ON SIMON NELSON PATTEN’S PROGRESSIVISM: A NOTE

Abstract

This article is an attempt to offer an assessment of the main coordinates of Simon Nelson Patten’s views on democracy and biological determinism. This will allowus to better delineate the differences—as well as the affinities—between Patten and the core of progressives discussed by Thomas C. Leonard in a series of path-breaking contributions, culminating in his Illiberal Reformers: Race, Eugenics, and American Economics in the Progressive Era. It is our contention that even within the persisting intricacies, ambiguities, and contradictions of Patten’s expository style, it is possible to trace a shift in some aspects of his ideas—a gradual evolution thatmakes his peculiar brand of progressivism different from that of his most “illiberal” counterparts.