To the Editors:

Cass Sunstein’s review of three books about ordinary Germans and the Nazi regime is more disquieting than even he indicates. The normal concern of people of all sorts with their daily lives, family, work, leisure, and so on indicates that only those in certain areas of work and life could possibly notice the slow but relentless advance of authoritarian and totalitarian policies by the government. The Nazis knew how to appeal to people who did not have ideological concerns but only normal human concerns. They knew how to conceal their real goals and how to make passive individuals active supporters. Our own American people are also not concerned with more than the economy, health care costs, and job opportunities, and they respond positively to those who promise action in these areas, without knowledge enough to judge whether the promises are likely to come to fruition. Very few Americans, like very few Germans, need to be fanatics to support policies that sound attractive but have hidden goals and dangers. Trump seems to know, like Hitler and like Mussolini, and in fact unlike Lenin and Stalin, how to appeal to a variety of concerns with promises that can be both attractive and contradictory. In my view, no population is educated enough, sensitive enough, or ethical enough to see through the deception. Thus the danger is very great indeed. It may in fact be one of the chief weaknesses of democracy that democracy can lead to tyranny just as well or perhaps even more than other political systems.

Norman Ravitch Emeritus Professor of History University of California, Riverside Riverside, California