The Idealist

John Locke is credited with being the most influential English writer on those who declared independence from Britian and put forth the goal to “form a more perfect union.” His Second Treatise on Government is, perhaps, the most powerful piece describing the concepts that the people are sovereign and that government can only be done by consent and that once those who are appointed to govern stray from the mandate given by the People, that sovereign body (the majority of the People) can recall them and reassert its power to govern.

In this book Locke also gives an explanation of property that is reasoned, reasonable, and not capitalistic. In fact, Locke is considered by many to be the father of liberal economics (today’s libertarian economic viewpoint) as his ideas laid the groundwork for Adam Smith’s descriptions of a free market, of Frederic Bastiat’s utopia of free exchange of goods and services, and of Ludwig von Mises’ explanation of subjective value and the natural laws of human action and choice.

In an effort to understand conservatism, I started reading Russell Kirk’s The Conservative Mind. Kirk, via his influential book, is considered the Father of the conservative resurgence that occurred in America and Britain starting in the late 1960′s and reaching its pinnacle in the 1980′s with the Reagan administration in the U.S. and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the U.K. I was raised conservative and first became aware of politics when conservatism was at its apex, but my experiences in the world and a more nuanced study of recent (and ancient) history forced me to question some of my conservative heritage. After reading the introduction and first chapter, it is official…I have been declared a radical by the self-stated non-dogmatic conservatives.