William F. Buckley, Jr. is dead, and modern American conservatism has lost its chief intellectual spokesman and leader.
Buckley is one of the main reasons that I became a conservative. It wasn't just the influence of God and Man at Yale, Buckley's first and seminal book that made the case that Yale had abandoned its conservative Christian roots. Buckley had the novel idea that private colleges don't belong to their administration and faculty; these are the employees. Rather, colleges belong to the students who pay the tuition and who are there to learn. They along belong to the alumni, the living body of graduates who represent what the institution has produced; alumni also largely fund their alma mater and thus maintain their ties even when they have left.
I learned all this from Buckley, and our renegade newspaper The Dartmouth Review was patterned on Buckley's National Review. But there was more to Buckley than his books and writing. Interestingly Buckley never produced an important book after God and Man at Yale. His real influence was in who he was and what he represented. He was a suave, erudite and generous man, and he represented a conservatism that was witty, iconoclastic and fun. In my teens I had envisioned conservatives as stuffy and narrow-minded businessmen who upheld the status quo. Buckley showed me an irreverent conservatism that enjoyed life and fought to change the liberal status quo, especially on the college campus.
Before Buckley, there was no conservatism in America. The literary critic Lionel Trilling once famously remarked that America has a single political tradition and it is liberal. Conservatism, to the degree it exists, is only reaction. The conservative is not a man of ideas but simply twitches and barks in response to the inexorable march of liberal change. The conservative is against progress. Buckley himself played with this idea, and once described the mission of National Review as one of "standing athwart history, yelling Stop!" With this remark Buckley appeared to confirm the stereotype while in fact exploding it. An unthinking, unimaginative conservative would not have devised such a pithy, witty formulation.
Buckley may not have single-handedly invented modern intellectual conservatism, but he certainly made it respectable. He became the chief intellectual spokesman of the movement that culminated in Ronald Reagan. I never knew him well, although every few months I received an autographed Buckley book--typically about spies or sailing--in the mail. When Alan Wolfe launched his pompous and ignorant fusillade against my book The Enemy at Home, even suggesting that I was not a real conservative, Buckley rushed to my defense, noting that he was a far better authority on conservatism than Wolfe. In the end, it is these little kindnesses that you remember the most.
Today modern American conservatism is at the crossroads, and it's not clear what it's future will be. Oh, if only there were another young Buckley to gallantly lead the intellectual brigade. Still, what Buckley's movement accomplished, both through its intellectual and political successes, is nothing less than the transformation of American politics, even world politics. Buckley's life proves that ideas have consequences, and many of us continue to walk in the path that this far-seeing man cleared for us.
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How William F. Buckley Changed America
Posted Feb 27th 2008 1:11PM by Dinesh D'Souza
Filed under: Breaking News
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Reader Comments ( Page 12 of 13)
166. @ p-boy
I'm coming around to your no free will way of thinking. I intended to sit this one out...but...could...not...stop...myself, with all the ignorance flying about, I had to dive in and add my own ignorance to the salmagundi.
mac at 10:56PM on Feb 28th 2008
167. bump
brandon at 10:58PM on Feb 28th 2008
168. Good for you, Mac.
I'm just surprised, because most of the guys that I trained with that are in the military are very conservative. I consider myself conservative but these guys thought I was a liberal.
kulari94 at 11:01PM on Feb 28th 2008
169. floyd
A bigot or a liberal? I don't agree with either point of view.
Jerry at 11:05PM on Feb 28th 2008
170. Kulari
I was very conservative, still am in a lot of ways. My religion ( none) has no influence what-so-ever on my political views.
I don't think the current republican party has a clue what conservatism is. As for W ( bush), I think he is as left of center as Bill Clinton, though not as good a president.
Barry Goldwater... now that's a conservative.
mac at 11:20PM on Feb 28th 2008
171. Hehe Jerry... bigot or a liberal.. you only get to pick one.
mac... it is true, there is no free-will. It is a theist tool to convince you that you had some part in being/staying a Christian or Muslim or whatever.
not-pboyfloyd at 11:46PM on Feb 28th 2008
172. Mac:
1) How is Bush more liberal than Goldwater?
2) Why do you believe Bush is just as liberal as Clinton?
kulari94 at 11:50PM on Feb 28th 2008
173. Mac:
How do you define conservatism?
kulari94 at 11:51PM on Feb 28th 2008
174. Kulari94,
Bush has enacted numerous legislations(?) that curtail civil liberties to a very large degree, no conservative would ever consider making as many laws as bush has.
I believe the 'neocons'( for want of a better word) have hijacked the republican party, as well as the libertarian party( if indeed one existed).
I think Linda who she said she was a social liberal but a fiscal conservative, I made some joking comment, but I agree with the sentiment.
mac at 12:03AM on Feb 29th 2008
175. dumbfounded drooled:
"Lets not forget Buckley's lesser known accomplishments....
-His insistence on implementing a tattoing program of AIDS patients, so that the public would know who they were."
As I recall, Mr. Buckley wished to tattoo that they had AIDS on their buttocks. This way, no one would know but prospective sex partners. Do you deny that this would have saved human lives? Perhaps others must die to appease YOUR political correctness...
Robeson at 12:15AM on Feb 29th 2008
176. Perhaps this is the wrong place to submit this by virtue of the posts that have gone before, but here is my brief eulogy to Wm F. Buckley. I read a book called "Up from Liberalism" in 1969, during the heat of the Vietnam protest. This book changed my life, and provided a framework for believing that conservative principles could be based on insightful reflection. I watched "Firing Line" many times over those same years. Yes, I saw the Gore Vidal show, but it was the anamoly. Actually, the episode that stands out most in my memory was an interview with Thomas Szasz, during which Buckley strived to find a point of contention with his guest. I ordered, and still have, a transcript of that show. Buckley remained true to a conservative/pragmatic libertarian view of the world his entire life, yet was never at a loss to admit when he had misinterpreted an issue. That is what sets conservatives apart from "liberal" thinkers, in my opinion. Politics is not a religion, wherein the soul of man is linked. It should be an exchange of ideas, representing the best analysis of the evidence, and an outcome based on diverse "opinions" and conclusions. Mr. Buckley provided the most consistent viewpoint on an array of ideas of all political thinkers of the 20th Century. All Americans should applaud the man.
kenneth terrell at 12:16AM on Feb 29th 2008
177. ...and... and ... what if Benny Hinn cured them?
Huh? Never thought of that now... did ya?
not-pboyfloyd at 12:18AM on Feb 29th 2008
178. Monty = dick of the day. Congratulations.
Off to Jamaica for some R and R.
Hope everyone fares well. See you when I come back.
Linda at 2:09AM on Feb 29th 2008
179. Monty = dick of the day. Congratulations.
Off to Jamaica for some R and R.
Hope everyone fares well. See you when I come back.
Linda at 2:10AM on Feb 29th 2008
180. If yer still there..
enjoy, Linda.
not-pboyfloyd at 2:33AM on Feb 29th 2008