Then, what is the origin of our “desperate need to agree”? There is a possible answer in our history, if only we can be persuaded to give our history a little attention. When we became a nation we were not a folk. We were, in fact, so far from being alike that there were only our common grievances and a few propositions on which we could be got together at all, and the propositions were more like stubborn articles of faith than like tested observations: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal ... certain inalienable Rights ... Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness ... the consent of the governed ... are, and of Right ought to be, Free and Independent States.” That is not the tone of men who are partakers in a common tradition and who share reasonable and familiar convictions. Thus under the spur of our first national necessity we gave the first evidence of our capacity to substitute an arbitrary and not too exacting lowest common denominator to which men can subscribe, for the natural and rigorous highest common multiple that expresses their genuine community of interest. The device succeeded because we succeeded, but it was the propositions that got the credit. The device has continued to succeed ever since for the same reason that tradition succeeds in the modern college--nobody who has had any reason to challenge the propositions has been able to get at us. Our proper job was to create a people, to get acquainted with each other and develop a common background. But the almost miraculous success of our lowest common denominator stood in the way of our working out any highest common multiple. Instead of developing a common background, we went on assimilating subscribers to the Declaration, our arbitrary tradition, “Americanism.” We have been so increasingly beset by aliens who had to be assimilated that their Americanization has prevented our own. We now believe our national job was the Conquest of the West, as if scattering people over a continent were any substitute for creating a People. But we have never been seriously challenged. If our good luck should hold, the second or third generation after us will believe our job was the subjugation of a hemisphere, including the assimilation of genuine peoples who have done us less harm even than the Indians did. But, whatever our practice, we shall never admit that our theory has altered. Still lacking any common background, we shall still enclose ourselves against the void in the painted scene of our tradition. But our luck may not hold. We may be challenged yet. CLARENCE BRITTEN THE INTELLECTUAL LIFE