Buckley

buckley.jpg

I suppose everyone who ever came in contact with, or read a book by, William F. Buckley, Jr. has to chime in. Yes, I met him and when I was a young teenager he praised me for asking a particularly convoluted question, which made me feel clever (for a few minutes). No, we were not buddies and I have no colorful stories to tell about him. His influence on me was largely of a negative kind: I figured out early that I did not want to be superficial in my writing or speech, as his columns typically were.

His obit of the late Murray N. Rothbard may have been unkind, but then, so was Murray, who uttered quite vicious comments about the recently departed, so I suppose that that personal conflict is now over.

In any case, the conservative movement over which he exercised an influence is now finished. The “Sharon Statement” of the Young Americans for Freedom, which was founded at his home in Sharon, Connecticut, represents a brand of “conservatism” that no longer has a public voice. In its place, we have Neo-Cons and Theo-Cons, all devoted to expanded government power.



18 Responses to “Buckley”

  1. I read the Rothbard obit. Ironically, Rothbard was not only right that lighthouses should be private, and Buckley entirely wrong — historically lighthouses were indeed private in Britain.

    See Ronald Coase “The Lighthouse in Economics.” (Journal of Law and Economics, Vol. 17, No. 2 Oct., 1974)

    I think Buckley did a great deal to promote big government conservatism. The neo & theo cons are his children.

  2. Tom G. Palmer

    I wouldn’t argue with that. But I also wouldn’t put him in the same camp as the Neo-Cons and Theo-Cons, either.

    I don’t think that Buckley was attacking private lighthouses (although I wasn’t there). My recollection of the description of the occasion was that he was mocking concern with privatization of lighthouses when there were bigger issues around, a bit like people who mock legalization of narcotics when there is a war going on. (And I should point out that Buckley early on became a skeptic about the “war on drugs” and later on a skeptic about the “war on terror,” or at least the wisdom of the decision to invade Iraq.) His legacy is decidedly mixed.

  3. My concern in the obituary is that he completely overstates Rothbard’s role in the LP. He was not the founder or the party nor ever its leader.

  4. Tom G. Palmer

    I suppose I should have mentioned that. It was of a piece with Buckley’s superficiality. Why bother checking facts? He once boasted that he spent very little time on his columns and it showed.

    But if true, the bit about Rothbard applauding Khruschev was disturbing, although not out of character for Murray: http://www.tomgpalmer.com/archives/020192.php

    In any case, both are now gone and it’s better to focus on their insights and additions to human understanding than their faults.

  5. Joshua Shoenfeld

    Buckley rejected the libertarian ideas of Chodorov and Rothbard in favor of statism and militarism.

    Buckley proclaimed during the Cold War we had to give up liberty in order to fight the Soviet Union and Communism, “We have to accept Big Government for the duration â?? for neither an offensive nor a defensive war can be waged given our present government skills except through the instrumentality of a totalitarian bureaucracy within our shores.”

    Buckley and many conservatives often talk about the virtues of liberty, yet they ultimately reject liberty because they prefer war, destruction, and statism even more.

    Buckley was known for being an intellectual, yet he created a movement that transformed into an anti-intellectual movement that believes that government should possess totalitarian powers in order to kill all Muslims and Arabs abroad and to spy and oppress Americans at home.

    Buckley’s conservatism provided a comfortable home for the neo-conservatives once the “left” was not militant and statist enough for them. Now, that the neo-conservatives have launched their “war on terrah”, they can argue that we need a totalitarian bureaucracy at home in order to fight “terrists” and “ay-rabs”.

    I read that Buckley opposed or was reluctant to support the neo-con war on Iraq. He must not have liked the neo-conservative takeover of the republican party when it came to Republicans expanding the welfare state too.

    Libertarians understand that militarism and socialism fit perfectly together. We call it the welfare-warfare state.

    I wonder if Buckley found some satisfaction in the degeneration of his conservative movement because he argued that we needed big government in order to fight our alleged foreign enemies.

    Overall, Buckley won the popularity battle over radical libertarians such as Rothbard and conservatives such as the Birchers.

    However, Buckley’s victory, the triumph of war and statism, over personal liberty and limiting the power of government, will be our defeat as we continue on the “road to serfdom.”

    Buckley’s conservatism beget George W. Bush, John McCain, and the cult-like worship of the state among the mainstream conservative movement.

    Buckley will not be missed.

  6. I interpret WFB’s reference to “the disadvantages of knowing nothing about lighthouses” as saying Rothbard didn’t understand public goods. But the mainstream neoclassical econ theory of public goods is clearly wrong.

    Paul Samuelson pioneered the lighthouse example as the quintessential public good that could never be produced privately. Coase completely refuted this — in the real world, lighthouses were indeed privately goods, and worked just fine.

    Perhaps Buckley was not a true neo/theocon, but he was certainly extremely hostile to non-interventionist Old Conservatism. His two big contributions to conservatism are promoting muscular interventionism around the world, and combining Christianity as a centerpiece of political philosophy.

    He helped change the debate from leftwing big govt vs small govt, to leftwing big govt vs rightwing big govt. Ugh.

    Incidentally, I’ve heard that the WFB’s claim that Rothbard applauded Khruschev was simply a lie. Does anyone have any info on this?

  7. Tom, I don’t mean to defend Rothbard, but applauding Khruschev would indeed have been out of character for him, I think.

    His applause for the death of the South Viet Nam gov’t wasn’t applause for the North. He did describe them as a bloody state regime as well. I find his position bizarre, but it isn’t the same as applauding the North. He doesn’t seem to have supported or applauded *anyone.*

    If he really did applaud Khruschev, that would be something different.

  8. “. . . the Young Americans for Freedom, which was founded at his home in Sharon, Connecticut, represents a brand of â??conservatismâ? that no longer has a public voice.”

    Indeed it is lost. It is now a matter of public record as to the time and place of the death of the Architect of the American Conservative movement: Wednesday February 27, 2008, Stamford Conn, William F. Buckley Jr.: 1925-2008.

    What is not clear is exactly when the American Conservative movement itself died. However, while the date of this event cannot be known with the same precision as Buckley’s death, what is known is that it undoubtedly proceeded William F. Buckley Jr. to the Grave. To read more, click here:

    http://libertydesirebelief.thechartersofdreams.com/2008/02/american-conservatism-proceede.html

  9. Tom G. Palmer

    Buckley’s legacy was complex. It should be remembered that there were plenty of other people and strains of thought interacting in the 1950s and 1960s. And some of those “purged” by Buckley were not peaceniks, but even more eager crusaders for nuclear war with the USSR.

    Buckley didn’t “reject” Rothbard’s ideas. That presupposes that they were somehow mainstream, or that Buckley was one of his acolytes. Neither was the case. He did not share them. The case of Chodorov is certainly sadder, as his vision of a free society was indeed pushed to the side by the infusion of more European-style conservatism, of the sort criticized by F. A. Hayek in his essay “Why I Am Not a Conservative.” The Intercollegiate Society of Individualists was taken over and turned into the rather different Intercollegiate Studies Institute. That was indeed a sad moment, made sadder by the additional infusion of zealotry for military intervention overseas.

    As to whether Rothbard cheered Khruschev, I don’t know. (Hence my preface of “If true.”) I did witness him cackling with glee at the conquest of South Vietnam by the North Vietnamese army and it showed a side of him that was decidedly unattractive and disturbing. It was more than a remark about the sociology of state power. It was as if someone had applauded the dismemberment of Poland by the Third Reich and the USSR. It’s hard to explain such behavior away as mere happiness that an oppressive state had disappeared, or that the myth of state invincibility was shattered, or that some Humean insight about states resting on opinion was vindicated.

    That said, they’re both now dead. Learn from their insights and their mistakes alike.

  10. Thank you for the occasion to think about these issues. I am not well enough acquainted with the history of the American conservative movement to say much about Buckley’s influence or his relationship with Rothbard (or anyone else). But I can say that he left a mark on British conservatism, as well, and to the extent that it was associated with the rise of Thatcherism, it was generally for the better.

  11. Joshua Shoenfeld

    Buckley’s movement of neo-cons and christo-fascists must be loving the current Zionist assault on Gaza. Ron Paul’s campaign demonstrates that the conservative voter rejects the ideas of individual freedom, peace, and limiting the power of government. Conservatism is all about expanding the power of the government in order to kill Muslims and Arabs and stifle dissent at home. John McCain is the perfect leader for this morally depraved movement that happens to be the world’s greatest threat to the existence of human civilization.

  12. I would only reluctantly yield my place among Buckley Bashers, but Joshua’s post strikes me as rather extreme. How are all of those undesirables to be lumped together into “Buckley’s movement”? I have tried, but I cannot imagine how the conservative movement that Buckley transformed is “all about expanding the power of the government in order to kill Muslims and Arabs and stifle dissent at home.”

    Maybe Joshua should try sticking to decaf for a while.

  13. Buckley wasn’t much of a scholar at all. He was a bit of a snob, but I don’t think he was much of a thinker. I heard that he was supposedly profoundly influenced by Albert J Nock in his early days, but in Buckley’s early writing career, he was already advocating a ‘totalitarian bureaucracy’ to destroy the Reds. This just doesn’t seem to what a man influenced by Nock would think. That ‘totalitarian bureaucracy’ is here to stay too, as the Cold War may be long gone, but conservatives and liberals alike will always find new bugaboos to justify its existence. Rothbard certainly had his flaws, but he was right about Buckley and the ‘New Right’. The ‘conservative’ movement is now a dangerous monster running amok.

  14. Joshua wrote: “Buckley proclaimed during the Cold War we had to give up liberty in order to fight the Soviet Union and Communism, “We have to accept Big Government for the duration â?? for neither an offensive nor a defensive war can be waged given our present government skills except through the instrumentality of a totalitarian bureaucracy within our shores.”

    True. Buckley did say that but Ludwig Von Mises on page 282 of “Human Action” wrote “He who in our age opposes armaments and conscription is, perhaps unknown to himself, an abettor of those aiming at the enslavement of all.”

    Was Von Mises a statist also?

  15. Charles,

    The bottom line is that Rothbard was not just an isolationist, he believed that the USA was the real aggressor in the Cold War and the Soviets were not imperalistic by nature. Here are some quotes from Murray during the 1970s’

    Fear about Soviet intentions have been grossly exaggerated and systematically played upon…these [American] militaristic rantings are wrongheaded, mistaken, and potentially disastrous.” (Libertarian Review, July 1978)

    “Libertarians should clearly welcome any moveâ??reciprocal or unilateralâ?? toward either military or economic disarmament.” (Libertarian Review, July 1978.)

    “To my knowledge, Soviet psychiatry has not been used to suppress dissent (or to defame living or dead persons) outside the Soviet Union, whereas Western psychiatry has been so used….(Inquiry, February 6, 1978.)

    It was not just Buckley that was alarmed by Rothbard’s leftist views on Soviet power.Libertarian author and good friend of Von Misers, Lawrence Fertig wrote in 1968 that,”Among the things which are real
    disturbing is the case of Murray Rothbard…….He is allied with the New Left. Imagine that! Just a short while ago he was on a Committee that favored Castro and Cuba. It’s sad to see a brillant mind like his go to pot that way”

  16. Other words of “wisdom” from Murray Rothbard during the Cold War. I don’t blame Buckley a bit for keeping his distance from Murray on Soviet issues.

    “It should occasion no great surprise, then, if …a democratic and relatively far freer United States has been more aggressive and imperialistic in foreign affairs than a relatively totalitarian Russia and China.” (Murray Rothbard in Libertarian Review, April 1978.)

    “But if one disregards the Russian conquests in Eastern Europe, there is relatively little evidence remaining of Communist imperialism. There are occasional minor interventions, in Africa and elsewhere, but these are nowhere near the scale of a great many American interventions since the Second World War.” (Libertarian Review, March 1978.)

    “For the past decade the Western press has been waxing indignant over what it calls the political misuse of psychiatry in the Soviet Union. This is a case of selective indignation with a vengeance.” (Inquiry, December 5, 1977.)

    From “Toward a Strategy for Libertarian Social Change”

    “Those critics…who attack Communists for being willing to kill capitalists…are incorrect: the problem with the Communists is…that their ends (e.g., dictatorship of the proletariat) are incorrect…the libertarian criticism is against Communist goals and principles, and not against their insight into the relationship between means and ends.” (pp. 10-11)

    ” …a special, very small, directing center must be set up; a network of executive agents must be developed…What Lenin was basically doing was instituting a vitally important innovation: applying modern organization theory and practice to a movement for radical social change. [Lenin’s] concept of ‘democratic centralism’ has been bitterly attached…but…members of an organization should loyally abide by the decision and by the directives of the chosen officials so long as they continue to be members.” (pp. 53-54)

  17. Joshua Shoenfeld

    The United States was an aggressor in the Cold War by waging wars and aiding proxies. Buckley believed that fighting the Cold War was necessary in order to prevent the Communists from taking over the US. Rothbard understood that Buckley’s view was absurd. Communist countries cannot subsidize and sustain their militarist activities as effectively as more free market countries can. Buckley’s hawkish views were great for the military industrial complex and the regimes we subsidized at the expense of the taxpayer.

    The new left was not perfect but at least that movement favored peace and rejected war. The old left merged with Buckley’s movement because of their affinity for war and statism. Rothbard later allied with anti war conservatives. I don’t see anything wrong with creating alliances with different groups on issues of common agreement.

    Today, Rothbard would most likely reject “the war on terror” because he would have realized that our foreign policy is to blame for hatred against the US. A non-interventionist/isolationist US would not be subject to terrorist attacks. Rothbard also would have been horrified that we continue to subsidize Israel’s aggression against the Arabs.

    Buckley’s ideology is about war and increasing government power. Rothbard’s ideology is about peace and decreasing government power.

  18. Joshua, Rothbard’s hatred for Buckley was personal which he covered up with ideological words. Buckley wrote that imfamous “Commenweal” in 1952 YET as late as 1959, Rothbard was doing economic research for Buckley’s book “Up From Liberalism”. It was only Buckley refused to publish his isolationist article in NR in April 1959, did Rothbard decided that Buckey was a warmonger. After all, if Buckley was a warmonger in 1952, why would Rothbard do research work for such a man in 1959????

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