and economic systems. He accused Woodrow Wilson's administration of returning the country to Jeffersonian individualism, the opposite of where he thought the country should be going. He ended by appealing to Americans’ cultural and social instincts to improve their situation.