Some easy ones to list would be William F Buckley, Russell Kirk, The Federalist Papers by Madison, Jay, and Hamilton.

Additionally I would include Men in Black by Mark Levin…it focuses on the Judiciary.

That is all I have off the top of my head…anyhow great idea.

Some St. Augustine.

Edmund Burke.

F.A. Hayek + Milton Freidman.

You’ve got to throw in some Russell Kirk and a bit from Goldwater’s classic.

Surely there is a good passage from Gibbons that could be added for color.

I confess, when I saw the title, I figured it was gonna be pistols at 20 paces, or the like. It was like, “well, what did I do THIS time?”

OK, seriously, I’m all for it. Give me today to come up with a few things — and I know you can expect to hear likewise from my compatriot Aaron Gardner, and probably plenty from the Fredhead gang as well.

One thing you can do is read the comment sections of both my Fredhead 3, and ABG’s excellent Conservatism Defined from the last couple of days. Several RedStaters get into discussions of the merits of various authors – and it should not surprise you to find that not everybody is as enamoured of Kirk and EPU and ABG are.

I’ve not really thought of it from the course/syllabus angle before.

Right this moment, off the top of my head, some reading-list thoughts, starting with the basics (and I find SHOCKING the number of people who have never sat down and read the DOI, the Constitution, and some of the other great American Revolution works:

• Thomas Jefferson (1776) – Declaration of Independence
• James Madison et al (1787) – United States Constitution
• Patrick Henry (speech, untitled) (1775) — Give me liberty of give me death
• Hamilton, Madison, Jay (1787) — The Federalist Papers
• Friedrich A. Hayek (1960) — The Constitution of Liberty
• Barry Goldwater (1960) — Conscience of a Conservative
• Ronald Reagan (1964) (speech) — RNC Convention Speech
• Russell Kirk (1997, rev of 1990) — Rights and Duties : Reflections on our Conservative Constitution
• Russell Kirk (1993, essay) — Ten Conservative Principles
• Kiron Skinner (2004) — Reagan – A Life in Letters
• Thomas Sowell (2001) — Basic Economics
• Thomas Sowell (2003) — Applied Economics

Anyway, for now….

Are you some sort of college instructor or professor or something? What is the venue we are talking about? Campus, online, what? Continuing education?

Kirk considered himself a historian of ideas. The Conservative Mind and its compendium the Conservative Reader are an awesome place to start because it touches of a variety of conservative thought from Burke, to John Adams, to Calhoun, Santayana, Balfour, etc…

I suspect not everything shold be too dry. I’d recommend David Horowitz’s Radical Son and Destructive Generation for color.

You may want to look into some anti-bolshevik writing from someone like Chambers or Dostoyevsky. I would just excpert the first couple chapters of Witness.

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Even after the let down that it’s not pistols at 20 paces…

I can help with the outline. If you are interested, shoot me an e-mail or answer this comment.

At the risk of getting booed. I would recommend “What It Means To Be A Libertarian,” by Charles Murray.

I realize that there is a difference between conservatism and libertarianism.

But American conservatism has a strong libertarian influence, which is what separates American conservatism from the stale conservatism of continential Europe.

Wealth of Nations.

I recommend:

1. “Clash of Orthodoxies” by Professor Robbie George of Princeton for the best 1 stop and insight packed book on the culture wars.

2. That the Declaration of Independence be taught simultaneously with John Locke’s explanation of the natural law, which I believe forms the philosophical underpinning to the conservative philosophy on property rights.

3. A section focusing on the federalist papers and the text from the Constitutional Convention, as penned by James Madison, which I believe would engender in students a greater appreciation for federalism (the anti-federalists), and respect for conservative judicial philosophy.

4. If you also contrast with liberal philosophies, I would show the striking parallels between Nazi rhetoric and the modern left. A sobering place to start would be a book called The Nazi Doctors (don’t recall the author off the top of my head). It is filled with anecdotes from the doctors, guards, and surviving victims from the concentration camps. Really, a whole another course could be taught on the history of liberal movements and their propensity toward violence.

Morton’s 25 Recommended Books

This link goes to Morton Blackwell’s 25 Recommended Books on the Leadership Institute website.

with some basic philosophical underpinnings for conservatism, I will second John Locke.

• Wealth & Poverty, George Gilder

• Spirit of Democratic Capitalism, Michael Novak

• Sowell: A Conflict of Visions, Knowledge & Decisions and Migrations & Cultures

• Harvest of Sorrow, Robert Conquest

As (a usually Democrat-voting) someone who would like to take such a course — why on Earth no find a way to offer it online on RedState somehow? Many of your readings would be in the public domain, after all — here’s my input:

Burke, the Federalist Papers, and Winston Churchill would probably be good points of concentration.

Counterpoints (in a single class or throughout) wherein you highlight basic conservative thoughts behind figures not generally thought of as conservative — Gandhi, MLK, Malcolm X, etc. — would be interesting and illuminating.

A foundational discussion of conservatism through comparing and contrasting Plato versus Aristotle’s thoughts on society would be interesting, but could get real abstract and academic real fast. Same with a discussion of Rome via Gibbon.

William F Buckley will be a constant source of grace note passages (and more)…

Everyone here is heavy on the recent stuff. Get some more classics. Off the top of my head:

Aristotle
Locke
Burke
Toqueville
Adam Smith
Sumner: “The Forgotten Man”

I’d add “Free to Choose” by Milton Friedman and his wife to this excellent list.

I suggest Francis Schaeffer. For related writings that are a bit more contemporary, several books by Nancy Pearcey and/or Chuck Colson are excellent.

Stay far, far away from Jim Wallis.

Personally, I’m very puzzled by conservatism in many respects. Whatever your reading list or intellectual underpinnings, I think that answering some difficult questions in light of the conservative philosophy might help to illuminate the issue:

*Taxes: I’ve never met a conservative that didn’t feel that lower taxes were better. Yet the top marginal rate has steadily decreased over the last 60 years and is currently at its lowest point since the Great Depression. The simple question is – at what point are taxes “low enough”? The bigger question is “on what basis does a conservative answer this question?”

*Family values: without presuming that the two are never (or always) mutually exclusive: which is more important? Stability and functionality of families, or maintaining a traditional family structure? If conservatism requires belief that the traditional family structure is optimal for stability and functionality, then how is “traditional” defined, what qualities of that tradition are those that maximize stability and functionality, and how is that belief supported evidentially?

*Militarism: The United States is, by orders of magnitude, the most militarily powerful nation in the world. Conservatives generally promote steadily increasing military spending, both in absolute terms and (especially) as a fraction of overall government spending. According to the principles of conservatism, when should military spending stop increasing?

*Life: How does conservatism define life, such that an undifferentiated human embryo and someone in a persistent vegetative state both meet the criteria – and how are those criteria morally relevant? That is to say, what properties of “life” apply to both of these two states and compel society to protect it from destruction over and against other important values by force of law?

Yes, these are contentious questions. I don’t argue that. But intellectually consistent answers to them would go a long way toward explaining the underlying thinking behind conservatism – I think to a geater degree than any reading list (whose answers may or may not pertain to modern conservatism) that anyone could propose.

One huge different between today’s political landscape and that of a generation or two ago is that the Left has a comprehensive and well-thought-out world view that carefully backs up their positions and convinces them that they are absolutely 100% correct and that conservatives are just backwoods uninformed bigots.

Evolution is a massive underpinning to much of this, and few on the Left have taken the time to examine the best arguments against Evolution. They assume it to be fact. They also have been presented the most goofy and laughable “strawman” arguments favoring Creationism. They mistakenly believe that Creationism is only backed up by religion and are shockingly mis-informed about the best arguments and science for Creationism (or Intelligent Design) and against Evolution.

How does this effect politics? For starters, here are some things that have tremendous underpinnings in Evolution and a world view that is devoid of a Christanity or belief in an actual conscious supreme being:

extreme environmentalism – They believe that man is not a steward of the earth, man is the scourge of the earth… we are better of not being here and “hands off” is the best policy. In their mind, Earth was doing just find until we started populating it. This would partially explain their bizarre opposition to nuclear energy. And, of course, we see now what “hands off” is doing in California’s forest management!

(IRONICALLY – I wonder how much CO2 those fires are emitting? I wonder how many animals, and endangered animals, have lost their lives and/or habitats in those fires?)

extreme animal rights – In their minds, animals and humans are both evolved animals on a spectrum. So how dare we elevate the needs or human rights of humans over animals?

value of human life – In an official state-sanctioned biography of Joseph Stalin, it stated that his philosophy was heavily influenced when he was told about Darwin’s findings. Now that “God” was dead (in Stalin’s mind), it later became much easier to murder millions of people. After all, if there is no Creator to answer to for one’s actions in the afterlife, then what does a dictator have to fear?

Likewise, PZ Myers, one of the most prolific pro-evolution anti-creationism bloggers on the Internet (and featured prominently in the recent “No Intelligence Allowed” movie) admitted on his blog that he favors infanticide in certain cases where the baby had an unexpected birth defect.

Did you get that? He favors legalizing the parents killing their already born baby, in certain situations.

If we are all just “lucky slime” formed out of random particles, who is to say what is right or wrong? And how can one judge another’s value system? And why can’t we just give power to the State and allow the State to socially “re-engineer”. What is the big deal about killing our already-born baby who won’t have much “quality of life” and will just be an economic burden on the parents and gov’t, right?

The reason that this wasn’t particularly critical in the past is that, 40 years ago, even Democrats mostly had a rather Christian world-view. Even those who accepted Evolution as fact took a “God must have used Evolution as a tool in creation” point of view, inconsistent as that may be.

Back then, there were simply too many barriers to accepting the logical conclusions of Evolution which are now becoming widely accepted.

But that isn’t the case for high school and college students today. They are well indoctrinated in deep Leftist world-views… and their brainwashing about Evolution is a key foundation to this.

FINALLY: Probably THE BEST pro-creationism anti-evolution book that is extremely short and easy to read is “The Case Against Darwin”. It is very short and powerful, and sticks to arguments for which there is a consensus amongst leading young-earth and old-earth creationists. It mainly sticks to just the pure science. Unfortunatly, it avoids a few of the best arguments which are difficult to explain quickly–for the sake of brevity–so that is understandable.

The author has some good information here

I think the outline should touch on the main fundamentals of conservatism, with excerpts from the reading list to bolster and fill out these fundamentals.

Maybe we could begin by fleshing out conservatism, then contrasting it with the basic tenets of competing philosophies. The reading list would be for students who wish to more fully explore certain aspects of conservatism more fully – say, the economic fundamentals, or the role and importance of God in conservatism, etc.

I just think when we do this, confidently and articulately, we change hearts and minds.

by Paul Johnson (conservative historian). I stumbled on the original edition in a used bookstore and I have been enthralled. Will be a definite Christmas wish to get the revised ed.

I’d be really curious whether others liked it and whether this book or sections thereof could provide useful perspective for the class.

Practically speaking, history teaches cause and effect.

A truly conservative concept, n’est pas?

Conversely, what is liberalism but the absence of consequences for actions taken?

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Activists Taking Action: Unified Patriots

Science and technology used to be separate from political ideology.

These days the fields of engineering, science, medicine, psychology, and technology has been claimed by liberalism. I think there is a way to bring these fields into the discussion from an ethical standpoint. The ethical implications of a conservative approach versus the liberal approach

I have to give some thought to this correlation; however, since liberalism has been injected into these fields it is equally logical to assume that conservative principles can be applied.

This is the 2nd diary today I’ve bookmarked to read the thread later.

I’ve been wanting to read some WF Buckley for a while. Somehow I’ve never read any conservative theorists. I’ll be tuning in to see what people believe are the best of the best of WFB. I trust no other source better, needless to say.

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Activists Taking Action: Unified Patriots

There are a bunch of conservative reading lists posted on the web from National Review to the Federalist Society and others. Some suggestions:

James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay – The Federalist Papers

The Declaration of Independence

The Constitution and Amendments

Alexis de Tocqueville – Democracy in America

Edmund Burke – Reflections on the Revolution in France

Russell Kirk – The Conservative Mind

Friedrich A. Hayek – The Road to Serfdom

Whittaker Chambers – Witness

Ayn Rand – Atlas Shrugged

Milton Friedman – Capitalism and Freedom

William F. Buckley – God And Man At Yale

Barry Goldwater – Conscience of a Conservative

Ronald Reagan, Martin Anderson, Annelise Anderson, and Kiron Skiner – Reagan, In His Own Hand: The Writings of Ronald Reagan That Reveal His Revolutionary Vision for America

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn – The Gulag Archipelago

Walid Phares – Future Jihad

George Orwell – 1984

Aldous Huxley – Brave New World

The City Journal quarterly published by The Manhattan Institute

Daily review of articles published on HumanEvents.com

Are you attempting to give a basic primer on modern, mainstream American conservatism or something more like the philosophical basis of American conservatism? Or even a history of American conservatism?

Although some fantastic suggestions have been made by the many commenters above me, I think that you need to answer the question of focus first before you jump to reading lists. Additionally, I think it important to remember that American conservatism is not monolithic. Each wing of conservatism is going to have its own peculiar brand of political philosophy drawn from widely diverse sources.

If you are going for a general primer on modern American conservatism, I have nothing to add to the suggestions already given above. If you want a history of conservatism, again nothing to add. Russell Kirk is the man. If you want the philosophical underpinings of American conservatism, I might have some suggestions. Let me know where you are going with this.

Is what I think you should title your course, and the focus should be on the extent to which Conservatism can be identified as a unified philosophy and the extent to which the category itself is a figment of our imaginations.

This is an unbelievably illuminating exercise.

The list of books proposed is remarkably similar to any list that a group of moderate Democrats would have compiled, with the exception I would say of perhaps a few books – like Buckley and Kirk.

Is there really such thing as Conservatism – or Liberalism for that matter? I tend to think both are far too nebulous to deserve either the capitalization or the ‘ism’ suffix, and the reading suggestions and range of comments demonstrate that notion to me with breathtaking clarity.

nt

… recommend would be:

The Heritage Guide to The Constitution, editorial Board Chaired by Edwin Meese III. – It is a book in which 100 Legal Scholars provide an examination of the Constitution line by line. They stress the original intent of the Framers, including the notes at the Constitutional Convention by James Madison, The Federalist Papers, and Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story’s 1833 book “Commentaries on The Constitution of The United States”.

The other book I strongly recommend is:

American Conservatism -An Encyclopedia. It is edited by Bruce Frohnen, Jeremy Beer, and Jeffrey Nelson. It contains essays from over 200 leading Conservative Scholars who cover individual schools of thought in the Conservative movement since World War II, so as to include the intellectual underpinnings of those philosophies.

If your going to teach a class in it, I would definitely consider these books. These two books get to the heart of Conservatism without assigning 30 seperate books. It is all condensed down here.

The Viking Portable Library put out a nice anthology edited by Russell Kirk called The Portable Conservative Reader that I’d recommend for a brief overview. It will hit most of the important names. I second the earlier recommendation of God and Man at Yale as Buckley generally shares with Goldwater credit for founding the modern conservative movement. For Reagan, if you can find a copy of it I like In His Own Hand, which is mostly a compilation of the note cards he used to make his 5 minutes speeches well before he became president. It is both a slightly different take on how to present material, and instructive about how he had well developed thoughts about what he our country ought to do long before he was elected, and his policies and speeches after his election followed from them. But that may be because I still mostly recall the left always deriding him as an amicable dunce or the actor reading the lines he was handed by his handlers. Now that he is dead and they all agree he was brilliant and the patron saint of our pre-August economic collapse, maybe that isn’t as important any more.

Baltimore’s greatest sarcast deserves a spot.

Nothing feeds the conservative soul quite like mocking the state and its apologists.

Jack, I’ve found in reading C.S. Lewis’ non-fiction that many of his arguments in the realm of civics and society smell very much like fundamental conservatism. I especially recommend a speech called “Why I am Not a Pacifist” currently published in “The Weight of Glory, and Other Sermons.” You may find some of Lewis’ insight adds some spice to the writings of the heavy hitters and fathers of conservatism recommended by others.

For the request: once you refine your reading list and syllabus, will you post it in another diary so I (and others, I’m sure) can further benefit from your labors?

I am not a teacher, but few times I did teach about a certain topic, some of students were overwhelmed by so much details I’ve tried to cram down their throats.

Don’t do it my way, that was a mistake I’ve come to regret.

If you want to teach about conservatism. You’ll have to start out with its basic tenets, so that mean you don’t use dense language or textbooks that look like Mount Everest to climb over.

Keep in your mind, we’re talking about modern society, nobody wants to know about Edmund Burke, Locke, Tocqueville, etc. You should use historical figures who relate to today’s modern, hot issues. Since economy is today’s top issue, use Hamilton versus Jefferson as the starting point.

I’ve found it quite simple to use the following format to start off teaching on anything:

1. Expound on the subject
2. Illustrate an example
3. Application to our daily lives

Use visual aids, so that will help you to move along on different points and may help your students to understand more clearly.

I think students will enjoy your teaching if they know how it applies to their lives. Otherwise, telling the history of conservatism does no one any good, because one wants to relate history to their lives. Make Conservatism an interesting subject!

On a final note, it is my strong suggestion that yoou start off with modern conservatives who are well known in media. That way, you can use it as a foundation to build upon, by tracing its lineage back to famous historical figures, and try to stick with America only. Conservatism by its nature is probably a difficult subject to teach.

I think that’s all I can type at this point. Go out and have fun teaching your students!

You were hoping to get a bundle of ideas to work with, a little input, some ideas on reading and study material. I’d say you got a whole feast of things to work with.

So if I might, a word of advice. Unless you are both unemployed and a Mario Andretti-style speed-reader, you can’t possibly read even 1/10th of the suggested materials in any kind of time frame that is practical for getting started.

For the moment I would focus on those things suggested that are compact and give a mix of different viewpoints. I would toss in at least ONE practical-application book. So for the moment, a little wider than deep. I’m a known Russell Kirk flack so take this with a grain of salt of course.

For a quick crash-course in modern American conservatism to get you ready to teach, I say:

• Russell Kirk — Portable Conservative Reader. As suggested by somebody above, he generously cites from the big names. It’s huge (700p) but has chapters from Burke, Hamilton, Adams, Toqueville, etc. You can skip around, read what suits you.
• Russell Kirk – Rights and Duties. Just trust EPU on this. Why and how conservatism, a deeper study that is easy to follow.
• Russell Kirk – 10 Conservative Principles ()see Aaron Gardner’s outline a couple of days ago (just an essay, but a NICE outline, easy to teach, in my opinion)
• the actual Constitution and Declaration
• Milton Friedman – Free to Choose

Consume these, I think you have your foundation and plenty of teaching material. Many, many others are great as well, it is very tough settling on just a few.

Who was the big fusion conservative from the 1960’s? He would be good to include.

I’ve thought about doing the same thing, and I guess I would use less of the recent American books and more of the classics. But that may just be a personal predilection; I use older stuff in the rest of my Poli Sci classes, too.

Unlike Addison, I like excerpting things because I don’t pretend that the excerpt is representative of the whole work. I can paint an broad picture of the book’s argument and its context in lecture much faster than the students could read it. Once I’ve done that for the students, then we dive into a small piece of it to discuss in greater detail. Moreover, I’m more concerned that the students confront important ideas than I am that they know “Burke said X” and “Locke said Y.” It works for me, at least. I also find that my students do respond to “old dead guys” as long as I show how it is relevant, but YMMV.

Burke is a tough slog for students (I’ve used it in class before), but as other commenters have said, there’s lots of good stuff there. Maybe just excerpt the “little platoons” part. Same with Tocqueville, but excerpting the “immense tutulary power” part. Or maybe the social capital part.

I don’t see Locke or Smith as conservative–I peg them as liberal (the original liberal, not the current sense of “progressive”).

I’d add parts of Machiavelli’s Discourses, particularly his discussions of virtue and civil-military issues.

Going back even farther, there’s a part of Thucydides where he talks about how the government of the middle (the men who own a reasonable amount of land, not the rich elite or the poor masses) is the best government–but that might require a long explanation of Greek politics that you don’t have time for in 8 weeks.

Cato was the original social conservative. You might find a speech of his (against the Catallines??) that talks about the decay of Roman morals. You might also pair this with a selection from Alan Bloom (where he talks about the 1960s in Closing of the American Mind).

My students are always pleasantly surprised when we look at the politics/religion connection through Bolt’s “Man for All Seasons.” You could also show the movie (since it is taken straight from the play).

This may sound odd, but I would use some Vaclav Havel (former Czech dissident and president). Maybe selections from his Summer Meditations. He offers an eloquent argument that respect for individual choice and individual diversity is compassionate, not amoral. He also connects faith and politics in a non-denominational way that can appeal to non-Christians.

To me, at least, the development of British Common Law offers a useful example of how conservatives see change and reform, so you might use Harold Berman’s work on the subject.

On the subject of law, Scalia had a book review in the magazine First Things about the origin of law that might be fun reading for students. It was short, intelligent, and provocative. I forget the exact cite, though.

On the subject of war, I use Thatcher’s Speech to the Bournemouth Party conference (I think that was the name) justifying the Falklands War.

Finally, Koestler’s Darkness at Noon is fascinating look at what happens when you reject conservatism entirely. Seductive and horrific at the same time.

I’d be curious to see what you end up using and hear how it went.

I would like to also offer Magna Carta, The essay “I, Pencil” by Leonard E. Read, the Virtue of Selfishness by Ayn Rand .

Reinforcing previous listings: John Locke’s Two Treaties on Government, Our founding documents plus The Federalist, The Law by Bastiat And the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith.

Don’t forget the 10 Commandments and additional writings in both the Old and New testament as much of what we “used to be” flowed to us from our Judeo-Christian traditions. Especially as it relates to the “Circle of Trust” as it relates to our national motto “In God We Trust”. I blogged a little more here: http://www.harangue.org/2008/11/circle-of-trust.html

Lastly, don’t forget about the evils of the alternative – vis-à-vis Marxist/Socialist/Communist ideology – which are not limited to the loss of personal freedom, abolishing personal property, or the loss of religious freedom. As a Q.E.D. I usually enumerate the “big ten” items that Marx listed were necessary to create a socialist state -

“ These measures will, of course, be different in different countries.
Nevertheless, in most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable.
1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labor in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, etc.”

I would submit that conservatism is grounded in the dignity, and consequent liberty and responsibility, of the individual. From that perspective, I think the following could be helpful:

Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI

Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle

1984, George Orwell

The Theme is Freedom, M. Stanton Evans.

These have been some of the most enlightening comments in one place I have ever read. This thread is on my Favorites list, and I refer back to it often.

Here is what I am going to do. Read. Read. And read some more. I am starting with the following:

• The Conservative Mind / Russell Kirk
• The Road To Serfdom / F.A. Hayek
• Capitalism and Freedom / Milton Friedman
• The Conscience of a Conservative / Goldwater

I will be doing a second round of reading around the second week of December.

Kirk’s “Ten Conservative Principles” got read last night.

SI Conservative put it very well above when he said “I would submit that conservatism is grounded in the dignity, and consequent liberty and responsibility, of the individual.”

This is going to be an easy sell, folks. I can’t wait to start.

Next up: The outline of the class, and suggestions on how these books apply to each section.

I recommend these two, as well:

Basic American Government by Clarence B. Carson, published by American Textbook Committee, Route 1, Box 13, Wadley, Alabama 36276 (1993). I seem to recall I bought this book through the Conservative Book Club.

Your American Yardstick: Twelve Basic American Principles by Hamilton Abert Long, published by Your Heritage Books, Inc., Lafayette Building, Indpendence Mall, Philadelphia, PA (1963). I bought this book at a second-hand book store in Sierra Vista, AZ way back in 1978. I don’t know if the publishing company still exists.

Thanks,
Dan