ABSTRACT
Historians in an age of unceasing international peril, when national security and the capacity for survival are fundamental concerns, can hardly avoid a somewhat conservative view of their country's history. Their common concern is with the nature and degree of stability in American experience. Yet their answers are various and often ambivalent. Some of the efforts to sum up American history in recent years primarily emphasize the stability-and therefore the continuity-of American experience over the centuries. In addition to its integral approach, Tocqueville's classic has the special appeal today of rendering a mixed verdict on American democracy. Boorstin was equally impressed by the massive stability and un philosophic harmony of America. The domestic conflicts so apparent in an age of reform had diverted progressive scholars from the international context of American history. Conservative evolutionists were confident that unity would continue to overcome internal strife.
