No.
1120
Delivered April 1, 2009 April 27, 2009
The End of Conservatism?
Lee Edwards, Ph.D.
The modern conservative movement began as a
Remnant with Albert Jay Nock and Frank Chodorov;
grew into an intellectual movement with Friedrich Talking Points
Hayek, Richard Weaver, and Russell Kirk; blossomed • Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., wrote in 1947 that
into a political movement with William F. Buckley Jr. “there seems no inherent obstacle to the
and Barry Goldwater; burst into full bloom as a gradual advance of socialism in the United
governing movement with Ronald Reagan and The States through a series of New Deals.” Five-
Heritage Foundation and other organizations; suc- and-a-half decades later, George Will wrote
cumbed to hubris with Newt Gingrich and Tom that we had experienced “the intellectual col-
DeLay; imploded under George W. Bush and the neo- lapse of socialism” around the world.
conservatives; and is now wondering whether it is • Through the power of its ideas—linked by
headed for the ash heap of history. the priceless principle of ordered liberty—and
the successful political application of those
Let us begin our examination of the state of Amer-
ideas, the conservative movement became a
ican conservatism with a little history. major and often dominant player in the
Forty-five years ago, Lyndon Baines Johnson won political and economic realms of our nation.
the presidency in a landslide, receiving 61 percent of • With the right leadership, much of the frus-
the popular vote and carrying 44 states for a total of tration and uncertainty that characterize
486 electoral votes. Johnson’s coattails were long and the conservative movement at present will
wide: Democrats wound up with a two-to-one major- fade away as they did when Robert Taft,
ity in the Senate and the House of Representatives— Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and Newt
the largest Democratic majority in the House since the Gingrich were the acknowledged leaders of
high point of the New Deal. conservatism.
The political historian Theodore White concluded
that “the elections of 1964 had left the Republican
party in desperate condition.”1 Because Barry Gold-
water had run a defiantly conservative campaign from
beginning to end, most political experts were quick to This paper, in its entirety, can be found at:
www.heritage.org/Research/Thought/hl1120.cfm
second White’s bleak assessment of Republicanism Produced by the B. Kenneth Simon
and go him one better with regard to the state of Center for American Studies
American conservatism. Published by The Heritage Foundation
214 Massachusetts Avenue, NE
Washington, DC 20002–4999
(202) 546-4400 • heritage.org
Nothing written here is to be construed as necessarily reflect-
ing the views of The Heritage Foundation or as an attempt
to aid or hinder the passage of any bill before Congress.
No. 1120 Delivered April 1, 2009
Walter Lippmann, the preeminent pundit of the Fifteen years after the so-called Goldwater deba-
day, wrote that the returns disproved “there is a great cle, Ronald Reagan announced that he would again
latent majority of ‘conservative’ Republicans.” seek the Republican nomination for President. The
Author-journalist Robert J. Donovan said that if immediate reaction of the punditocracy was that
Republicans are seen to be “the voice of right-wing Reagan was too old—he was nearly 69—too con-
radicalism,” they “will remain a minority party indef- servative, and too dumb to be President. How could
initely.” The New York Times’s James Reston summed anyone who had hosted a TV program called “Death
up that “Barry Goldwater not only lost the presiden- Valley Days” cope with the multifaceted responsibil-
tial election…but the conservative cause as well.”212 ities of the leader of the free world?
Conservatives dismissed this doomsday analysis. The New Republic characterized Reagan as an “ex-
Ronald Reagan, fresh from his widely hailed national movie actor, darling of the rabid right…an interna-
television address on behalf of Goldwater, wrote that tional innocent, and an economic extremist.” Soci-
the landslide majority did not vote against conserva- ologist Robert Coles called the prospect of Reagan
tism but against “a false image” of conservatism that winning the GOP nomination “preposterous,” while
“our liberal opponents successfully mounted.” James Conaway wrote in the Atlantic Monthly that
Frank Meyer, the politically astute senior editor among the news media, the idea of Reagan as Presi-
of National Review, pointed out that despite the car- dent “was more than [they] could bear.”4
icature of the conservative cause as “extremist, rad- Yet, a decade later, when Ronald Reagan left the
ical, nihilist, anarchic,” two-fifths of the voters voted White House, historians and politicians poured
for the conservative alternative to liberalism.3 Mey- forth a stream of encomiums about his presidency,
er’s implication was clear: You can build a powerful citing the restoration of Americans’ confidence in
political movement on a foundation of 27 million themselves, the impressive economic recovery, and
true believers. the end of the Cold War at the bargaining table and
So who was proved more correct in their not on the battlefield.
assessment of the returns—Walter Lippmann or Summing up his presidency after his death, the
Ronald Reagan? Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Edmund Morris
said, “We know his greatness as a president by what
From Goldwater to Reagan we don’t see today…. Where is the Soviet Union?
Reviled and rejected in 1964 as no other presi- Where is the double-digit inflation? Where is the
dential candidate in the 20th century—one maga- national malaise?” “On foreign policy,” remarked
zine cover screamed that he was “psychologically Democratic Senator Edward M. Kennedy, “[Reagan]
unfit” to be President—Barry Goldwater was easily will be honored as the president who won the
reelected to the U.S. Senate in 1968 while the Pres- Cold War.”
ident who buried him in an historic landslide dared Still, not everyone sang Reagan’s praises. The
not seek reelection. Reagan legacy, said Nobel Prize economist James
Looking back, we can see that the 1964 election Tobin, was “a crippled federal government.” “I don’t
results and the 1965 passage of the Great Society think history has any reason to be kind to him,” said
into law marked the apogee of modern liberalism. CBS’s Morley Safer.
In 1966, the Republican Party, led by Goldwater So who was more correct in their assessment,
conservatives, gained 47 seats in the House of Rep- Morley Safer or Edward Kennedy?
resentatives and three seats in the Senate.
1. Theodore White, The Making of the President—1964 (New York: Signet Books, 1965), p. 453.
2. Lee Edwards, Goldwater: The Man Who Made a Revolution (Washington, D.C.: Regnery Publishing, 1995), p. 344.
3. Ibid., p. 345.
4. Steven F. Hayward, The Age of Reagan: The Fall of the Old Liberal Order 1964–1980 (Rosehill, Cal.: Prima Publishing, 2001), p. 620.
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No. 1120 Delivered April 1, 2009
American conservatism has undoubtedly suf- heroes: William Lloyd Garrison, William Jennings
fered steep ups and downs in the post–World War II Bryan, Martin Luther King, Jr., and John Paul
period. Indeed, it seemed on the edge of extinction II—a quartet that has yet to make an appear-
after the crushing defeat of Goldwater in 1964, after ance at the annual CPAC or the Southern Bap-
Reagan’s failure to capture the Republican presiden- tist Convention.
tial nomination in 1976, and after Bill Clinton’s • Commentator Patrick J. Buchanan lambastes
“Third Way” victory in 1992, but each time conser- arrogant neoconservatives and greedy Wall
vatism rose from the ashes like the fabled phoenix. Streeters for leading us astray and sets forth an
A New Era for Conservatives? America First platform.
Today, liberal pundits and historians are at it • Cato’s David Boaz invokes a plague on both Big
again. Amnesic as ever, they are saying that in the Government conservatives and liberals and says
wake of last November’s elections, American con- that choice is the key—whether you’re choos-
servatism is headed for the ash heap of history. ing a church, a school, or a lifestyle.
• The country is no longer “America the conser- Let us be clear about one thing: Republicans lost
vative,” asserted senior editor John Judis of The in 2008 and 2006 not because they ran on conser-
New Republic, but “America the liberal.” vative ideas but because they ran away from conser-
vative ideas.
• Barely able to contain herself, the editor of The
Nation trumpeted that the election of Barack Needed: An Inclusive
Obama marked “the collapse of conservatism.” Constitutional Conservatism
• Barack Obama’s victory signaled more than “the So what is to be done? I suggest that what is now
end of an era of Republican presidential domi- needed is a politics of inclusion, not exclusion—no
nance and conservative ideology,” stated one- casting out of social conservatives or neoconserva-
time conservative Michael Lind; “it may mark tives or any other kind of conservative, but a
the beginning of a Fourth Republic of the renewed fusionism that will unite all the branches
United States.”5 of the now-divided conservative mainstream. I
Lind’s conclusion that the era of conservatism believe that a rejuvenated fusionism can do this by
was ended and America was at the beginning of an blending the concepts of liberty and order, individ-
era of “Hamiltonian centralization and reform” was ual freedom and responsibility, limited government
seconded not only by euphoric liberals, but by anx- and a strong national defense just as the Founding
ious conservatives ready to chart a new course even Fathers did with the checks and balances of the
if they were uncertain about the destination. Constitution.
• Former Republican Congressman Mickey Frank Meyer, the author of the original fusionism
Edwards has called for a return to the libertar- and an avowed libertarian, stated that the core prin-
ian philosophy of Barry Goldwater. The villain ciple of his theory was that “the freedom of the per-
behind the collapse of conservatism, Edwards son [is] the central and primary end of political
says, was the coupling of Big Government con- society.” The state has only three limited functions:
servatives and the Religious Right. national defense, the preservation of domestic order,
and the administration of justice between citizens.6
• Former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson states
that we need compassionate conservatism to con- But Meyer argued that religious and traditional
front global AIDS, combat U.S. poverty, and precepts were needed to undergird freedom, which
promote human rights abroad. Saying that con- could not exist on the relativist-materialistic pre-
servatism without idealism is dead, he lists his mises of modern thought. In the American experi-
5. Michael Lind, “Obama and the Dawn of the Fourth Republic,” salon.com, November 7, 2008.
6. George H. Nash, The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945 (Wilmington, Del.: ISI Books, 1996), p. 159.
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No. 1120 Delivered April 1, 2009
ence, liberty and faith are joined, not separated as ern traditionalist; and Whittaker Chambers, the
the secularists have long argued. one-time Communist spy turned anticommu-
Such a constitutional conservatism, in the words nist champion.
of my colleague Matthew Spalding, will unite all • Next came the men of interpretation, the jour-
conservatives through the natural fusion provided nalists and popularizers like the polymath Will-
by American principles. It will remind economic iam F. Buckley Jr., the columnist and television
conservatives that morality is essential to limited commentator George Will, and the radio talk-
government, cultural conservatives that unlimited meister Rush Limbaugh.
government is a threat to moral self-government, • Last came the men of action, the politicians
and national security conservatives that energetic and policymakers, led by what I call the Four
but responsible government is the key to the nation’s Misters: “Mr. Republican,” Senator Robert A.
well-being and proper place in the world.7 Taft of Ohio; “Mr. Conservative,” Senator Barry
What all the brave new proposals by anxious Goldwater of Arizona; “Mr. President,” Ronald
conservatives lack is an understanding of the histo- Reagan; and “Mr. Speaker,” Georgia Congressman
ry of modern American conservatism. So how has Newt Gingrich.
conservatism survived crisis after crisis for more But the philosophers would not have been able
than 50 years and each time emerged with renewed to write their books and the popularizers would not
strength and momentum? have been able to publish their magazines and the
Was it luck? Divine intervention? Well, I believe politicians would not have been able to run their
in providence, but I also believe in free will. campaigns without the support of conservative phi-
Was each conservative recovery simply part of lanthropists—men of means and vision—such as
the pendulum syndrome that Arthur Schlesinger, Sun Oil Company’s J. Howard Pew, who gave the
Jr., suggested dominates American politics, swing- Intercollegiate Studies Institute its first $1,000; Col-
ing left for a generation or so, then right, then left orado beer baron Joseph Coors, whose $250,000
again, ad infinitum? Or is the continuing success and investment enabled The Heritage Foundation to
durability of American conservatism due to the con- open its doors; and California oilman Henry Salva-
scious acts of individual men and women operating tori, who put up much of the money for Ronald
on certain fundamental principles over the course Reagan’s TV address for Barry Goldwater.
of the past five decades? And I must mention another funding father,
Richard Viguerie, who perfected the craft of direct-
The Conservative Ascendancy mail political fund-raising. Viguerie and his follow-
Herein, I believe, lies the central reason for the ers have raised hundreds of millions of dollars for
viability of the conservative movement, guided by causes and candidates, without which the conserva-
principles such as limited constitutional govern- tive movement would be a pale shadow of itself.
ment, free enterprise, and traditional American val- The conservative ascendancy was also helped by
ues based on our Judeo–Christian heritage. the decline and fall of American liberalism, its swift
The movement has been fortunate—I might descent marked by a telltale shift from concern for
even say blessed—to have been led by a remarkable the common man and Middle America to preoccu-
group of philosophers, popularizers, politicians, pation with minorities and special interests.
and philanthropists. Conservatives triumphed in the 1980s and 1990s
• First came the men of ideas, intellectuals and when their movement contained all the elements
philosophers like Friedrich Hayek, the Austrian- necessary for political success: a clear, consistent
born classical liberal; Russell Kirk, the Midwest- philosophy; a broad-based national constituency; a
7. Matthew Spalding, “A New American Fusionism: Recovering Principles in Our Politics,” Heritage Foundation Lecture
No. 1114, March 17, 2009.
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No. 1120 Delivered April 1, 2009
sound financial base; proficiency in the mass media; As soon as the Berlin Wall came down, conserva-
and charismatic, principled leadership. tives began building walls between one another.
They were also helped by a sixth factor—an Soon there was open talk of a “conservative crack-
atmosphere of crisis. In 1980, Americans were sharp- up.” Sharp disagreements erupted among conserva-
ly aware that the nation required leaders who could tives over trade, immigration, and the direction of
cope with critical problems like inflation, unem- U.S. foreign policy.
ployment, and the Soviet empire. In 1994, the However, following Bill Clinton’s 1992 victory,
people demanded that something be done about conservatives began constructing a coalition of eco-
out-of-control government programs like welfare. nomic free-marketers, anti-government Perot sup-
porters, and believers in conservative family values.
Unintended Consequences The last group—the social conservatives—turned
But life in this target-rich environment had unin- out in many ways to be the most important for they
tended consequences. Some Americans began to provided the necessary ground troops in the politi-
believe that government was always the problem— cal wars.
a position, by the way, that Ronald Reagan never It did not trouble conservatives that coalition-
held. Antipathy and then antagonism spread, affect- building was an uneven and often frustrating pro-
ing everything from voter turnout to respect for cess. Just as conservatives have always opposed cen-
government as an institution. Conservatives were tralized economic planning, so do they oppose
obliged to explain that they were for limiting, not centralized political planning. The conservative
eliminating government. Some Americans conclud- movement is a loosely bound movement made up,
ed that conservatives, in their rush to wipe out 50 in the words of political strategist Morton Blackwell,
years of welfarism, apparently did not care what of “activists, scholars, donors and organizational
happened to people dependent on welfare. entrepreneurs held together by…shared philoso-
William Kristol asked a pertinent question: “How phy, shared enemies, and shared experiences.”9
can Americans love their nation if they hate its gov- The present spirited debate about the future of
ernment?” Government does have its legitimate pur- conservatism among conservatives is a sign not of
poses, he argued, but then he overcompensated by decay, but of vitality. Disagreement can strengthen a
urging a revival of “national greatness” conservatism movement as long as the disagreements are based
modeled on the example of Theodore Roosevelt. on principle and not driven by a desire for personal
As Matthew Spalding has pointed out, T.R. is a aggrandizement.
problematic choice since Roosevelt’s New National-
ism called for an activist state with strong regulatory Building a Successful Movement
powers, a goal at cross purposes with modern con- So where is conservatism headed? As I have said,
servatism. While some conservatives might find certain elements are necessary for a successful polit-
Roosevelt’s brand of vigorous leadership “refresh- ical movement.
ing,” Spalding says, a better and more recent states- To begin with, it must have a clearly defined, con-
man to emulate is Ronald Reagan.8 sistent philosophy. It is a given that conservatives of
It is beyond dispute that conservatives miss all stripes honor the Constitution and its established
Reagan. Starting in 1989, traditional conservatives, system of checks and balances. They agree that gov-
libertarians, and neoconservatives have been fuss- ernment should be limited, individuals should be
ing and feuding like so many Hatfields and McCoys. free and responsible, and there can be no lasting lib-
They miss the soothing presence of Ronald Reagan erty without virtue—public and private.
and the unifying threat of Communism.
8. Matthew Spalding, “The Trouble with TR,” National Review, February 23, 1998, pp. 31–34.
9. Morton C. Blackwell, “Thoughts on the Conservative Movement Now,” paper prepared for the Frank Meyer Society,
Washington, D.C., November 18, 1992.
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No. 1120 Delivered April 1, 2009
These ideas are not just conservative ideas, but political success, the number of conservative
American ideas that have their roots in the Found- donors has grown exponentially from a few thou-
ing of the Republic and are endorsed by a majority sand in the 1950s to more than eight million today.
of the American people. Last October, the Tarrance The fiscal strength of conservative organizations
Group reported that 57 percent of Americans call is impressive. The combined annual budgets of the
themselves “somewhat conservative” or “very con- 16 most influential conservative organizations—
servative” while just 35 percent consider themselves including The Heritage Foundation, the Intercolle-
“somewhat liberal” or “very liberal.” A Rasmussen giate Studies Institute, Young America’s Foundation,
survey at about the same time underscored Ameri- and the Media Research Center—total $544 million
cans’ skepticism about government, reporting that in 2008 dollars. And there are the center-right foun-
59 percent of voters agreed with the statement that dations whose assets approximate $7.4 billion,
government is the problem and not the solution.10 including the Big Six—Templeton, Scaife, Bradley,
Even in the midst of an economic crisis, America Noble, Amway, and Castle Rock—and another 37
remains a center-right nation in its political philos- foundations across the country.
ophy, although the center is farther to the Left than A political movement must be media-savvy,
it was 25 years ago. Many Americans have seen the familiar with and expert in the use of the latest in
future of the welfare state, and they like what they mass communications. Here there is a paradox: Con-
think they see, especially the entitlements. servatives have displayed mistrust, anger, and con-
Fortunately, there are a number of conservative tempt toward the mass media for decades. Yet:
scholars, young and old, committed to explaining • The number one columnist in America is conser-
the conservative philosophy and exposing modern vative Cal Thomas. A bevy of younger writers
liberalism, building on the work of Hayek, Richard like Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, and Jonah
Weaver, Russell Kirk, Leo Strauss, Eric Voegelin, Goldberg have written best-selling books and are
and others. Present-day conservative intellectuals in frequent demand as TV commentators.
include Robert George of Princeton, Harvey Mans-
field of Harvard, Charles Kesler of the Claremont • The number one radio talk show host is conser-
Institute, Hadley Arkes of Amherst, James Ceaser at vative Rush Limbaugh, who has a weekly audi-
the University of Virginia, Charles Murray of the ence of some 15 million. The number two radio
American Enterprise Institute, and Matthew Spald- host is conservative Sean Hannity.
ing here at Heritage. • In the cable world, Fox News leads CNN in
Next, a political movement must have a broad- audience ratings, thanks to such commentators
based, broad-minded national constituency. Conserva- as Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Glenn Beck.
tives are independent, individualistic. They like to The Fox network has been the number one
argue about ideas and institutions with friends as cable news network for seven years.
well as adversaries. They are uncomfortable with • In the world of the Internet, dominated by lib-
compromise and scorn accommodation. erals for most of the decade, conservatives are
But they have come together and stayed together asserting themselves with new Web sites, blogs,
when the times required it and when the right lead- and experiments in Facebook and Twitter.
ership managed it—as with Robert Taft in the 1950s, Which brings us to the fifth element of a political
Barry Goldwater in the 1960s, Ronald Reagan in the movement: charismatic, principled leadership. Today,
1980s, Newt Gingrich in the 1990s, and even for the first time in 60 years, there is no undisputed
George W. Bush following the 9/11 terrorist attacks. conservative leader—no Taft, no Goldwater, no
Next, a political movement must have a sound Reagan, no designated successor like George Herbert
financial base. Thanks to technical proficiency and Walker Bush in 1988 and George W. Bush in 2000,
both of whom sorely disappointed conservatives.
10. Ed Feulner, “Conservatism’s Vital Signs,” The Washington Times, November 7, 2008.
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No. 1120 Delivered April 1, 2009
But there are many rising and already visible • In 2001, the Bush Administration, working
stars in the conservative firmament, such as Con- with a Republican Congress, enacted a monu-
gressmen Mike Pence, Paul Ryan, and Tom Price, mental tax cut of $1.6 trillion—the largest in
chairman of the Republican Study Committee; Sen- U.S. history—which kept the economy hum-
ators John Cornyn, Tom Coburn, and Jim DeMint, ming until the financial collapse of 2008.
chairman of the Senate Steering Committee; Gover- The liberal historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.,
nors Sarah Palin, Bobby Jindal, and Mark Sanford, wrote in 1947 that “there seems no inherent obsta-
chairman of the Republican Governors’ Confer- cle to the gradual advance of socialism in the United
ence—plus past and future presidential candidates States through a series of New Deals.” Five-and-a-
like Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee. half decades later, the conservative columnist and
With the right leadership, much of the frustra- commentator George Will wrote that we had expe-
tion and uncertainty that characterize the conserva- rienced “the intellectual collapse of socialism”
tive movement at present will fade away as they did around the world.11
when Taft, Goldwater, Reagan, and Gingrich were The one political constant throughout these
the acknowledged leaders of conservatism. years was the rise of the Right, whose ascent to
The One Political Constant national power and prominence was interrupted by
the death of its leaders, calamitous defeats at the
When the day comes, as it will, when the conser- polls, constant feuding within its ranks over means
vative movement unites behind the right leader and and ends, and the hostility of the prevailing liberal
puts him on course to enter the White House, the establishment. But through the power of its ideas—
question will be raised: Can conservatives govern? linked by the priceless principle of ordered liber-
It is a reasonable question, given the glaring mis- ty—and the successful political application of those
steps and failures of the Bush Administration. ideas, the conservative movement became a major
The answer is simple: Of course conservatives and often dominant player in the political and eco-
can govern. nomic realms of our nation.
• In 1947, a Republican Congress under the lead- So it was and so it is in these times of crisis and
ership of Senator Taft cut federal spending and doubt and even fear, when conservative values are
taxes and helped lay the foundation for the suc- called for—prudence, not rashness; custom, not the
cessful foreign policy of containment. impulse of the moment; a transcendent faith, not a
• In 1981, the Reagan Administration overcame fatal conceit; reform, not revolution. As we seek
the opposition of a Democratic House and passed solutions to problems that seem almost unsolvable,
the Economic Recovery Act, which cut mar- we should recall the wisdom of T. S. Eliot, who
ginal tax rates across the board and prepared reminded us that no great cause is wholly lost,
the way for a period of unprecedented economic because no great cause is ever wholly gained.
recovery lasting more than 20 years. —Lee Edwards, Ph.D., is Distinguished Fellow in
• In 1996, a Republican Congress under House Conservative Thought in the B. Kenneth Simon Center
Speaker Newt Gingrich passed, over President for American Studies at The Heritage Foundation and
Clinton’s veto, welfare reform which substituted a leading historian of the American conservative
work for welfare and enabled the states to re- movement.
duce their welfare rolls by as much as 33 percent.
11. For the Schlesinger quote in Partisan Review, see “Notable and Quotable,” The Wall Street Journal, December 27, 1961; for
the Will quote, see Morton C. Blackwell, “Social Change and Friends of Liberty,” address delivered at the Mercatus Center,
Arlington, Virginia, July 16, 2001.
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