Heir to a long tradition in American magazines, the New Republic was born as a journal of "the collective opinion of the editors, mainly on the political, economic, and social problems" in 1914, even though those opinions were considered largely liberal and occasionally radical. The first editor, Herbert Croly, was a progressive reformer who used the New Republic to arouse in his readers "little insurrections." The successes of the 1930s New Deal and the rise of communism induced his successors to adopt a more pragmatic political philosophy, but the magazine remained left of center. The conservatism of the 1950s, along with an acute financial problem, pulled the magazine from its pure philosophizing to criticism of the arts, books, and mass. However, its ultimate circulation success was grounded in aggressive national political journalism. From covering Watergate through the well tempered reports of John Osbourne, the New Republic drifted...