Do we need a New Right?

When William F. Buckley Jr. wrote Up From Liberalism in 1959, there wasn’t much of a conservative alternative. A few years prior, professor Lionel Trilling had observed liberalism was not merely dominant but exclusive, joking that conservatives were limited to occasional “irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas.” Then along came Buckley and National Review, then Ronald Reagan, the Heritage Foundation, the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board, Newt Gingrich, and George W. Bush.

Yet a school of scholars calling ­themselves “the New Right” is ready to move on from that legacy, such that the title of their new book Up From Conservatism: Revitalizing the Right After a Generation of Decay (Encounter 2023) is not an homage but a dig. Led by editor Arthur Milikh and generally affiliated with the Claremont Institute, the authors of these 20 essays believe something is very wrong with America and with the institutional conservative movement that hasn’t stopped the nation from crumbling into such disrepair.

Their diagnosis is brutal: “The Left currently rules every consequential ­sector of society, from the nation’s educational institutions (K-12 and higher education), to large parts of the media, corporate America, Big Tech, and the federal administrative apparatus. … The Left now seems even to own the top military brass.” That is dire but rings true. The courts and the Church are two unmentioned exceptions.

Since the Berlin Wall fell, the essayists charge, “the establishment Right has registered no clear gains and many clear losses.” This ignores several successes: welfare reform, school choice, and “broken windows” policing to begin the list. America has made it 20-­plus years since 9/11 without a terrorist attack on the homeland. The Supreme Court has hit several home runs on the Second Amendment and religious liberty, even as we turn to the latter for sanctuary from a hostile culture. Things are bad, but not all bad.

Milikh blames the loss of American culture on the right’s single-minded focus on economics, “relegat[ing] moral and political questions to the status of ‘social issues’ and treat[ing] them as largely insignificant, and even embarrassing, second-order concerns, of relevance only when useful to galvanize the vote.” Again, this ignores the impeachment of Bill Clinton, “compassionate conservatism,” the partial-birth abortion ban, the state constitutional amendments to defend traditional marriage—Republicans did more than just cut taxes, ultimately winning on reversing Roe but losing on defining marriage.

The “old” and “new” right agree on 90 percent of issues. The latter is less enthusiastic for military entanglements abroad and more enthusiastic for government entanglement in markets at home (especially vis-à-vis Big Tech), but they still share the same vision: strong families, vibrant communities, peace through strength, patriotism, broad-based prosperity, and revitalized state and local governments. The difference is assessment and attitude—the Claremont crew believes the left will do whatever it takes to win, and conservatives will keep losing if we aren’t willing to fight fire with fire.

In answering that question, everyone on the right should keep front-and-center Chesterton’s admonition, “The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.” Love of America, not hatred of the left, is our North Star.

This book is the beginning, not the end, of a conversation within conservatism: What is an agenda that advances our principles and can win the consistent support of the American people? And what are the right tone and tactics by which to advance that agenda? Those questions are important, but never forget: Winning ideas must be championed by the right messenger.