The Progressives' coupling of historical contingency with the doctrine of progress reveals how their movement was the means by which nineteenth-century German historicism was imported into the American political tradition. Among other things, American Progressives took from the Germans—and especially from the philosopher G.W.F. Hegel—their critique of natural rights and their organic or "living" notion of the national state. It was thus through the Progressives that the concept of a "living Constitution" entered the American lexicon.
Progressivism was not homegrown but imported from Germany. Living constitution was imported from Germany which argues the constitution should be understood according to the theory of organic life.
