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Title: Conservatism in America Since 1930: A Reader by Gregory L. Schneider ISBN: 0-8147-9798-9 Publisher: New York University Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $70.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)
Rating: 5
Summary: A "big tent" in the best and most positive of ways
Comment: This is a book that, in my humble opinion, probably should be on the desk of every self-described "conservative" leader and activist across America. It's that useful.
I say "self-described," because one of the key recurring features in American conservative history has been the drive by one brand of "conservatives" to purge another brand from movement or party for not meeting the first brand's standards of "real" conservatism. Not surprisingly, therefore, some folks of one or another stripe might argue with the inclusion of the Buchananites, or the Rothbardians, or the Southern Agrarians, or the neo-cons in a book about "conservatives."
As much as it is a documentary history of modern conservatism, though, this book is a useful reminder of how much the various shoots and branches of conservatism still have in common today. Anyone who has read, for example, Dinesh D'Souza's denunciation of libertarians in "Letters to a Young Conservative" would do well to read Rothbard's pre-emptive (1980) refutation of D'Souza's arguments in "What is Libertarianism?" (pp. 262-273). Similarly, the frequent willingness of some to credit William F. Buckley with "inventing" conservatism in the 1950s should note editor Schneider's deliberate dating of the contents of this volume back to 1930. While the vital contributions of Buckley and the Sharon Conference are not slighted, the roots of modern conservatism in the pre-war Old Right are here given the credit they deserve.
There are many other important contributions here that deserve to be read and understood by conscientious conservatives. F.A. Hayek's 1959 work "Why I am not a Conservative" (pp. 180-194), as one example, is perhaps better known by its title than by the contents of Hayek's actual argument. For while he shows that he is not, in fact, *a* "conservative," he also reveals his devotion to ideals very much in line with tradition and a conservative approach to philosophy and life.
Through it all, insightful essays and introductions by Schneider himself tie the individual readings together thematically, and also present the various themes and movements within the larger context of the history of American conservatism.
On the whole, this volume probably won't resolve the principled differences between, say, Bill Kristol and Sam Francis. But it will help reveal how both men's philosophical stands arise from the same general pool of conservative history. It may not, and perhaps should not, reverse the "conservative crack-up" that has developed in the last years and decades and restore a unified "conservative movement." But it may at least provide a much-needed philosophical and historical context for anyone who uses that much-abused label to describe themselves. And given how few modern conservatives seem to know -- or care -- about their own history, that can only be a good thing.
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Title: A Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism by Jonathan M. Schoenwald ISBN: 0195157265 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $21.00 |
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Title: The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America by George H. Nash ISBN: 188292620X Publisher: Intercollegiate Studies Institute Pub. Date: 01 April, 1998 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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Title: A Nation under Our Feet : Black Political Struggles in the Rural South from Slavery to the Great Migration by Steven Hahn ISBN: 0674011694 Publisher: Belknap Press Pub. Date: 10 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
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Title: The Portable Edmund Burke (The Viking Portable Library) by Edmund Burke, Isaac Kramnick ISBN: 0140267603 Publisher: Penguin Books Pub. Date: 01 July, 1999 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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Title: Party of the People : A History of the Democrats by JULES WITCOVER ISBN: 0375507426 Publisher: Random House Pub. Date: 04 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
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