He will regard them as in meaning and effect
subversive of the established political and economic system of the
country; and he would be right. The American people could never adopt
the accompanying programme, moderate as it is from the point of view of
its ultimate object, without unsettling some of their most settled
habits and transforming many of their most cherished ideas. It would
mean for the American people the gradual assumption of a new
responsibility, the adoption of a new outlook, the beginning of a new
life. It would, consequently, be radical and revolutionary in
implication, even though it were modest in its expectation of immediate
achievement; and the fact that it is revolutionary in implication, but
moderate in its practical proposals, is precisely the justification for
my description of it as a constructive national programme. It is
national just because it seeks to realize the purpose of American
national association without undermining or overthrowing the living
conditions of American national integrity.
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