The moral and social aspiration proper to American life is, of course, the aspiration vaguely described by the word democratic; and the actual achievement of the American nation points towards an adequate and fruitful definition of the democratic ideal.

It also influenced the later New Deal. Increasingly skeptical of the capacity of social welfare legislation to remedy social ills Croly argued that America's liberal promise could be redeemed only by syndicalist reforms involving workplace democracy. After returning to America Herbert Croly worked as an editor for an architectural magazine The Architectural Record from 1900 to 1906.

Croley was one of the founders of modern liberalism in the United States especially through his books essays and highly influential magazine founded in 1914 The New Republic. Increasingly skeptical of the capacity of social welfare legislation to remedy social ills Croly argued that America's liberal promise could be redeemed only by syndicalist reforms involving workplace democracy.