Regular attendees of the John Locke Foundation?s Shaftesbury Society meetings might remember Steven Hayward?s October 2009 presentation on the second volume of his Age of Reagan political history.
The two-volume set helps correct the historical record of Reagan?s impact, as does Hayward?s latest article for National Review. In that new magazine piece, Hayward is particularly interested in pointing out how Reagan?s views differed from those of today?s liberals:
[H]e explained his use of [quotations from Thomas] Paine in conservative terms way back in his 1965 autobiography, Where?s The Rest Of Me? ?The classical liberal,? Reagan wrote, ?used to be the man who believed the individual was, and should be forever, the master of his destiny. That is now the conservative position. The liberal used to believe in freedom under law. He now takes the ancient feudal position that power is everything. He believes in a stronger and stronger central government, in the philosophy that control is better than freedom. The conservative now quotes Thomas Paine, a longtime refuge of the liberals: ?Government is a necessary evil; let us have as little of it as possible.??
Reagan?s mixture of the revolutionary or progressive Paine with the Jeffersonian limited-government Paine is a potent formula in American politics that liberals have abandoned. Regardless of the tensions in Reagan?s version, it exposed liberalism as a pessimistic and increasingly reactionary faction.
Hayward also discussed his research into Reagan?s record during an interview with Carolina Journal Radio.
