Religion & Liberty Online Archives

History

July 26, 2019

Edmund Burke on true freedom

In the United States, a growing number of Americans, especially young Americans, are calling for extreme personal autonomy in the guise of “freedom,” while promoting increased government control and coercion. The left, for example, defends radical pro-abortion laws motivated by a desire for personal autonomy. Continue Reading...
July 23, 2019

How ideologues devalue and dismiss economics

Economics is often dismissed as ideological, reductionist, and mendacious. In the United States we see these criticisms increasingly from both the political left and right. This should come as no surprise as the lessons of economics have implications for the prudential decisions that make up much of our political life. Continue Reading...
July 10, 2019

Who’s an Old Whig?

“Old Whig” isn’t a political term that trips off the tongue these days. The phrase itself was coined by Edmund Burke in his August 1791 pamphlet An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs in which he sought to explain to some of his erstwhile colleagues why his rejection of the French Revolution was entirely consistent with Whig principles rather than a betrayal. Continue Reading...
June 28, 2019

What Willmoore Kendall can teach us about America

Willmoore Kendall defied the norms of many mainstream intellectual movements. Those who knew him recall a “typical strangeness” that characterized the man and his works. He was a solitary figure who has been largely forgotten in today’s conservative conversations. Continue Reading...