Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1993. [Vol. 1.] Eger Journal of American Studies. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 21)
BOOK REVIEWS - John C. Chalberg: August Heckscher: Woodrow Wilson. Macmillan, 1991. 734 pp
ending" as well. Not only was Wilson the nominee, but reformist progressivism was in control of the Democratic Party. Once again, Heckscher and Wilson are one. Having taken Wilson to the doors of the White House, Heckscher permits the private Wilson a measure of reticence. The substance of the rest of the Wilson story is "less the tale of what the world did to him than of what he did to the world." Or tried to do, all in the name of something less than unbridled Wilsonian idealism, for August Heckscher, having already humanized the previously austere-appearing Professor Wilson, is determined to politicize the often dreamily protrayed President Wilson. In fact, Heckscher takes pains to portray Wilson as the consummate consensus politician. Borrowing from an earlier Wilson biographer, Charles Seymour, Heckscher agrees that Wilson sought to "catch the trend of the inarticulate rather than the vociferous opinion." With a leadership style which "depended heavily on being able to interpret the national will," Wilson invariably waited for the majority view to surface magically —or "avoid [ed] action even when his personal views and preferences were clear." The enactment of New Freedom legislation is a case in point. Laws were passed to "establish conditions for full and fair competition," but forgotten was his 1912 campaign "promise of social justice" as well. Here Heckscher and Herbert Croly, founding father of The New Republic, are one. To Heckscher, Wilson was all too content to leave "untouched the social and humanitarian issues that had been an underlying part of the New Freedom agenda." To Croly, Wilson was a conundrum: "How can a man of his shrewd and masculine intelligence possibly delude himself into making the extravagant clains which he makes on behalf of the Democratic legislative achievement." Heckscher thinks that he has an answer to "Croly's question: "Wilson's apparent belief that progressivism had been fulfilled...was at odds with his deeper convictions." However, Wilson the politician knew just what the traffic would bear and was quite content to settle for it. On the foreign policy front Wilson pursued a similar strategy, his efforts to force Mexico to "elect good men" notwithstanding. Heckscher is not about to dismiss entirely the idealism that was a part of Woodrow 158
