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Goldwater: The Man Who Made a Revolution
No other losing presidential candidate, perhaps no other politician, has had a greater effect on the shape of current American politics than Barry Goldwater.
In this, the most comprehensive Goldwater biography ever written, Lee Edwards renders the most penetrating account to date of the icon who put the conservative movement on the national stage. Replete with new information and unpublished facts, Goldwater establishes itself as the definitive study of the political maverick who made a revolution.
In this, the most comprehensive Goldwater biography ever written, Lee Edwards renders the most penetrating account to date of the icon who put the conservative movement on the national stage. Replete with new information and unpublished facts, Goldwater establishes itself as the definitive study of the political maverick who made a revolution.
572 pages, Paperback
First published June 13, 1995
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About the author
Lee Edwards
68 books12 followersLee Willard Edwards was an American academic and author and a fellow at The Heritage Foundation. He was a historian of the conservative movement in the United States.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 16, 2019
Though Barry Goldwater lost the presidency in a landslide of epic proportions in 1964 the conservatives of the Republican party set in motion a movement to capture the party and make it their
own which they succeeded in 1980 with the election of Ronald Reagan. And in some respects they left
their founder behind. When he retired from the Senate in 1987 and died in 1998 Goldwater did not
like a whole lot of what he saw.
The closest the Democrats had to this experience was the losing candidacy of Alfred E. Smith in 1928.
Al Smith lost to Herbert Hoover in a landslide. But an urban ethnic captured the nomination, a Catholic to boot. Though he lost Smith's election was the catalyst for bringing the big urban areas
gradually into control of that party and the social welfare gospel that became its creed.
Goldwater author Lee Edwards points out was the first ideological candidate nominated by a major
party. Previous to this a guy from a small state like Arizona at the time being nominated was unheard of. There's a reason why so many New Yorkers up to then were on both party's tickets,
the large electoral bloc of votes. Goldwater's candidacy was based on a movement that was seeing
its first success in nominating a candidate not from the Eastern establishment.
Arizona was still a territory when Goldwater was born in 1909. His was a prominent merchant
family in Phoenix, Arizona and for many years with war service interrupting Goldwater was part of
the management of the department store they ran. He was a true westerner brought up on pioneer
tales of rugged individualism and that translated to his embracing a conservative creed. The
family business was strictly non-union.
Arizona was a state dominated by Democrats who grew kind of fat and lazy in their domination.
Barry Goldwater was one of many in the post World War II era who founded a new rejuvenated
Republican party and he got himself elected to the Phoenix City Council. In 1952 recruited by none
other than Everett Dirksen of Illinois, Goldwater ran and challenged incumbent US Senator Ernest
MacFarland who was the Senate Majority Leader and won with the help of Dwight Eisenhower's
coattails. Goldwater had a curious relationship with Ike, thought he was too cozy with the Democrats, but he knew he was in the Senate because of him.
In the Senate he was one outspoken conservative, he was a strong defender of Joe McCarthy and
his anti-Communist crusade and voted against censure. He was assigned to the Labor committee
in the Senate and railed against union corruption in the best style of a paternalistic employer. In
the year of 1958 which was a Democratic landslide in the off year Goldwater was one of few
survivors and became the uncrowned head of the rightwing of the Republican Party.
He had a friendly personal relationship with John F. Kennedy and looked forward to running and
debating him in 1964. But the events in Dallas changed all that. Goldwater did not want to run
after that, but to millions for whom he was the head of a movement he couldn't just bow out. He
knew deep down that no Republican was going to win in 1964 against Lyndon Johnson, but the
tide for him to run was irresistible.
And he lost big carrying five deep south states by dint of his vote against the Civil Rights bill of
1964 and his native Arizona. Partly he lost because some of the Eastern establishment resented
losing control. Even though Representative William Miller of upstate New York was his running
mate for Vice President, New York's Republican party cut him wherever possible. When his
arch enemy Nelson Rockefeller bowed out after losing to Goldwater in California, Governor William
Scranton ran a last ditch stop Goldwater effort which availed him nothing, but gave Democrats
ample ammunition.
In fact the bulk of Lee Edwards's book is devoted to the 1964 campaign. Even Edwards who is a
tried and true member of the conservative movement concedes Goldwater might have been more
circumspect and discreet.
Goldwater was out of the Senate for four years. But when octogenarian Carl Hayden decided to
retire Goldwater ran and won and served three more terms.
What he did not like was the right's new emphasis on social issues. His wife in fact was a supporter of Planned Parenthood and abortion was not on Goldwater's radar. He thought the
Moral Majority was neither and said that preachers in government was a bad idea because politics
is the art of compromise and preachers see everything as good versus evil. Ronald Reagan who
made his first foray into politics with a taped infomercial for Goldwater was the biggest beneficiary
of his campaign ultimately. But he and Reagan were never especially close.
For all those years as a spokesman for conservatism and leading the movement Goldwater never
had any important legislation attributed to him. That was remedied before he retired when he
wrote and directed a bill through Congress for a reorganization of the Defense Department. By
that time he was head of the Armed Services Committee and had some clout. Except in his last
years Goldwater was never a member of the Senate inner circle.
Lee Edwards writes at times like a man disappointed in how it went with him and his first love.
Nevertheless he paints an interesting picture of Goldwater. Maybe in a couple of generations a
more objective view of this most significant figure will be written.
own which they succeeded in 1980 with the election of Ronald Reagan. And in some respects they left
their founder behind. When he retired from the Senate in 1987 and died in 1998 Goldwater did not
like a whole lot of what he saw.
The closest the Democrats had to this experience was the losing candidacy of Alfred E. Smith in 1928.
Al Smith lost to Herbert Hoover in a landslide. But an urban ethnic captured the nomination, a Catholic to boot. Though he lost Smith's election was the catalyst for bringing the big urban areas
gradually into control of that party and the social welfare gospel that became its creed.
Goldwater author Lee Edwards points out was the first ideological candidate nominated by a major
party. Previous to this a guy from a small state like Arizona at the time being nominated was unheard of. There's a reason why so many New Yorkers up to then were on both party's tickets,
the large electoral bloc of votes. Goldwater's candidacy was based on a movement that was seeing
its first success in nominating a candidate not from the Eastern establishment.
Arizona was still a territory when Goldwater was born in 1909. His was a prominent merchant
family in Phoenix, Arizona and for many years with war service interrupting Goldwater was part of
the management of the department store they ran. He was a true westerner brought up on pioneer
tales of rugged individualism and that translated to his embracing a conservative creed. The
family business was strictly non-union.
Arizona was a state dominated by Democrats who grew kind of fat and lazy in their domination.
Barry Goldwater was one of many in the post World War II era who founded a new rejuvenated
Republican party and he got himself elected to the Phoenix City Council. In 1952 recruited by none
other than Everett Dirksen of Illinois, Goldwater ran and challenged incumbent US Senator Ernest
MacFarland who was the Senate Majority Leader and won with the help of Dwight Eisenhower's
coattails. Goldwater had a curious relationship with Ike, thought he was too cozy with the Democrats, but he knew he was in the Senate because of him.
In the Senate he was one outspoken conservative, he was a strong defender of Joe McCarthy and
his anti-Communist crusade and voted against censure. He was assigned to the Labor committee
in the Senate and railed against union corruption in the best style of a paternalistic employer. In
the year of 1958 which was a Democratic landslide in the off year Goldwater was one of few
survivors and became the uncrowned head of the rightwing of the Republican Party.
He had a friendly personal relationship with John F. Kennedy and looked forward to running and
debating him in 1964. But the events in Dallas changed all that. Goldwater did not want to run
after that, but to millions for whom he was the head of a movement he couldn't just bow out. He
knew deep down that no Republican was going to win in 1964 against Lyndon Johnson, but the
tide for him to run was irresistible.
And he lost big carrying five deep south states by dint of his vote against the Civil Rights bill of
1964 and his native Arizona. Partly he lost because some of the Eastern establishment resented
losing control. Even though Representative William Miller of upstate New York was his running
mate for Vice President, New York's Republican party cut him wherever possible. When his
arch enemy Nelson Rockefeller bowed out after losing to Goldwater in California, Governor William
Scranton ran a last ditch stop Goldwater effort which availed him nothing, but gave Democrats
ample ammunition.
In fact the bulk of Lee Edwards's book is devoted to the 1964 campaign. Even Edwards who is a
tried and true member of the conservative movement concedes Goldwater might have been more
circumspect and discreet.
Goldwater was out of the Senate for four years. But when octogenarian Carl Hayden decided to
retire Goldwater ran and won and served three more terms.
What he did not like was the right's new emphasis on social issues. His wife in fact was a supporter of Planned Parenthood and abortion was not on Goldwater's radar. He thought the
Moral Majority was neither and said that preachers in government was a bad idea because politics
is the art of compromise and preachers see everything as good versus evil. Ronald Reagan who
made his first foray into politics with a taped infomercial for Goldwater was the biggest beneficiary
of his campaign ultimately. But he and Reagan were never especially close.
For all those years as a spokesman for conservatism and leading the movement Goldwater never
had any important legislation attributed to him. That was remedied before he retired when he
wrote and directed a bill through Congress for a reorganization of the Defense Department. By
that time he was head of the Armed Services Committee and had some clout. Except in his last
years Goldwater was never a member of the Senate inner circle.
Lee Edwards writes at times like a man disappointed in how it went with him and his first love.
Nevertheless he paints an interesting picture of Goldwater. Maybe in a couple of generations a
more objective view of this most significant figure will be written.
April 18, 2014
From its present state, its hard to imagine how small, how irrelevant, how insignificant conservatism was in the early 1950's. National Review did not exist, the future editor of The American Spectator was only a boy. There were no conservative think tanks - no Heritage Foundation, no Cato Institute, no Center for Strategic and International Studies. There was no talk radio. There were only a handful of conservative intellectuals and their works; F.A. Hayek's The Road to Serfdom was the most quoted source. In 1951, William F. Buckley, Jr. made a big splash with God and Man at Yale, but not much had been heard from him since (he founded NR in 1955). In short, it seemed as though liberalism would be the dominant ideology for years to come. This is the climate in which Barry Goldwater was elected to the Senate for the first time in 1952.
Lee Edwards' Goldwater traces Goldwater's career and shows how the seeds of Ronald Reagan's victory and the 1994 Republican Revolution were sown in Goldwater's historic defeat at the hands of LBJ in 1964. He shows that Goldwater was a man who stuck to his principals (rather than playing politics), and inspired a generation plus of conservatives to speak out for what they believed in.
Goldwater is more a political biography than a personal one. Edwards starts with tracing how the Goldwater family came to America and Barry's early life, leading to his decision to run for the Senate in 1952. From then on, he goes into great detail about the 1964 campaign and the Senator's dealings with various presidents (from LBJ to Carter) after his return to the Senate. I wish there was more time spent on Goldwater the man, but what's here is very interesting.
Goldwater described himself as a "Jeffersonian", by which he meant he adhered to five basic principles:
1) individualism, stemming from the belief in the ability of man to govern himself
2) republicanism, reflecting a faith in the people and a conviction that government should be kept close the people
3) anticentralism, based on a distrust of executive power and the protection of the rights of the individual states
4) strict constructionism, that the government has only the powers prescribed to it in the Constitution
5) frugality and simplicity, calling for economy of government, paying of debts, and the cutting of taxes.
During his 30 years in the Senate, Goldwater said the better legislator was one who repealed laws rather than passed them. This reminds me of Calvin Coolidge's famous statement "It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones". Goldwater also gave the best definition of conservatism I've ever heard; one that modern politicians would do well to learn. The conservative approach, he said, "is nothing more or less than an attempt to apply the wisdom and experience and the revealed truths of the past to the problems of today."
When we read about the past, we often find similarities in what has happened to what is happening today. Life, and politics, is nothing if not cyclical. In July 1953, the administration wanted to increase the debt limit and Goldwater, then a freshman Senator, took to the floor to argue against it. He felt it was Congress's job to say to the administration that it cannot spend money because the people don't have it. He warned his colleagues of the perils of deficit spending, something we don't bat an eye about these days.
In 1963, a group of influential Republicans formed a Draft Goldwater committee. They ginned up support across the country in an effort to get Goldwater nominated for President. There were several large rallies held, including ones at New York's Madison Square Garden and a July Fourth rally in Washington, D.C. The rally in D.C. was described like this:
That description reminds me very much of the present day Tea Party movement.
Goldwater presents a fuller picture of the times in which the man lived and his lasting impact on the country. By speaking plainly and sticking to principle, Goldwater was like a modern day Jeremiah. But, unlike other Old Testament prophets, Goldwater was able to see his ideas vindicated a mere sixteen years after his crushing defeat.
Lee Edwards' Goldwater traces Goldwater's career and shows how the seeds of Ronald Reagan's victory and the 1994 Republican Revolution were sown in Goldwater's historic defeat at the hands of LBJ in 1964. He shows that Goldwater was a man who stuck to his principals (rather than playing politics), and inspired a generation plus of conservatives to speak out for what they believed in.
Goldwater is more a political biography than a personal one. Edwards starts with tracing how the Goldwater family came to America and Barry's early life, leading to his decision to run for the Senate in 1952. From then on, he goes into great detail about the 1964 campaign and the Senator's dealings with various presidents (from LBJ to Carter) after his return to the Senate. I wish there was more time spent on Goldwater the man, but what's here is very interesting.
Goldwater described himself as a "Jeffersonian", by which he meant he adhered to five basic principles:
1) individualism, stemming from the belief in the ability of man to govern himself
2) republicanism, reflecting a faith in the people and a conviction that government should be kept close the people
3) anticentralism, based on a distrust of executive power and the protection of the rights of the individual states
4) strict constructionism, that the government has only the powers prescribed to it in the Constitution
5) frugality and simplicity, calling for economy of government, paying of debts, and the cutting of taxes.
During his 30 years in the Senate, Goldwater said the better legislator was one who repealed laws rather than passed them. This reminds me of Calvin Coolidge's famous statement "It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones". Goldwater also gave the best definition of conservatism I've ever heard; one that modern politicians would do well to learn. The conservative approach, he said, "is nothing more or less than an attempt to apply the wisdom and experience and the revealed truths of the past to the problems of today."
When we read about the past, we often find similarities in what has happened to what is happening today. Life, and politics, is nothing if not cyclical. In July 1953, the administration wanted to increase the debt limit and Goldwater, then a freshman Senator, took to the floor to argue against it. He felt it was Congress's job to say to the administration that it cannot spend money because the people don't have it. He warned his colleagues of the perils of deficit spending, something we don't bat an eye about these days.
In 1963, a group of influential Republicans formed a Draft Goldwater committee. They ginned up support across the country in an effort to get Goldwater nominated for President. There were several large rallies held, including ones at New York's Madison Square Garden and a July Fourth rally in Washington, D.C. The rally in D.C. was described like this:
It was a typical Goldwater crowd. There were little old ladies in tennis shows, truck drivers with tattoos, professors who read Mises rather than Keynes, right-wingers who were convinced that Wall Street and the Kremlin were conspiring to run the world, Southern whites who had faith in the Cross and the Flag, retired people on Social Security who were worried about inflation, Westerners tired of catering to Easterners, anticommunists demanding action against Cuba and Khrushchev, small businessmen fighting a losing battle against government rules and regulations, readers of The Conscience of a Conservative, high school and college rebels looking for a cause - all of them believing that it was possible to solve problems as America had in the past...without federal bureaucrats.
That description reminds me very much of the present day Tea Party movement.
Goldwater presents a fuller picture of the times in which the man lived and his lasting impact on the country. By speaking plainly and sticking to principle, Goldwater was like a modern day Jeremiah. But, unlike other Old Testament prophets, Goldwater was able to see his ideas vindicated a mere sixteen years after his crushing defeat.
May 18, 2019
This book does a really great job of describing and educating the reader on the influence that Barry Goldwater had on on conservatism. The author takes you through the early years of Goldwater and his moral of philosophical roots and then jumps straight into his long Senate career. Edwards is very good at sparking interest in the seemingly dry battles that Goldwater fought with 7 presidents. A good read, well worth any history or politics lover's time.
November 13, 2019
Before and after reading this biography, I held Sen. Goldwater in high respect. He was a man of principle, and did indeed make so very much of the future of the United States possible. Although I don't agree with his philosophy totally, I find his to be very close to my own. In his later years, he seemed to waffle, but that can be attributed to his health and age. He's one of the few people I can honestly say I wish I'd met and talked with.
June 18, 2023
A thorough, praising, but by no means uncritical biography of the man who made the conservative movement possible. Great stuff.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews