A Way Out of the Conservative Malaise

With Bill Clinton’s concession that “the era of big government is over,” American conservatives won a stunning ideological victory. Yet, even as conservative ideas are in the ascendancy, the parties and politicians that represent them are in serious trouble. In the United States, Britain and France, right-leaning candidates have been routed in the most recent elections by more moderate centrists.

The mood at the recent International Conservative Congress in Washington, D.C., was accordingly pessimistic. Sponsored by various right-wing think tanks and magazines, the conference explored the question: Why are conservatives failing politically everywhere, and what can be done to revive the successes of the Reagan era?

William Kristol and David Brooks, both of The Weekly Standard, recently urged conservatives to abandon their anti-government rhetoric and support more ambitious federal initiatives that could give Americans a renewed sense of “national greatness.” In a different vein, William J. Bennett and John J. Dilulio, in Commentary magazine, called for a downsizing of the federal government, delegation of many of its functions to state and local governments, and a revitalized private sphere of businesses, churches and philanthropies to assume the task of a “new reconstruction” of civil society.

If conservatives seek to duplicate Ronald Reagan’s success, they might ask: How might Reagan come down on this question?

Reagan’s agenda was focused on three themes: limiting the size of government, anti-communism and traditional values. Each seems to have given rise to a distinctive faction on the right. There are balance-the-budget conservatives, national-greatness conservatives and cultural conservatives. All invoke the name of Reagan, but their efforts to replicate his successes are not likely to succeed, because none seems to understand fully what the former president was all about.

The budget balancers envisioned themselves completing the Reagan revolution. But they miscalculated by targeting popular entitlement programs. In the 1980 campaign, Reagan pledged to reduce “waste, fraud and abuse” in federal programs but he did not propose to eliminate a single one. Government spending grew at about the same pace under Reagan as under his predecessor. Reagan’s substantive emphasis was always on lowering taxes to accelerate economic growth, thereby limiting the size of government relative to the size of the economy.

The national-greatness conservatives, as represented by Kristol and Brooks, make their peace with big government. They ask: “How can Americans love their nation if they hate its government?” While approving of measures such as welfare reform, Kristol and Brooks advance a vision of a lean but robust federal government that would not shrink from taking on grand new projects that would vindicate “the greatness of the American experiment.”

These conservatives are responding, in large part, to the absence today of the kind of unifying patriotic vision that Reagan articulated so well in the 1980s. Yet, Reagan’s call to arms was based upon the existence of the genuine threat posed by Soviet missiles.

What is striking about Kristol and Brooks’s vision is its lack of content. For months, The Weekly Standard, which Kristol edits, has been striving to rally conservatives to oppose the government of China with the same vehemence with which they resisted the Soviet Union. The Chinese rulers, like the tyrants of the old Politburo, do not hesitate to persecute dissidents to maintain their hold on power, yet the Chinese have embraced Western-style capitalism, liberalization seems to be proceeding rapidly, and the country poses no obvious threat to Americans or U.S. interests.

Other proposals for national greatness at least have the benefit of harmless triviality. Political scientist Eliot A. Cohen calls for a new project to “acquire, protect and maintain Civil War battlefields.” Brooks has suggested that America again could become great by building national buildings and monuments. Sad to say, one recent construction is the Ronald Reagan Federal Building, a monstrosity that houses several government agencies whose existence Reagan opposed throughout his political career.

Perhaps the most interesting response to the plight of modern conservatism comes from the cultural reformers. This camp, led by Robert H. Bork, contends that the most serious problem facing the country is not political but moral. In Bork’s view, the American people have been corrupted by liberal permissiveness.

Many cultural conservatives caution against looking to government for answers. If the American people are the problem, changing their minds and behavior is the only solution. What is needed, argues historian Gertrude Himmelfarb, is a “re-moralization” of America. Bennett and others promote cultural renewal through public sermonizing and support for local initiatives like church programs to teach parental responsibility.

Reagan believed in cultural reform but he would not have endorsed the right’s effort to achieve it by abjuring the use of state power. Rep. Steve Largent recently remarked that his most important public involvement is his church. That’s good news for Largent on Judgment Day, but is this why he was elected to serve in Congress? Reagan understood that the best way to change the culture is to change law and public policy.

Reagan believed that the conflict between economic and social conservatives could best be settled by what he termed his “new federalism.” He favored letting the moral issues be resolved by communities governing themselves at the local level. If the people of Tupelo, Miss., want to outlaw various rap lyrics and keep Hustler out of the school library, let them. And if you happen to live in Tupelo and don’t like the new restrictions, move.

At the same time, Reagan would have been appalled at the schoolmarm tone in which pundits of the right lecture the American people. Reagan saw the depth of human frailty but appealed to the better angels of our nature. He spoke of achievement rather than indolence, triumph instead for failure, goodness instead of depravity. This was partly for moral reasons: He was a theological optimist who believed in salvation. But he was also a pragmatist. He knew that most people respond better to encouragement than to harsh criticism.

The single most important reason for the failure of the Republicans and the conservatives is that both groups have lost their faith in the American people. In the 1980s, Reagan converted the right, traditionally the party of pessimism, into an optimistic movement. So perhaps it is not surprising that once Reagan left, the GOP and the conservatives have reverted to their old familiar ways. If the Republicans fail to learn Reagan’s lesson, they will soon lose their congressional majority and once again become a minority party and a marginal political movement.

There is no point pining for another Reagan. The truth is, the right doesn’t need another Reagan. Building on his themes of low tax rates, equal rights under the law and expanded opportunity, a Reaganite agenda for today’s conservatives would emphasize a flat tax, a colorblind public policy and school vouchers. The GOP and conservatives can win again by integrating these concepts into a clear moral and political vision, then taking action to realize it, and appealing to the good sense and decency of the American people.*