“When it comes to politics, what are you?”

“I’m a conservative.”

“Ohh…”

Conservative, liberal, republican, democrat, progressive. I suspect most of you are like me when asked to categorize yourself politically. You simply provide your inquisitor…and let’s face it, when they ask that question, their motives are inquisitorial…with one of those shorthand descriptors.

Unfortunately, their understanding of what it means to be a conservative, or progressive, or democrat or republican, is almost certainly informed by certain assumptions and associations they have acquired from the present public discourse. In most cases, these characterizations can be quite fairly described as ranging from disingenuous distortions to malicious misrepresentations.

CONSERVE WHAT?

So what do I mean when I proclaim that I am a conservative?

Let’s begin by asking the most logical question: What is it that I am trying to conserve?

To conserve something is to protect it from harm or destruction. Depending on when and where one might be answering the question, what a conservative is trying to protect might be the Monarchy, the Soviet Union, or the Galactic Empire. I am not, however, an 18th century Englishman, a 20th century Russian politburo member, or a 25th century citizen of Tatooine. I am an American citizen in the 21st century professing to be a conservative. So, what am I trying to conserve? According to George Will, in his book The Conservative Sensibility, the correct answer to that question is simple, straightforward, and reasonable:

An American conservative desires to conserve the principles of the American founding.

AN EXCEPTIONAL IDEA

People who bristle at the idea of American exceptionalism are no doubt misapprehending the concept as some sort of jingoistic claim of national superiority. Nothing could be further from the truth. Exceptionalism in this context refers to the uniqueness of both the American founding and the revolutionary ideas upon which it was based.

Unlike any nation before it, the United States was unique in that it could pinpoint exactly when and where it came into being. To that point in history, nation states arose gradually and organically…and violently… into the entities we now recognize as individual countries. On July 4, 1776, the United States was proclaimed into being. Just as exceptional was the fact that this revolutionary proclamation was not driven by the usual catalysts, such as poverty or political oppression. The men proclaiming their independence were relatively free and prosperous Englishmen, who enjoyed more rights and material well being than most of the world at that time. This revolution was sparked by an idea, and it forever turned upside down the understanding of the relationship of man to his governing institutions.

“We have it in our power to begin the world again.”

Thomas Paine

Drawing from the political and philosophical musings of classical civilizations and Enlightenment political philosophers (particularly John Locke), and infused with a Judeo-Christian teleology, the Founders followed a line of reasoning the essence of which Jefferson poetically captured in the second line of the Declaration. To wit, Mankind, uniquely endowed by their creator with reason, can use that reason to discern certain truths (“self-evident” truths) about the nature of man. First and foremost, that man is created equally free, and as such, is endowed with certain inherent rights (natural rights), to include the right to life and the right to be free to chose his own pursuits.

All well and good. The dignity of the individual was a concept introduced by Judeo-Christian theology and expounded upon by secular philosophers before Jefferson and his pals adopted it. But the Founders took things one step further. What Jefferson proclaimed in his next sentence was the exceptional idea at the root of the American revolution:

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence (emphasis added)

Let me reiterate: To secure these a priori rights is the reason government exists. This is a complete inversion of the previous relationship of men to their political societies and it is the bedrock principle of American conservatism. We do not need to petition the government….be it a king, emperor, or parliament…to obtain these rights. They already belong to us as free men. We set up political systems in order to secure these rights from infringement by other men or society at large.

If you doubt the Founders commitment to this principle-if you think it a mere throwaway piece of poetic musing-notice that in the preamble to the document that describes the governing structure within which their revolutionary ideas were to be implemented, they reaffirm the principle:

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty, to ourselves and our posterity…”

Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America (emphasis added)

In order to understand what it is to be a conservative, you must grasp this principle first: Government does not exist to grant the blessings of liberty. It exists, with our consent as free men, solely to secure those blessings. We, by mutual consent, agree to surrender a small portion of our natural liberty for the express and limited purpose of establishing a zone of individual freedom, bounded by the rule of law, within which to pursue happiness as we see fit.

Over the past century or so, this concept of natural rights has been under attack by many in our political and intellectual classes. They believe the Founders’ doctrine of individual, natural rights, secured by a government limited to that narrow purpose, is hopelessly inadequate for the challenges of our modern world. They believe we have outgrown those founding principles and the thinking that follows from it.

As a conservative, I believe just the opposite. The Founders principle of government as the securer of rights rather than as the source of rights is one of the great political insights. It must be reasserted, not rejected, if we are to have the best kind of republic possible in this imperfect world.

Speaking of imperfect worlds, in part two I will explore another philosophical perspective crucial to the Founders’ thinking. Accepting the truth of that idea, and understanding its implications, leads one logically to certain conclusions about the form of government best suited to secure our natural rights.