Edmund Burke was at once a chief exponent of the Ciceronian doctrine of natural law and a chief opponent of the “rights of man.” In our time, which is experiencing simultaneously a revival of interest in natural-law theory and an enthusiasm for defining “human rights” that is exemplified by the United Nations’ lengthy declaration, Burke’s [...]
Sixty-nine percent of voters nationwide are angry with the policies of the federal government. To understand why, it’s important to remember that most voters believe tax cuts and government spending cuts are good for the economy. Collectively, voters have voted for politicians who promised spending cuts and tax cuts in just about every election over the [...]
Adventures of an Accidental Sociologist: How to Explain the World Without Becoming a Bore, by Peter L. Berger. Prometheus Books, 2011. Sociology was invented in the nineteenth century by the French philosopher Auguste Comte, who envisioned a “science of society” in which religion was replaced by rationalism and the polity was ruled by experts. Comte intended the [...]
From historian Dumas Malone, we can, if we wish, begin to discern the real Jefferson. And that Jefferson is, in the broad outline of American history, identifiable in no other way than as a conservative. The Sage of Monticello, by Dumas Malone, Volume Six of Jefferson and His Time In 1809 Thomas Jefferson yielded up [...]
I distinctly remember reading Jacques Ellul’s books on technology, and specifically even remember where I was sitting when I read his The Technological Bluff, where he essentially argues that it is all but over and people will give over to the tidal wave of technology/technique. Here we are more than twenty years later, and if [...]
The Iliad by Homer, translated by Herbert Jordan (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2008) It is noteworthy that when the freedman Livius Andronicus (c. 250 B.C.) gave the Romans their first translation of Homer it was the Odyssey, not the Iliad he chose to render in the old Saturnian verse: Virum mihi Camena, insece versutum, [...]
One of the most surprising things to me since the inauguration of this site is our constant need to re-examine the word “conservatism.” Over the past 44 months, a question about definition or label or something related to this has come up at least 44 times, if not more. […]
Writer/Director Whit Stillman's newest film, Damsels in Distress, is soon to arrive in theaters. If you are a fan of Whit Stillman's movies (and you should be) it is very exciting to see Stillman's new film debut after a thirteen year hiatus. Stillman's earlier films Metropolitan, The Last Days of Disco and Barcelona constitute a marvelous trilogy well addressed in the [...]
C.S Lewis on Secularism and the real divide of the Old West from the New, It is hard to have patience with those Jeremiahs, in Press or pulpit, who warns us that we are “relapsing into Paganism.” It might be rather fun if we were. It would be pleasant to see some future Prime Minister trying [...]
Patriotism exhibits an unarticulated agreement with Aristotle’s great and challenging assertion that “all men are by nature political animals.” According to Aristotle, humanity in full flourishing requires the goods that a political community affords—the material goods of sustenance, shelter, protection by an organized defense, and the less quantifiable goods of education, the bonds of [...]
This lecture by Charles Murray draws on the themes of his excellent book In Pursuit of Happiness and Good Government. It is a strong argument for the central place of community in conservative thought. […]
Russell Kirk deserves special attention on the topic of ideologies. In his twenty-nine books on politics, history, constitutional law, literature, social criticism, economics, and fiction, the legacy of the French Revolution and the loosening of the ideologues upon the world haunted him at a profound level. Tellingly, Kirk’s most important influence was Edmund Burke, the [...]
Conservatives value individual liberty as much as libertarians, but they deny that freedom from coercion is the only form of liberty. It cannot be repeated often enough: The issue dividing conservatives and libertarians is not whether there should be a public philosophy by which we are governed, but which philosophy should govern us, conservatism or [...]
Recommended essays regarding Mr. Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) on The Imaginative Conservative: Looking for Mr. Jefferson by Clyde Wilson Thomas Jefferson’s Birthday by Clyde Wilson Thomas Jefferson & the American Declaration of Independence by Ross Lence Thomas Jefferson, Conservative by Clyde Wilson Jefferson Was Right by Joseph Sobran Calhoun, Jefferson, and Popular Rule by Lee Cheek The [...]