The Retiring Intellectual

By and large, the U.S. intellectual is anticonservative in politics. He rarely strays beyond the liberal wing of the Democratic Party; he grieves over the alleged decline of the social order. And Sociologist Seymour M. Lipset of the University of California, who gives this sort of summary, suspects that the U.S. intellectual has been kidding himself for a long time: he may feel sorrier for himself than for society. Writing in Daedalus, Lipset suggests that U.S. intellectuals, and particularly professors, feel woefully unrespected by the very egalitarian society whose ideals they support so fervently. In short: "The data clearly show that feelings of low status are closely correlated with the advocacy of liberal politics."

What low status? According to Lipset, the U.S. respects intellectuals far more than they imagine. In 1947 the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago polled Americans on how they rated 96 occupations, and college professors emerged on a par with bankers and corporation directors, were outranked only by physicians and top political leaders. In 1950 a similar national poll placed professors fourth in 24 categories; 38% of those polled called them "upper class." And while professors consider themselves undervalued by businessmen, 62% of those teaching at top institutions were themselves from managerial and professional families--roughly the same background as that of big corporation leaders. Private & Public Incomes. What makes the U.S. professor feel sorry for himself, Professor Lipset thinks, is comparison with the massive social-political prestige of his European counterpart. The comparison makes little sense. In all

Europe, only a few thousand men are called "professor." In contrast, the U.S. has nearly 2,000 institutions of higher learning--New York City alone has over 40 with more than 20,000 teachers--and some 200,000 Americans bear the professorial title. Obviously, Europe's easy intermingling of intellectuals, politicians, publishers and lawyers is improbable in the U.S. And yet the U.S. Government, "even when the Republicans are in office, does employ and consult professors and other intellectuals." Harper's Magazine Editor John Fischer has observed that "the Eisenhower administration employs more professors than the New Deal ever did."

Nor does Lipset believe that American intellectuals have much cause for thinking themselves financially undervalued--"There are really two income structures in modern Western countries, the private and the public one." A Supreme Court Justice earns far less than he could in corporate practice; a Cabinet officer takes a hefty pay cut to enter Government. By favorable comparison, a full professor earns a minimum $12,000 at some top U.S. universities (v. a U.S. district attorney's $12,500), plus a good deal more on the side through books, articles, lecture and consulting fees. "The truth is," says Lipset, "that professors, like the lawyers who become judges, really believe that the noneconomic rewards of the job are better than monetary gains."

Gentlemen & Scholars. If U.S. intellectuals ever had a right to feel oppressed, says Lipset, it was in the late 19th century, when Henry Adams eloquently brooded over the rise of the so-called "robber barons." The anti-intellectualism of that day was the cold contempt of unlettered men (whose scions later gave millions to universities). The result--since the U.S. lacked a conservative tradition --was to fill intellectuals, from Wilson through Roosevelt, with liberal reformist zeal. But the anti-intellectualism of today is no longer contempt for a low-status group. It is more likely fear of a high-status group--"a kind of populist antagonism to any elite." To the now defunct Facts Forum, a Texas mouthpiece for the late Joe McCarthy, the enemy was plain: "The American respectables, the socially pedigreed, the culturally acceptable, the certified gentlemen and scholars, dripping with college degrees."

Lipset sees evidence that "a significant minority [of U.S. intellectuals] have become conservative." One reason is continued prosperity, another the implacable nature of Communism, which encourages intellectuals "to defend an existing or past society against those who argue for a future Utopia. Like Burke, they have come to look for sources of stability. Only time will tell whether a permanent change in the relationship of the American intellectual to his society is in process. There will still remain the inherent tendencies to oppose the status quo. Any status quo embodies rigidities and dogmatisms which intellectuals have an inalienable right of attacking."

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