Introduction

Abstract

The following essays in American political thought are presented in honor of Professor Francis W. Coker, who recently retired from active service in the Department of Political Science at Yale University. It was the original intention of a group of his former graduate students to do something on a more elaborate scale, but the project foundered on the shoals of the tensions and insecurities of the cold war, with normal work schedules disrupted by the military call-up and by transfers into and out of the civil service. Professor Coker has had a long and distinguished career in American political science, as a scholar and author, as chairman of his department, and as an active member of the American Political Science Association, of which he served as President in 1935. But he is best remembered by his graduate students as a relentlessly intelligent teacher, as a constructive critic, as a kindly gentleman, and as a friend always interested in their work and in their progress. They often recall his seminar in political theory, its range and depth, its careful scholarship, and above all, its concern with moral questions. It is hoped that the publication of these essays will convey to Professor Coker some small measure of the respect and affection which his former students acquired during their pleasant years in New Haven.