Leo Strauss and Carl Schmitt

Abstract

I have devoted part of my work to the political thought of Carl Schmitt, in my opinion one of the most enlightened minds of the 20th century, not only because of his intellectual acuteness, but also because the historical point of view from which he spoke was exceptional: the collapse of the Second Reich, i.e. the absolute end of a world centred on the imperial idea, the rise of the Weimar Republic and its agony in the arms of the Third Reich, and the new international order that took shape after its fall with the total humiliation of Germany, which Schmitt saw as the triumph of liberal Americanist imperialism. Many were Carl Schmitt’s correspondents during his lifetime. Thousands of letters can be found in Schmitt’s archive. Three of these letters were from Leo Strauss. We cannot find the correlative letters of Schmitt. But from the content of the letters we have to deduce that Schmitt did not reply to Strauss, at least not to these three letters. Strange for someone who was in the habit of always replying to letters. These letters were sent between 1932 and 1933 and inform us of an opinion written by Schmitt to evaluate Strauss’s research on Hobbes before the Rockefeller Foundation in order to Strauss to apply for a grant.  Strauss won the grant and thanks Schmitt. Many scholars speculate on the idea of Schmitt’s silence and put it down to the dangers of corresponding with a Jew like Strauss at that time. There is undoubtedly a good biographical argument there, but that does not interest me as much as the content of their relationship through their texts.