As a followup to my previous post:
A growing individualistic and libertarian orientation had been growing on the American right since they had began their opposition to FDR's New Deal policies. Foundations like the Volker Fund and the Foundation for Economic Education(FEE), along with periodicals like "The Freeman" would serve to produce a new generation of American rightists, centered on free markets and individual rights. As the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union heated up, a brewing Red Scare would lead to many on the right to replace their traditional realist foreign policy with anti-communist containment.
The two most prominent of these new figures were libertarian Frank Meyer and conservative William F. Buckley. They came to recognize that the growing libertarian, anti-communist, and conservative movements needed to coalesce into a broader and more powerful fusionist force. However, the New Conservatives would dominate the early 1950s both literary and intellectually, with Kirk, Weaver, Viereck publishing top selling books and drawing thousands to their lectures. Meyer viewed these non-conformist traditionalist too dismissive of free markets and individuals and too European in their origins.
It was in this context that Buckley would launch "National Review". The magazine would unite heavy hitters like James Burnham, F.A. Hayek, and Irving Kristol. The magazine embodied the fusionist ideals of Buckley along with with his focus on "American Exceptionalism", an ideology that saw the values and history as exceptional and indispensable among history. The magazine was more successful than Meyer and Buckley could have imagined, and Buckley finally decided to roll the dice and invite the traditionalists to a meeting in Chicago to hammer out a cohesive front. However, Kirk personally remained skeptical, and advised Richard Weaver to attend the summit. At the convention when Hayek and Meyer pushed a proposal for the traditionalists to adopt free market economics in exchange for a codifying of Christian values, Weaver called their bluff and led the traditionalists to walk out. The Philadelphia Manifesto would act as the New Conservative rebuke of any future attempts at fusionism.
Buckley pushed on with his next projects, founding the university organization Young Americans for Freedom(YAF) and publishing the Sharon statement. And while another blow would come when the traditionalist-allied Wilhelm Ropke wrestled control of the Mont Pelerin Society from Hayek, the immediate launching of the Mises Institute would soften the blow. Going into the mid 1960s, the Freedom Conservatives, as they would brand themselves, would come to be more involved in the Civil Rights movement. "Free Soil, Free Trade, Free Markets, Free Men" would be the slogan National Review adopted as they railed against the "collectivist idiocy" of New Conservatism, communism, and segregation. It would also serve to push the rising stars of Goldwater and Ronald Reagan against Nixon's tories.
I'd like to thank you all for the warm response the first part got. I'd now like to ask a general question. As I mentioned, Richard Nixon does eventually become president, but I never said he would do so under the Republican Party. Brent Bozell IOTL did propose to Buckley and Burnham in 1958 a new political party. However, the "Conservative split causing new Third Party" is taken by existing projects. That and the intellectual and literary battles that could be raged seems more appealing to me, and perhaps having a more fractious Republican Party would be a better take. Thoughts?
A growing individualistic and libertarian orientation had been growing on the American right since they had began their opposition to FDR's New Deal policies. Foundations like the Volker Fund and the Foundation for Economic Education(FEE), along with periodicals like "The Freeman" would serve to produce a new generation of American rightists, centered on free markets and individual rights. As the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union heated up, a brewing Red Scare would lead to many on the right to replace their traditional realist foreign policy with anti-communist containment.
The two most prominent of these new figures were libertarian Frank Meyer and conservative William F. Buckley. They came to recognize that the growing libertarian, anti-communist, and conservative movements needed to coalesce into a broader and more powerful fusionist force. However, the New Conservatives would dominate the early 1950s both literary and intellectually, with Kirk, Weaver, Viereck publishing top selling books and drawing thousands to their lectures. Meyer viewed these non-conformist traditionalist too dismissive of free markets and individuals and too European in their origins.
It was in this context that Buckley would launch "National Review". The magazine would unite heavy hitters like James Burnham, F.A. Hayek, and Irving Kristol. The magazine embodied the fusionist ideals of Buckley along with with his focus on "American Exceptionalism", an ideology that saw the values and history as exceptional and indispensable among history. The magazine was more successful than Meyer and Buckley could have imagined, and Buckley finally decided to roll the dice and invite the traditionalists to a meeting in Chicago to hammer out a cohesive front. However, Kirk personally remained skeptical, and advised Richard Weaver to attend the summit. At the convention when Hayek and Meyer pushed a proposal for the traditionalists to adopt free market economics in exchange for a codifying of Christian values, Weaver called their bluff and led the traditionalists to walk out. The Philadelphia Manifesto would act as the New Conservative rebuke of any future attempts at fusionism.
Buckley pushed on with his next projects, founding the university organization Young Americans for Freedom(YAF) and publishing the Sharon statement. And while another blow would come when the traditionalist-allied Wilhelm Ropke wrestled control of the Mont Pelerin Society from Hayek, the immediate launching of the Mises Institute would soften the blow. Going into the mid 1960s, the Freedom Conservatives, as they would brand themselves, would come to be more involved in the Civil Rights movement. "Free Soil, Free Trade, Free Markets, Free Men" would be the slogan National Review adopted as they railed against the "collectivist idiocy" of New Conservatism, communism, and segregation. It would also serve to push the rising stars of Goldwater and Ronald Reagan against Nixon's tories.
I'd like to thank you all for the warm response the first part got. I'd now like to ask a general question. As I mentioned, Richard Nixon does eventually become president, but I never said he would do so under the Republican Party. Brent Bozell IOTL did propose to Buckley and Burnham in 1958 a new political party. However, the "Conservative split causing new Third Party" is taken by existing projects. That and the intellectual and literary battles that could be raged seems more appealing to me, and perhaps having a more fractious Republican Party would be a better take. Thoughts?
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