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Entries by Brad Birzer

Sunday, July 4, 2010

A (very late) review of Skoble's DELETING THE STATE

“Centralized, coercive political authority--the State--is not necessary.”

So writes Aeon Skoble, a philosopher possessed of an all-too-rare combination of rigorous logic, empathy, and imagination. This opening line ably and honestly captures the essence of his 2008 book, Deleting the State.

Something in me--at some level--says that Skoble’s desire for political anarchism must be wrong. But, admittedly, I have a hard time finding what it is, no matter how hard I try after reading Deleting the State. Not only can Skoble write very well (and, for an academic, very clearly), but he writes in such an earnest and intellectual manner, that it’s hard to disagree with him.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

And, R.J. Pestritto's talk this weekend. . .

http://www.tvworldwide.com/events/hillsdale/100130/default.cfm?action=2

Posted on Wednesday, February 3, 2010 at 2:29 PM | Comments (0) | Top

Our own brilliant Paul Moreno

HNN/L&P's own Paul Moreno on Lincoln and the Constitution:
http://www.tvworldwide.com/events/hillsdale/100130/session3.html

Enjoy.

Posted on Wednesday, February 3, 2010 at 8:43 AM | Comments (2) | Top

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Habits of Empire

Our territorial expansion “instilled in the American people the habit of empire-building. . . . All along, the United States was also a republic. ‘Republic’ and ‘empire’ have not always fit well together. Today there is a good chance that ‘empire’ might eclipse ‘republic.’ Old habits can become unthinking practices. . . . Thus we have always been an imperial nation, and remain so, but the shape of the American empire has shifted over time. Its present form is different from either our own past ones or historic ones like Rome or Britain. It is still developing. . . . The three historic American empires have all rested on an ideology of expansion. Military solution, overlain by rationales and high ideals, have consistently been considered effective and justified.”--Walter Nugent, Habits of Empire (2008)xiv-xvii.

Posted on Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 11:07 PM | Comments (1) | Top

Friday, January 15, 2010

Any good American history text books out there?

What are the good American history textbooks out there? The one we use by George Tindall and David Shi declines in quality (but not quantity!) with every new edition. Here’s a telling example. The text, America: A Narrative History (brief 7th ed.), gives the impression that Maryland was somehow a semi-tolerant Catholic colony. This is demonstrably untrue after 1689. Beginning with the so-called “Coup of 1689” and the full repeal of the Toleration Act of 1649, Maryland instituted the strongest and most effective anti-Catholic laws in the North American colonies. A practicing Catholic:
• Couldn’t vote
• Couldn’t hold office
• Couldn’t bear witness/testify in a court of law
• Couldn’t practice law
• Had to practice his religion, ultimately, in a private chapel
• Had his land double (and sometimes more) taxed; additionally, his land was always liable to confiscation during times of war, especially if against Catholics
• Often could not raise a child in the “Catholic fashion” without having the child forcibly removed from the Catholic parent(s) and shipped to England to live with a Protestant family.

The end of such laws also reveal the power of the American Revolution, for the extra legal associations of 1774 swept aside these laws, even as the First Continental Congress condemned the Quebec Act on October 21, 1774, viewing the act as a “power, to reduce the ancient, free Protestant colonies to . . . slavery. . . Nor can we suppress our astonishment that a British parliament should ever consent to establish in that country a religion that has deluged your island with blood, and dispersed impiety, bigotry, persecution, murder and rebellion through every part of the world.”

What a world.

Posted on Friday, January 15, 2010 at 8:27 AM | Comments (1) | Top

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Moreno on the Democratic Party

http://detnews.com/article/20091211/OPINION01/912110331/Democrats-return-to-job-killing-tradition

Brilliant article.

Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 at 8:27 AM | Comments (4) | Top

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Gamble's "The Stories We Tell. . ."

A beautiful and thoughtful piece.

http://www.frontporchrepublic.com/?p=6848

Posted on Thursday, October 29, 2009 at 3:10 PM | Comments (0) | Top

Friday, October 23, 2009

Ted Cruz

I had the chance to meet Ted Cruz, Republican candidate for the Attorney General of Texas, this past Wednesday morning. Cruz was M.C.ing the annual breakfast of Winston Elliott’s FREE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE. I’m not one to be impressed by many politicians, but I was thoroughly impressed with Cruz. Articulate, smart, principled, and a believer in liberty. Happy to know there are guys like him out there. Gives me great hope for the future. And, I assume that he’ll move into national politics as well at some point.

If you’re interested, here’s an article about Cruz:
http://www.tedcruz.org/pdf/cruz_profile.pdf

Posted on Friday, October 23, 2009 at 3:20 PM | Comments (2) | Top

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Russell Kirk on Liberalism and Hayek in the 1950s

If you're interested, HUMANITAS recently published an article I wrote on Russell Kirk's view of classical (and modern) liberalism in the 1950s. The article looks a bit at the Kirk-Hayek Mont Pelerin debate of 1957.

http://www.nhinet.org/birzer21-1.pdf

The same issue has pieces by Claes Ryn and others.

Posted on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 at 10:38 PM | Comments (2) | Top

Thursday, July 2, 2009

Larry Reed on patriotism

Larry Reed, president of FEE, always has much to say--all of it worth listening to and reading. Here is a wonderful essay (originally from 2003) on the meaning of patriotism.

http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/the-true-meaning-of-patriotism/

Posted on Thursday, July 2, 2009 at 1:56 PM | Comments (0) | Top

Sunday, March 8, 2009

Front Porch Republic

The incomparable Jeremy Beer, Patrick Deneen, Bill Kauffman, Mark Mitchell, and Mark Shiffman--as well as a variety of other thought-provoking and fascinating writers--are offering traditionalist and humane viewpoints on the world over at their brand-new website, Front Porch Republic. It's very much worth checking out.

Posted on Sunday, March 8, 2009 at 11:32 AM | Comments (1) | Top

Friday, March 6, 2009

The Legacy of Russell Kirk

The new University Bookman is out with some impressive articles on Russell Kirk by Jim Person, Lee Edwards, and Paul Gottfried. Especially good is Mark Kalthoff's excellent essay on Gregory Gillette's Isaac Newton’s Philosophy of Sacred Space and Sacred Time: An Essay on the History of an Idea.

http://www.kirkcenter.org/index.php/bookman/46-4/

Posted on Friday, March 6, 2009 at 6:48 PM | Comments (1) | Top

Thursday, February 26, 2009

T.E. Hulme (1883-1917)

I’ve come across the name and ideas of T.E. Hulme a number of times in the last decade, but I’ve only recently had time to examine his life and ideas in any detail. I had the opportunity because of a class I’m teaching on modernity and its critics this semester. Previously, I’d seen T.S. Eliot, Christopher Dawson, and Russell Kirk mention him.

As I dug around, I must admit I was rather astounded by what I found in terms of his ideas as well as by the importance conferred upon him by his generation. To my mind, history should never have forgotten him, and we would do well to remember him and what he wrote. Indeed, the German shell that took his life in the early autumn of 1917 might have changed a considerable part of the twentieth century by removing Hulme from it.