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The Conservative Affirmation
A bold and articulate defense of traditional American values, The Conservative Affirmation is Willmoore Kendall's enduring statement on the philosophical foundations of American conservatism. First published in 1963, the book argues that the U.S. Constitution reflects not a liberal mandate for endless individualism, but a carefully calibrated order rooted in majoritarian rule, moral consensus, and shared tradition. Kendall, a brilliant political theorist and one-time mentor to William F. Buckley Jr., challenges the liberal interpretations of the Founding and proposes a model of democracy constrained by virtue, religion, and responsible deliberation. With fierce intelligence and polemical clarity, he critiques the unchecked expansion of civil liberties, judicial activism, and secular technocracy—urging instead a return to the principles that he believes animated the American political community at its best. The Conservative Affirmation remains a key work for students of American political thought, conservatism, constitutionalism, and the enduring debate over the soul of the republic.
- GenresPolitics
340 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 1, 1985
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
April 23, 2020
First, the official Goodreads description of this book is appallingly bad. To paraphrase Wolfgang Pauli, not only is it not right, it’s not even wrong. I’m tempted to post a line-by-line refutation. But no, let’s stick with the task at hand.
Kendall is a largely forgotten conservative political theorist who seems to have thought so long and so deeply about enduring questions that he was paralyzed when it came to producing significant scholarship. He was, however, wickedly insightful when critiquing the works of others, which yields two reasons this volume is worth reading:
First, he intriguingly challenges received wisdom about American politics. He attacks, for instance, the notion that the U.S. Founders were direct intellectual descendants of John Locke, whom he hogties, shoves into a barrel with John Stuart Mill, and rolls off George Washington’s enormous Mt. Rushmore forehead.
This foray is part of a larger attack against the concept of the open society, wherein free speech is the highest good. The open society, Kendall argued, invites increasing dispersal of opinion in communities, which depend on shared beliefs and values. As if anticipating the modern American cultivation of individually tailored worldviews, each sustained by Twitter feeds and “news” sources of our choice, Kendall argued that this dispersal of opinion invites “irresponsible speculation and irresponsible utterance. As time passes, moreover, the extremes of opinion will—as they did in Weimar—get further and further apart, so that...their bearers can less and less tolerate even the thought of one another, still less one another’s presence in society.” I challenge you to find a better pre-1970 prophecy about modern American politics.
The second reason to read this volume is that Kendall’s turns of phrase are what one might achieve after cross-breeding G.K. Chesterton with a honey badger. Because I feel no need to offer more organization and thematic constraint than Kendall himself did, I’ll leave you with a few hand-curated gems:
“One begins to suspect that the true American tradition is less that of our Fourth of July orations and our constitutional law textbooks, with their cluck-clucking over the so-called preferred freedoms, than, quite simply, that of riding somebody out of town on a rail.”
“My own instinct would be to let [American Communist Party leader] Gus Hall speak freely pretty much anywhere—until such time as the American people have the good sense to deport him to the Soviet Union.”
“The man or woman who wishes to exercise a right to be heard has a logically and temporally prior obligation to prepare himself for participation in the exchange.”
Regarding the radical who wants to undo American society: “The stigmata by which he is to be recognized are the various forms of the wish to live off our Civilization and benefit from the commitments it imposes upon others, but not live within them.”
Regarding the liberal Christian activist: “He speaks of the new religion just over the horizon in language that suggests he is thinking of founding it.”
Kendall is a largely forgotten conservative political theorist who seems to have thought so long and so deeply about enduring questions that he was paralyzed when it came to producing significant scholarship. He was, however, wickedly insightful when critiquing the works of others, which yields two reasons this volume is worth reading:
First, he intriguingly challenges received wisdom about American politics. He attacks, for instance, the notion that the U.S. Founders were direct intellectual descendants of John Locke, whom he hogties, shoves into a barrel with John Stuart Mill, and rolls off George Washington’s enormous Mt. Rushmore forehead.
This foray is part of a larger attack against the concept of the open society, wherein free speech is the highest good. The open society, Kendall argued, invites increasing dispersal of opinion in communities, which depend on shared beliefs and values. As if anticipating the modern American cultivation of individually tailored worldviews, each sustained by Twitter feeds and “news” sources of our choice, Kendall argued that this dispersal of opinion invites “irresponsible speculation and irresponsible utterance. As time passes, moreover, the extremes of opinion will—as they did in Weimar—get further and further apart, so that...their bearers can less and less tolerate even the thought of one another, still less one another’s presence in society.” I challenge you to find a better pre-1970 prophecy about modern American politics.
The second reason to read this volume is that Kendall’s turns of phrase are what one might achieve after cross-breeding G.K. Chesterton with a honey badger. Because I feel no need to offer more organization and thematic constraint than Kendall himself did, I’ll leave you with a few hand-curated gems:
“One begins to suspect that the true American tradition is less that of our Fourth of July orations and our constitutional law textbooks, with their cluck-clucking over the so-called preferred freedoms, than, quite simply, that of riding somebody out of town on a rail.”
“My own instinct would be to let [American Communist Party leader] Gus Hall speak freely pretty much anywhere—until such time as the American people have the good sense to deport him to the Soviet Union.”
“The man or woman who wishes to exercise a right to be heard has a logically and temporally prior obligation to prepare himself for participation in the exchange.”
Regarding the radical who wants to undo American society: “The stigmata by which he is to be recognized are the various forms of the wish to live off our Civilization and benefit from the commitments it imposes upon others, but not live within them.”
Regarding the liberal Christian activist: “He speaks of the new religion just over the horizon in language that suggests he is thinking of founding it.”
December 25, 2019
Kendall's conservatism is based on the Federalists, not Locke nor Burke, which sets him apart from thinkers like Russell Kirk and Frank Meyer. Very interesting analysis of the philosophy within the structure of the congressional and presidential elections in the US. His conservative attack on Millian free speech is also worth reading and comparing to the conservatism of America today. Finally, his analysis of contract theory and pacifism is superb.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews