PROCEEDINGS 219
SOME PROBLEMS OF CONTEMPORARY
HISTORIOGRAPHY1
By WALTER L. DORN
Among the multiple tendencies which
inspire historians of every
variety in our day, one of the strongest
is a synthetic, or comparative study
of history. Although national histories
are still being written in all the
countries of western society, there is a
keen consciousness everywhere
that national history in its isolation
does not constitute an intelligible field
of historical study. Comparative
procedure and synthesis provide the only
relatively objective criteria for
historical judgments, and periodization is
no longer the bugbear it once was, but
has, on the contrary, become a
sharp tool which enables the historian
to penetrate to profounder depths
than the dogmatic supporter of the principle of
continuity. Every country
has its synthetic historians from the
Englishman, Arnold Toynbee, who is
attempting it alone and single-handed,
to the numerous French, American
and German co-operative enterprises. So
much are we impressed with the
necessity of synthesis, that even our
minute specialized investigations are
inspired by an ultimate aim at
synthesis. And yet it still remains true,
that all further progress in the study
of history as such, lies along the
lines of plowing up fresh ground in the
multiple branches of specialized
history; the history of diplomacy and
political parties, the history of mili-
tary organization and strategy,
constitutional, legal, economic and admin-
istrative history, church history in all
its branches, the history of philos-
ophy and the natural and social sciences
and the history of art. Today
every sector of culture and civilization
has its special branch of history
with its own special set of principles.
Taking them all together it would
appear that the controversy of cultural
versus political history has ended
in a complete victory of cultural
history. It is on this point that I wish
to make a few comments.
There is abroad a curious notion that
cultural and political history
are opposites. This I cannot persuade
myself to be the case. If a real
and not a factitious synthesis of the
various branches of history is possible
at all, I suggest that cultural history
is at its best when it becomes an
integral part of political history. The
most felicitous economic historians
have been those who, like Leonard Woolf
in his Empire and Commerce in
Africa, have recognized the interdependence of politics and
economics, and
have tapped economic problems, described
economic institutions with a view
to the conditioning factor of politics.
While I do think that economists
have written the best economic
histories, a pure economic history that
emphasizes exclusively economic points
of view is a contradiction in terms.
This is also true of the other branches
of cultural history. A historiography
that ignores the factor of politics no
longer fulfills its mission. If it is
possible to speak of a triumph of
cultural history, it is only because the
political historian has incorporated it
as a necessary and integral part of
his field of study. The old controversy
of Kulturgeschichte versus political
history is no longer an issue in our
day. A real and genuine synthesis is
possible today only when the historian
gathers his material around the cen-
tral trunk of the political life of
nations and peoples, political life, to be sure,
conceived in the widest possible sense.
But if the State in its new and
expanded meaning still remains the
center of the historian's interest, he
reaches out in all directions into areas
that have either a direct or an
indirect relation to political life.
Even those who affect to be cultural
1 Text of an address delivered at the
joint session of the Ohio State Archaeological
and Historical Society and the Ohio
Academy of History, Deshler-Wallick Hotel,
Friday, April 1, 1938.
220 OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND
HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
historians cannot escape regarding the
State in its expanded sense as
a principal and central cultural
phenomenon. This re-affirmation of po-
litical history as the central trunk of
history is not incompatible with
the belief that the other branches of
cultural history have an inde-
pendent existence in their own right.
When, for example, the art historian,
Woelfflin, contends that the evolution
of the plastic arts follows an
imminent law of its own and that
national, religious, political and
economic factors are of secondary
importance, we see no good reason
to disagree with him, though we are apt
to emphasize these factors
more strongly than he does. The upshot
of this part of my argument
is that if we are to have a genuine
synthesis, we cannot achieve it
as historians of natural science, of
law, economics or religion (all these
fields require a special training which
no single man possesses), we can
do so only as political historians in
the widest sense, and consider these
other factors as they cut into the
central stream of the larger political
life of nations and peoples. There may,
of course, be differences of em-
phasis due to interest and capacity, but
I venture to suggest that there is
a pretty general consensus of opinion
among us on this main proposition.
I cannot forego the temptation to make
some remarks on the relation
of history to the social sciences.
Thanks to the work of such philosophers
as Rothacker and Rickert we draw a sharp
contrast between the explana-
tion offered by natural science and our
understanding of the historical
process. Although the historian cannot
dispense with the concept of causal-
ity, we know that we cannot prove a
scientific causal relation between
one event and another. The very uniqueness of the historical
process
makes it impossible to apply the methods
of the natural scientist. It is
true that, particularly in recent years,
the social sciences have become
more historical, after the failure of
the extreme forms of scientific posi-
tivism.
It is particularly the modern
sociologist who has occupied himself
with historical materials--and there is
a general disposition among his-
torians to learn from the sociologist everything there is to
learn. To
be sure, what passes under the general
caption of sociology is still an un-
certain quantity. If, for example, it is
the task of political sociology to
pursue the deeper roots of
constitutional evolution by examining these
roots in their relation to one another
and to the process of constitutional
evolution as a whole, we historians may
say in good conscience that this
is precisely what legal and constitutional
historians for the past thirty
years have done or have wanted to do.
What parades as the new history
is precisely what constitutional and
legal historians for the past gener-
ation have done or have wanted to do.
Historical jurisprudence has been
particularly careful to avoid deducing
legal principles from concepts, but
regards them as the products of the
historical process. It is the sociologists
who aim primarily at understanding the
social process, whom we historians
welcome with open arms, We historians need never be
alarmed that sociology
will swallow history. The best among
them, like Max Weber and Sombart,
to mention only two, have become
historians. The kind of sociology that
aims at abstract and timeless laws can
never absorb history, which turns
its attention to the unique, the
creative, to what has a past, a present and
a future. It is perfectly true, that if
it were possible, as Pareto and others
believe, that you could study society after the manner
of a natural
scientist, history would become useless.
Until that happens, if it ever hap-
pens, it appears to me rather fantastic
to believe that sociology can ever
supplant history. If sociology is a
special science or discipline at all, it
PROCEEDINGS 221
is the science of a procedure or of a
method. Many of the profoundest
sociologists contend that it is
pre-eminently the science of a method, a
Wissenschaftslehre. If that is true, then what objection is there to call-
ing a modern refined and improved
historical method a sociological method
also? This method apart, sociology has
no better claim to an independent
existence than cultural history. The
necessary division of labor may make
it advisable to have special departments
of sociology, economic and cultural
history at our universities, but how
much of the present evil of depart-
mentalized thinking could we not avoid,
were all of us to meet some-
where on the same ground? Sociology divorced from social history is
relatively useless. A sociology that
abandons the testing ground of social
history threatens to become a mere
institution for inventing a special eso-
teric jargon.
No one will deny the sociologist the
right to describe and analyze an
entire social system from the point of
view of his special discipline. Such
attempts have been made and successfully
made, but only by those who
are rooted in some special social
discipline, such as law, economics, or re-
ligion. There can be no objection if
such studies are limited by the special
interests of the investigator. To
transcend such limitations is not given to
mortal men.
Some sociologists have made supremely
successful efforts at a pro-
founder and sharper conceptual grasp of
historical materials. Among
these efforts I should like to include
Max Weber's efforts at establishing
a historical typology. There are
historians who have objected to the cre-
ation of historical types on the ground
that they are incompatible with the
predominance of the individual and the
unique in history which always
must claim the historian's first
attention. I hold this objection to be a
mistake. If the historian desires to
grasp the real significance of the unique
and the individual in history he cannot
dispense with what is typical, with
a typology. The practice of creating
types goes far back into the early
nineteenth century. All recent efforts
among modern sociologists at creat-
ing a typology are no more than a return
to this older procedure. G.
Freytag and Lavisse constantly operate
with historical types, and every one
is familiar with the prominence of types
in Burckhardt's The Civilization
of the Renaissance in Italy. Historical types are certainly nothing new to
the historians of America. The historian, however,
never confines himself
to the description of types, but transcends beyond
them. The historical
type must always be the means not the
ultimate object of historical descrip-
tion. Such an ideal type never possesses
a concrete reality, its construction
merely serves the purpose of historical
description. Such a type need not
be an average type, but merely the most precise
conceptual expression of an
empirical reality, or a cenceptual
intensification of historical reality, a
stylized reality. To subsume all history
under such types would be a per-
version. They dare never be more than a heuristic
principle for the study
of concrete historical reality, or a
means toward an end. Lavisse offers
an excellent illustration of the correct use of the
type. When he proceeds
from the description of the ideal type
of a Dutch mynheer in the seven-
teenth century to an analysis of the
personality and statemanship of John
Dewitt. Therefore, typological
construction and historical description are
two separate and distinct things. How often have we
been told that feudal-
ism was once a universal phenomenon
among all the peoples of Europe?
We historians know today that everywhere
it took on a different form. The
term renaissance has become such a typological concept,
and a loose-think-
ing historian like Lamprecht has blessed modern history
with a whole suc-
222
OHIO ARCHAELOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
cession of renaissances. I am of the opinion that there was but one
Renaissance, and to equate more or less
similar phenomena in different
epochs is misleading.
Permit me in the few moments that remain
at my disposal, to make a
few further comments on a subject of the
most vital importance to every
reflective historian: The relation
between the ideology of contemporary
political parties and the historian's
effort of rendering a study of the past
intelligible and useful.
Every decisive attitude toward a
political or historical problem involves
not merely the affirmation or negation
of a certain set of facts; it involves
also a well-rounded philosophy of life,
whether it be liberal, conservative
or socialist. Modern political parties
seek not merely to enroll their follow-
ers as active members of the party, but
attempt to indoctrinate them with
a definite system of political and
historical thought. The differentation
or polarization of politics and history
into several divergent movements
began in the nineteenth century and
proceeds with an ever-increasing inten-
sity in our own day. It is true, the
members of all parties, whether liberal,
conservative or communist, seek
historical reality in their thought, but this
reality is a different one in each case.
They contradict one another, they
conflict with one another and a serious
crisis in historical and political
thinking has arisen. It will no longer
do simply to insist on the absolute
and exclusive correctness of one's own
thought and the partial vision of
others, for in such a world as this it
turns out that one's own vision is
partial also.
As a background for my argument, which
is the central theme of my
remarks, let me attempt a typological
definition of the four principal kinds of
political and historical thought:
Conservatism, liberalism, socialism and
Fascism.
1. Conservatism. We find it especially
among the nobility and among
those groups of the bourgeois
intelligentsia who physically and intellectually
dominate the politics of a nation.
Wherever the universities were or-
ganized on a plutocratic basis, as in
Germany and Great Britain, we find
this conservative view of politics and
history. What characterizes the
conservative is that he singles out the
irrational, the non-calculable element
in politics and history as the object of
his special attention. In the eyes
of the conservative, politics and
history are not governed by reason. The
forces that dominate history are
unreasonable and human reason can do
nothing in the face of historical
tendencies. History is dominated by
instinct inherited by tradition, by
silently operating spiritual forces, by the
genius of a people which arises out of
the subconscious and shapes events
and movements. This was Edmund Burke's
view, the sage from whom
conservatives all over the world have
drawn their wisdom. This peculiar,
irrational, incalculable element, this
doctrine of inherited experience, which
is given only to those who for
generations have governed a country, is
simply designed to give legitimacy to a
particular class, and it was so used
by the nobles of England and Germany in
the nineteenth century.
But I beg you to note that people who
believe this and have a social
position to correspond to it can see
certain aspects of politics and history
very admirably. The conservative as a
rule has a keen eye for those aspects
of politics and history where reason
does not decide the issue, where the
solution is the resultant of a free play
of social forces. One may say
that the conservative interpretation of
politics and history revolves around
this pivot. To the conservative,
historical forces are at bottom irrational,
they cannot be artificially produced,
they grow. As between a rational
PROCEEDINGS 223
political planning and haphazard growth,
the conservative thinks that the
latter alone is possible. Generally speaking, this
irrational conception of
politics and history is a hang-over from
the pre-capitalistic epoch of
medieval history. The medieval jurist
contended that you could not make
law, all you could do is to find it
somewhere in the social customs and
habits of the people. Even so brilliant a historian as Ranke wrote
his
history with such ideas in mind. It is
an ideology of traditionally ruling
classes. But the conservative does not
believe that a science of politics is
possible.
2. Liberalism. The middle classes came
to power in an age of extreme
intellectualism. They employed this
intellectualism as a weapon to destroy
the privileges of the nobility and the
church. By intellectualism I mean
a manner of thought that either is not
aware of impulsive, emotional or
religious factors in politics or
history, or one that at least regards them as
being subject to the control of
intellect and reason. This bourgeois in-
tellectualism demands a scientific
history. It has the naive faith that there
is such a thing as a science of
politics. If in politics the bourgeois liberal
encounters this irrational, impulsive
element, he treats it as though it were
subject to intellectualistic
control. He, therefore, cannot help
believing
that political action can be
scientifically determined, first by setting down
the aims of the State and then by
determining the means by which these
aims can be realized. It is one of the
ear-marks of modern intellectualism
not to tolerate a type of thinking which
is rooted in the emotions, that is
to say, thinking in terms of value
alone. If, nonetheless, he encounters this
emotional or irrational element, as he
must, for in politics there is always
an element of the irrational, he
attempts to isolate and dissolve it. Gen-
erally, the bourgeois liberal really
does not face the crucial question whether
the irrational and incalculable factors
of politics and history are not at times
so inextricably mingled with factors we
call rational, that it is quite im-
possible to isolate and control them.
With an unperturbed optimism he
seeks to gain a field that is clear of
all irrationality. Political aims, he
thinks, can be determined and determined
correctly by discussion in parlia-
ment. One may say that the liberal
conception of parliamentarism was
that of a discussion society in which the
truth was to be sought by rational
discussion. That this was a delusion and
a snare and that our contemporary
parliaments are not discussion societies
everyone knows. We know today
that behind every political theory there
are collective interests that aim at
a practical, not theoretical, compromise
of conflicting interest groups rep-
resented in parliament. This becomes
clear as soon as we take up the
socialist theory of politics and
history.
3. Socialism. For the purpose of my
discussion here I shall con-
sider socialism and communism as one and
the same thing. Karl Marx
discovered that in politics and history
there is no such thing as a pure
intellectualism and that every political
theory has behind it certain collec-
tive economic interests. Marx called
this phenomenon, that all thought
in politics is conditioned by and bound
to certain interests, ideology. Any-
one who is familiar with socialist or
communist literature will know that
the Marxian finds this ideology in
politics and history only among his
opponents, while he, himself, pretends
to be free from such ideological
thinking. But the historian sees no good
reason why this discovery of
Marx should not also be applied to
Marxism itself to show the ideological
character of Marxian thought. I use the
word ideology here, not in the
sense of a conscious political lie, but
in the sense of a type of thinking
which necessarily corresponds to a
definite social position and that all
political and historical thinking is conditioned
by and bound to a definite
224
OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
social situation and social experience.
What I mean is that the way in
which you see history, the way in which
you construe isolated facts into
a picture of a total situation, in other
words, the way in which you see
politics and history in the large,
depends on where in the social scale you
stand.
You know that it was Karl Marx's purpose
to combat the utopian
form of socialism. To quote him:
"Communism is not a condition which
is to be created, not an ideal according
to which reality must be shaped;
we call communism a real movement which
will dissolve the present order
and the circumstances of this movement
arise out of the presuppositions
which now exist."
Now if, today, you ask a well-schooled
communist of Leninist
persuasion, how he pictures to himself
the society of the future, he will
answer you that your question is not a
relevant question and tell you that
the future will shape itself out of
present circumstances. He will tell you
that you cannot determine beforehand how anything
should or will be.
Only the direction of historical
evolution lies in us. The concrete problem
for the communist can always only be the
next step. Theory, even com-
munist theory, is a function of reality,
of history. You will see from
this brief statement that the socialist
wishes to avoid alike the extreme
intellectualism of the bourgeois liberal
and the complete irrationality of the
conservative. Lenin often quotes
Napoleon's famous dictum, "On s'engage,
puis on voit," and argues that it is first action which clarifies
thought.
Thus the communist theory of politics
and history is a synthesis of the
intellectualism of the bourgeois
liberal, for at every moment the situation
must be rationalized, and the
irrationality and intuitionism of the con-
servative, for he declines any attempt
to predict the future. At no time can
the communist act without theory, but
the new situation, growing out of
the one before it, is quite different.
Thus communism attempts a synthesis
of the irrational and intellectualistic
elements of politics and history. In so
far as the Marxian does not deny the
incalculable element in politics his
thought is closely related to that of
the conservative. He does not, like the
bourgeois liberal, treat this element as
though it were subject to rational
control. Now how is it possible to
explain this peculiar combination of
irrationality and intellectualism which
is so characteristic of Marxism?
Looking at it historically it is the
theory of a rising class which is not
interested in achieving merely momentary
successes, but takes a long view.
On the other hand, this class must keep
continuously alert in the face of
the ever-changing incalculable events of
every revolutionary situation.
Since merely momentary successes are
almost useless, it must take a long
view of things. Communism and socialism,
therefore, have a highly con-
strued interpretation of history on the
basis of which the communist can
always ask himself: Where do we now
stand? At what stage of its evolu-
tion has the movement now arrived? Thus a rational interpretation of
history is quite as necessary for the
communist as a clear program of
action. To put it briefly, Marxism
appears as rational thinking concern-
ing irrational action--irrational
because the communist knows that he can-
not calculate the result of that action.
Thus what is peculiar to the
dialectics of Marxism is that he incorporates
both the historical intellec-
tualism of the bourgeois and the
irrationality of the conservative view of
history.
4. Fascism. Fascism is closely allied to
the irrational philosophies of
modern times, I mean those of Bergson,
George Sorel and the Italian
sociologist, Pareto.
PROCEEDINGS 225
In the center of the Fascist doctrine of
politics there is the apotheosis
of action, the romantic faith in the
saving act and in the importance of
the initiative of a leading elite. For
the Fascist the essence of politics is
to recognize the moment for decisive
action. Programs are of no im-
portance, what is essential is
organization and absolute subordination to the
leader. Neither the masses nor ideas
make history, for all great historical
achievements are the work of an elite.
Here we have irrationality in its
extreme form, not the irrationality of
the conservative, not Edmund
Burke's mystic faith in the creative
power of a long span of time, but
the irrationality of the act which is
the negation of history. The Fascist
movement as it appears in Italy and
Germany is anti-historical. The
Fascist believes as little in the
possibility of a political science as he does
in the possibility of a scientific
investigation of history. Here the extreme
scientific skepticism of Pareto was
pressed into the service of a young
movement which is imbued with the naive
faith in the saving grace of vital
action.
Some things Marxism and Fascism have in common. While the
Fascist operates with the notion of a
myth, the Marxian uses the word
ideology in the sense of a tissue of
lies, a screening device, a fiction. But
from a Fascist point of view the Marxian
conception of history as being
determined by economic forces is only
another myth, just as every other
attempt to interpret history is a myth.
To the Fascist the notion that
there is such a thing as a
"proletariat" is also only a myth. In the last
analysis, the Fascist theory of politics
goes back to Machiavelli. The
Fascist belief in the elan of the leader
has its counterpart in Machiavelli's
conception of virtu and of the superman.
Now of the four systems of politics and
history which confront us in
our own day, those of conservatism,
liberalism and communism, though
they may be opposed to one another, have
at least this in common, that
they proceed on the supposition that
there are definite historical phenomena
which are related to one another and
which can be investigated in a way
that makes it possible to determine, as
it were, the location of every event
in the evolution of the race. They
further agree in this, that not every-
thing is possible at all times, that
certain experiences, actions, a particular
manner of thought are possible only
under certain conditions and in certain
epochs. To all three groups the study of
history and politics has meaning.
To all three groups history is a
necessary instrument of orientation and
a decisive factor in political action. But to Fascism,
to quote Mussolini:
"Everything is possible, even the
impossible and the most unreasonable."
As different as the interpretation of
history is among liberals, conservatives
and communists they all agree that there
is a certain connection between
men and events in history which can be
studied. They do not see in history
a heterogeneous juxtaposition of phenomena or a
meaningless chaos of
isolated events, but a coherent
co-operation of significant forces which it is
the business of the historian to reveal. They study
history to wrest from
it a criterion for their own action.
Much as they may differ, they all agree
that every sort of political action takes place in an
historical environment
and that we can clarify our political thinking by
placing ourselves into
this process of historical evolution. But as soon as we
come to the Fascist
apotheosis of action, history suddenly ceases to have
any meaning, as it
does already with George Sorel, the founder of
syndicalism. To the
Fascist every interpretation is pure
fiction, for, says the Fascist, the
dynamic personality can always break through obstacles
in every age. The
Fascist does not study history with the
serious intention of employing it
226
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
as a means of orientation in the world
in which he lives. He operates with
a fiction, a myth, a grand romantic
myth, which he proposes to transform
into reality. The Fascist puts into
practice what George Sorel and Pareto
wrote on their doctrine of the myth.
Now it is my argument here that all
these groups seek reality, but
that all of them see only a part of this
historico-political reality with which
we are dealing. The bourgeois intellectualist projected
his political
rationalism into history and revealed to
us this rational aspect of politics
and history as no one without his mental equipment and
social experience
could have done. If his intellectualistic
history was inadequate so were
his politics which were based on the principle that the
simple appeal to
reason and discussion would solve social
problems. Here we can see very
clearly how these partial views of history supplement
each other. Socialist
thought on politics and history begins
at the point where bourgeois intel-
lectualism discovered its limitations.
The socialist politician and historian
saw what the liberal did not see, that
political action was conditioned by
social position and class interests, elements that are
not amenable to
rational appeal, a point of view which
certainly extended our field of
political vision. And finally, if
Marxism had emphasized somewhat too
sharply the economic underpinning of
politics and history, the Fascist has
a keener eye for the great moment, not freighted with
the dead weight
of the past, a keener eye also for
critical situations, when class conscious-
ness suddenly becomes important.
This brings me to the crucial question,
whether a synthesis of all
these partial views of politics and
history is at all possible today. Let
me say at once that an absolute
synthesis for all times would be undesir-
able, it would merely be a relapse into the static view
of politics sponsored
by intellectualism. Only a relative synthesis is
thinkable, and this certainly
not in the sense of adding all these
partial points of view in the belief
that a mere addition of these points of
view would produce the synthesis
desired. That would be impossible, for a real synthesis
is not the quanti-
tative center between these various
points of view I have discussed here.
Such a synthesis could not be made once
for all time to come, it must
possess no fixity; it must decide from
case to case what portion of old
inherited institutions is no longer
necessary and what programs for the
present are not yet possible. Such an
experimental, dynamic, ever-changing
synthesis cannot be affected by a class,
let us say the middle class, but
by a relatively classless group.
Intellectuals have been such a
relatively classless group in the course
of modern history. I do not propose to tap here the difficult
socio-
logical problem of the role of the intellectual in modern
society. All
I wish to say on that score is that they
cannot be regarded as a distinct
social class or as the mere appendage of
another class. To be sure,
economically their social position depends largely upon
industrial capital,
much in the way that this is the case
with the professional classes. But
it is none the less true that they do
not depend on capital in the same
way as those who are directly engaged in
the economic process. A social
revolution would affect one group of
intellectuals favorably, another un-
favorably. They are not a class in the
sense that their economic interests
can be homogeneously determined. As a
matter of fact, we find intel-
lectuals in all classes and in all
political parties. In France, Great Britain
and Germany, they have always supplied
the theorists for the conservative
parties. It is a notorious fact that
they have supplied the "proletariat" of all
countries with theorists and leaders.
Again, the intellectuals were so closely
PROCEEDINGS 227
allied with the rising liberal
bourgeoisie that reference to this is scarcely
necessary. Thus in the midst of our
modern society which is being split up
into classes with a cumulative
intensity, there appears this group of intellec-
tuals, who, besides belonging to these
classes, have characteristics peculiar to
themselves. They form an actual center,
but still no distinct class. They do
not fluctuate unattached above the
classes, for they are recruited from all
classes and all social groups alike, but
what unites them is their education
and their disciplined and trained
intelligence. While the industrialist who is
directly engaged in the process of
production is bound to a definite class
and the manner of life peculiar to it
and finds that his thought and action
is determined by his social position,
the intellectual, besides being deter-
mined by his affinity for a special
class, is influenced also by something
quite independent of his class, his
disciplined and trained intelligence. The
capitalist's or the laborer's attitude
toward political and social problems
is more or less pre-determined by his
social position from which he cannot
escape, while this is not true in the
same degree of the intellectual. One
may, of course, argue that in an age
like our own when every class in
society tends to become class-conscious,
the intellectuals must inevitably
become, if not class conscious, at least
conscious of their position in this
society. In the course of the nineteenth century there are precedents
enough for this, I do not wish to investigate here the
possibility of
creating a party of intellectuals with a
distinct theory of political action.
In a democratic age where mass
organization and mass action is required
this strikes me as utterly impossible.
But this does not prevent the
intelligentsia from accomplishing things
which are of incalculable im-
portance for the entire political and
historical process. Precisely here lies
the supreme mission of the intellectual
in modern society, to find the point
from where a comprehensive orientation
of the entire political and historical
process is possible, and not exclusively
from a conservative, liberal or a
communist point of view. He is, as it
were, the watchman in a night
which would otherwise be too dark. It is
precisely because the intellectual
arrives at his political attitudes in a
different way from the other classes,
whose political decisions are largely
predetermined by their position in the
economic structure of society, that he
has a larger freedom of choice and,
therefore, feels a need for a
comprehensive orientation and of thinking
things together. This urge
toward a comprehensive orientation is
potentially active even when he has
become the member of a party. It is
first the existence of this relatively
free group of intellectuals who come
from all social classes and political
parties that makes possible the creation
of a forum in which the prevailing
tendencies of thought can mutually
influence and penetrate each other and
approach the difficult problem of
effecting a synthesis over and over
again of their partial points of view.
Let me attempt to summarize my argument
by setting up a hypothetical
university which is keenly alive to its
important mission in our modern
society. In this university political
science and history are studied in the
closest possible relationship to one
another. This university is in no sense
a party school in that it cultivates a
liberal political science and history,
or one that is conservative, or
socialist. This hypothetical university does
not see its mission in serving as a
nursery for any political party or in
indoctrinating its students with any
specific political or historical philosophy.
The very function of this university is
based on the realization that each
one of the political parties I have
discussed here represent only one seg-
ment, a partial point of view of the
entire political and historical reality.
It is just in our day when party schools
are arising everywhere at least
228
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
in Europe, and we are becoming
politically alive in every direction, that
there exists as never before the
possibility of cultivating such a higher
form of political science and history.
This new political science will not
aim primarily at dictating political
decisions but prepare the ground for
such decisions; it will reveal and
illuminate combinations in the realm of
politics and history which hitherto have
been scarcely noticed. It will
undertake for example investigations of
the following sort: If anyone
wants this or that, then he will think
thus and so at a particular point in
the historical situation, then he will
see the entire political process in this
or in that way. But the fact that he
wants this or that, depends on these
or those traditions, and these and those
traditions are dependent on such
and such positions in the structure of
society. Only he who approaches
political and historical problems in
this spirit will ever arrive at a relatively
comprehensive grasp of totality. Such a
political science and such a history
will acquire a new vitality, a new
meaning, and a new usefulness.
Dinner and Evening Sessions
A subscription dinner for members of
both organizations
representing the conference and their
friends occurred at the
Faculty Club of Ohio State University at
6 P. M. About fifty
were present. Mr. Robert Price, of the Department of English
of Ohio State University, addressed the
group on "Johnny Ap-
pleseed--the Myth and the Man."
This address was very much
appreciated by all present.
THE RECORD OF THE AMERICAN PRESS
An address delivered at the Annual
Meeting of the Ohio State Archaeo-
logical and Historical Society,
Columbus, Ohio, April 1, 1938,
8:15 P. M., University Hall
By DOUGLAS C. MCMURTRIE
We are all of us, I take it, interested
in history from one viewpoint or
another; otherwise we should not be
gathered here this evening. Relying
on that interest, I propose to ask your
attention to some matters con-
cerned with basic sources of historical
material.
If I read aright the trends of
historical study, I should say that the
most important thing to the historian of
today is access to original, con-
temporaneous sources of information. At
an earlier time, the writers of
history used to depend upon so-called
"authorities"--upon men who had
written books which had come to be
regarded as standard works on one
subject or another--and each writer
thereafter would quote such an author-
ity with a sense of finality. But the
modern historian is disposed to dis-
count almost all histories written after
the fact and to insist upon relating
all statements back to contemporaneous
evidence--evidence which has not
passed through all the changes through
which so many statements go when
they are filtered through memory and
through rewriting and restatement.
And contemporaneous evidence is not only
more accurate and hence more
important to the historian; it is also
more vivid.
I am not primarily a historian. My
interest in history began in be-
coming interested in the history of my
own profession, which is printing.
From that as a starting point, I have
become interested in history in gen-
PROCEEDINGS 219
SOME PROBLEMS OF CONTEMPORARY
HISTORIOGRAPHY1
By WALTER L. DORN
Among the multiple tendencies which
inspire historians of every
variety in our day, one of the strongest
is a synthetic, or comparative study
of history. Although national histories
are still being written in all the
countries of western society, there is a
keen consciousness everywhere
that national history in its isolation
does not constitute an intelligible field
of historical study. Comparative
procedure and synthesis provide the only
relatively objective criteria for
historical judgments, and periodization is
no longer the bugbear it once was, but
has, on the contrary, become a
sharp tool which enables the historian
to penetrate to profounder depths
than the dogmatic supporter of the principle of
continuity. Every country
has its synthetic historians from the
Englishman, Arnold Toynbee, who is
attempting it alone and single-handed,
to the numerous French, American
and German co-operative enterprises. So
much are we impressed with the
necessity of synthesis, that even our
minute specialized investigations are
inspired by an ultimate aim at
synthesis. And yet it still remains true,
that all further progress in the study
of history as such, lies along the
lines of plowing up fresh ground in the
multiple branches of specialized
history; the history of diplomacy and
political parties, the history of mili-
tary organization and strategy,
constitutional, legal, economic and admin-
istrative history, church history in all
its branches, the history of philos-
ophy and the natural and social sciences
and the history of art. Today
every sector of culture and civilization
has its special branch of history
with its own special set of principles.
Taking them all together it would
appear that the controversy of cultural
versus political history has ended
in a complete victory of cultural
history. It is on this point that I wish
to make a few comments.
There is abroad a curious notion that
cultural and political history
are opposites. This I cannot persuade
myself to be the case. If a real
and not a factitious synthesis of the
various branches of history is possible
at all, I suggest that cultural history
is at its best when it becomes an
integral part of political history. The
most felicitous economic historians
have been those who, like Leonard Woolf
in his Empire and Commerce in
Africa, have recognized the interdependence of politics and
economics, and
have tapped economic problems, described
economic institutions with a view
to the conditioning factor of politics.
While I do think that economists
have written the best economic
histories, a pure economic history that
emphasizes exclusively economic points
of view is a contradiction in terms.
This is also true of the other branches
of cultural history. A historiography
that ignores the factor of politics no
longer fulfills its mission. If it is
possible to speak of a triumph of
cultural history, it is only because the
political historian has incorporated it
as a necessary and integral part of
his field of study. The old controversy
of Kulturgeschichte versus political
history is no longer an issue in our
day. A real and genuine synthesis is
possible today only when the historian
gathers his material around the cen-
tral trunk of the political life of
nations and peoples, political life, to be sure,
conceived in the widest possible sense.
But if the State in its new and
expanded meaning still remains the
center of the historian's interest, he
reaches out in all directions into areas
that have either a direct or an
indirect relation to political life.
Even those who affect to be cultural
1 Text of an address delivered at the
joint session of the Ohio State Archaeological
and Historical Society and the Ohio
Academy of History, Deshler-Wallick Hotel,
Friday, April 1, 1938.