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A little more than twenty years ago the American people turned an important corner.

In what has aptly been called a `` constitutional revolution '', the basic nature of government was transformed from one essentially negative in nature ( the `` night-watchman state '' ) to one with affirmative duties to perform.

The `` positive state '' came into existence.

For lawyers, reflecting perhaps their parochial preferences, there has been a special fascination since then in the role played by the Supreme Court in that transformation -- the manner in which its decisions altered in `` the switch in time that saved nine '', President Roosevelt's ill-starred but in effect victorious `` Court-packing plan '', the imprimatur of judicial approval that was finally placed upon social legislation.

Of greater importance, however, is the content of those programs, which have had and are having enormous consequences for the American people.

Labor relations have been transformed, income security has become a standardized feature of political platforms, and all the many facets of the American version of the welfare state have become part of the conventional wisdom.

A national consensus of near unanimity exists that these governmental efforts are desirable as well as necessary.

Ratified in the Republican Party victory in 1952, the Positive State is now evidenced by political campaigns being waged not on whether but on how much social legislation there should be.