Sunday, April 29, 1956
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Page Threo
LIBERALS vs CONSERVATIVES
By PETER ECKSTEIN dence over the aborted expression
Daily star write of the general will.
POLITICS may be a corrupt field
-no doubt it is. But nowhere _ANOTHE nlong-standing on-
has the corruption extended furth- flit, and one leading to some
tha rutefiexndef language confusion in isolating the differ-
er than in the field of language. ences between liberalism and con-
Terms which were once meaning- sservatism, was the conflict over
ful tools of political classification
terole of the state Jefferson
have been reduced to mete jargon gave a reasonably good account of
This deterioration has been most the phase of history through which
complete and most lamentable in e had of h n hr hih
the terms Iibrt1 and conseivative he generalizing and concentrat-
With the cuirent retuin to favor ing all cares into one body
of the term conserative inow ver has destroyed the liberty and the
its proponents may choose to be righ of men in every govern-
labsr it wis adje itires like "pi- pment which has ever existed under
gressive" or "moderate we are at the sun."
least hearing msre of a defense of v,°x
bot sies.n Wee hea deiise oday, But it was not government per
both sides We(e he levirx today, se Jefferson opposed, only that
Robert Taft might not reply, as which violatedhis principle that
he did a fe years ins s a news- "care of human life and happiness
man's question. that I , guessed and not their destruction is the
every man considered himself a first and only legitinate object of
liberal and that he included him- THOMAS JEFFERSON ROBERT TAFT WILLIAM JAMES good government." It was a coy-
self i the catrory t ... Every centralization a threat .. Every man a liberal ...Every demand an obligation ernment which aided society in the
But if there is more defense of achievement of its wants which
both sides there is still little defi- the liberal-conservative muddle been liberal, many have falsely happens to be enjoying good for- Jefferson favored.
nition of either, accompanied by was made by Prof. Arthur Schles- associated the two concepts. What tune for the moment As increasingly poular control
much misuse of terms. The Pres- inger of Harvard University and is important, however, is the dire- over the state put it on the side
dent of the united States recently Author Russell Kirk in the New tion of change, not change itself. EXAMIATION of a few trends of fulfilling those wants, the liberal
attempted to describe his own Vor' Tim s msazine. In the Iibeal's Utopia it i the in the dispute between liberal- view could retain consistency only
philosophy by sayig that "In all After reecting several of the conservative who would advocate ism and conervativism might by shifting toward favoring a larg-
those things which deal with ore 'uierable definitions Prof. change, throw light on the essence of both. er role for the state.
people, we must be liberal, be mr unrbedfntos rf
human. In all those things which Schlesinger settles on describing a The so-called "radicals of the The question of control of the through the
human. I all thse thing whichCONSERVATIVESthog te
deal with the people's money or liberal as one who believes that right" certainly advocate change state has been a traditional battle- ages have attempted to impose
their economy or their form of "society can and should be im- to "improve" the status of society, field, the liberals leading the way a numr of restrain on the ex-
government, we must e conserva- proved and that the way to im- and liberals object, characterizing
tire' m tprove it is to apply the human the conservative proposls as at- in the evolution from monarchy pression of majority will and the
eem yt . n inteiect to social and economic tempts a "turning back the clock." and theocracy to democracy as we satisfaction of human wants. There
Presumably, then. conservative is prol'ms.' Schlesinger later calls The do so, however, only because know it. Conservatives threw many is often an appeal to the past, as
to be translated as "tight-fisted" the conservative-liberal dispute a of the assumption that history is ideological obstacles in their way: when Edmund Burke described the
and liberal as "generous," but the "contesr . . . between the past and on the side of the liberals, as gen- monarchy was defended as stem- state as "a partnership not only
President's statement leaves us the future," between those who erally it has been. But history ming from James I's "divine right between those who are living. but
completely in the dark on the very prefer courage and reason to those works, it is said, in terms of rear- of kings'" aristocracy was, in between those who are living, those
relevant issue of using public who favor caution and reverence. tions and cycles, and when con- Hamilton's words, the proper rule who are dead and those who are to
funds to meet public needs, servativism is on the ascendancy of the "rich and well born;" theo- be born."
dCHLESINGER'S definition, with it is the liberal who begs caution cracy drew its authority from the Thomas Paine replied in the lib-
SUCH dsaso mzye ay its emphasis on change and the and reverence. i"realed word of god." eral tradition when he wrote.
with a contempt for "semantics" ambiguous term "improvement," is After the Taft-Hartley law was Boston clergyman John Cotton "Every age and generation must
which is ussally reserved for "met- open to serious question. enacted, for example, many liberal put the theocratic case simply: be free to act for itself in all cases
aphysics," both being considered Anglo-American society has groups proposed to "turn back the "The more any law smells of man as the ages and generations which
a sure way to haggle interminably evolved from a fundamentally il- clock" to the New Deal's Wagner the more unprofitable" it is. Popu- preceded it . . . It is the living, and
over arbitrary and meaningless liberal beginning in absolute mon- Act. The clock is wedded to neither lar sovereignty was unthinkable; not the dead, that are to be accom-
distinctions. Yet impatient as we archy. Because the direction of side but is rather the hopelessly the will of God, his chosen servants modated."
may b wish the truggle for a d- mst
finitioy se ue stin e vmr wt me- ost change in that society has capricious mistress of whoever inor of the "well born" took prece- See STRUGGLE, Page I
finition, we use the terms with a
reckless frequency that demands
definition as its only restraint.
There seems to be something
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difficulty defining.
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