Freedom, Responsibility, and the Liberal Arts

By |2020-06-11T12:46:33-05:00June 11th, 2020|Categories: Liberal Arts, Liberal Learning, Liberalism, Liberty, Politics, St. John's College|

Pericles was proud of Athenian freedom and insisted it was worth dying for. Our ancestors shared that pride and that insistence. But they and he were proud, not of the absence of discipline or authority, but of the fact that in a society of free citizens discipline and authority are self-imposed. The other day an [...]

Religious Liberty in an Age of Pandemic

By |2020-05-16T20:17:34-05:00May 16th, 2020|Categories: American Republic, Constitution, First Amendment, Freedom, Liberty, Politics, Religion|

Is our nation witnessing a soft form of religious persecution beneath the cloak of public health? I pray and hope that this is not the case and that governments, preventing the free exercise of religion, will reverse course and allow church leaders to reopen their doors to once again proceed with the most essential task [...]

Freedom from Reality: The Diabolical Character of Modern Liberty

By |2020-04-13T12:30:57-05:00April 12th, 2020|Categories: Books, Christianity, Imagination, Liberty, Philosophy, Religion, Theology|

As our physical and political freedoms are increasingly curtailed by Leviathan due to the Coronavirus pandemic, we are hopefully becoming more aware of the value of what we are losing. Hopefully, it will be the occasion for a more urgent and honest reflection on the true meaning of freedom. Freedom from Reality: The Diabolical Character [...]

Liberty and Democracy in Western Civilization

By |2020-09-23T23:53:33-05:00April 8th, 2020|Categories: Audio/Video, Christianity, Conservatism, Liberty, Roger Scruton, Timeless Essays, Western Civilization|

The late, great conservative philosopher, Sir Roger Scruton, delivers the keynote address at the Institute of Public Affairs' 2014 Foundations of Western Civilization Symposium. He discusses the topics of freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the pursuit of truth. —Editor This essay was first published here in August 2014. The Imaginative Conservative applies the principle of [...]

American Liberty Reconsidered

By |2020-06-26T15:43:29-05:00July 3rd, 2019|Categories: American Founding, American Republic, Constitution, Declaration of Independence, Independence Day, Lee Cheek, Liberty, Senior Contributors|

The continued success of our nation is dependent upon a recovery of our appreciation of liberty, a return to the original division of government power as prescribed by the Constitution, and a renewal of personal responsibility for perpetuating the regime. As we celebrate American Independence, it is appropriate to reflect upon the foundations of our [...]

Liberal Education: The Foundation and Preservation of a Free Society

By |2019-02-28T15:50:32-06:00February 27th, 2019|Categories: Classical Education, Freedom, Liberal Arts, Liberal Learning, Liberty, Tradition, Western Tradition, Wisdom|

In a time of economic uncertainty, liberal education holds out the promise of joy in learning, contentment in contemplating truth, and satisfaction in community. These things are available to all people, rich or poor. Liberal education and the free society have always been intimately connected. A liberal education, an education which prepares one for freedom, [...]

Everything You Ever Feared to Know About American Security Policy

By |2019-08-07T00:17:47-05:00October 7th, 2018|Categories: Joseph Mussomeli, Liberty, National Security, Senior Contributors, Terrorism|

Two questions should always be asked over and over again before security measures are implemented: At what point do security measures impede security? And at one point is a free people no longer free? It has been quiet recently here in the homeland. Terrorist bombs and other attacks continue unabated in the Middle East and sporadically in Europe, but it has [...]

Truth as a Democratic Project

By |2019-04-25T13:09:50-05:00September 18th, 2018|Categories: Democracy, Fr. James Schall, Freedom, Government, Liberty, Philosophy, Reason, Relativism, Truth|

To save democracy from subjectivism, truth must become a democratic project. The greatest of crimes can be enacted in the name of sincerity, authenticity, and “being at peace with oneself.” Each of these criteria looks to one’s own estimate of oneself… During the Presidential Campaign of 1996, in California, President Bill Clinton said that democracy [...]

The Cornerstone of Conservatism

By |2019-05-07T14:40:38-05:00August 19th, 2018|Categories: American Republic, Christianity, Conservatism, Constitution, Government, Liberalism, Liberty, Politics|

Conservatism is a formal understanding of man. By understanding, I mean a verifiable truth, and by formal, I refer to a distinguishable methodology which permeated the celebrated thoughts of classical antiquity and scholastic medievalism. Conversely, Liberalism is an ideology for man. This is not to say that Conservatism is without its own prescriptions, but only [...]

Constitutional Drift & the Challenge of Self-Governance

By |2018-07-29T23:08:08-05:00July 29th, 2018|Categories: Conservatism, Constitution, Federalist, Government, Liberty, Politics, Timeless Essays|

Self-governance requires that those in positions of authority emphasize the importance of treating the Constitution as a "living document," in that phrase’s best sense—not as a surrender to expediency, but as a recognition that no nation can govern itself that fails to meet the responsibility of perpetually renewing the Constitution by living its constitution... Today’s [...]

The Faces of Freedom

By |2019-09-19T13:49:25-05:00July 24th, 2018|Categories: Books, Conservatism, Freedom, Liberty|

The suspicion that Frank S. Meyer’s “autonomous” individuals are not only abstractions but meaningless abstractions grows when we consider his conception of freedom… In Defense of Freedom: A Conservative Credo by Frank S. Meyer (179 pages, Regnery, 1962) In this book, Frank Meyer proposes to give us “a conservative criterion for a good society, a good [...]

Why Not Wife-Swapping?

By |2018-02-25T21:17:28-06:00February 25th, 2018|Categories: Culture, Homosexual Unions, Justice, Liberty, Marriage, Thomas R. Ascik|

In December, the Supreme Court decided not to hear a case that proposed to extend the Court’s sexual freedom cases to wife-swapping. In Coker v. Whittington, two sheriff’s deputies in Bossier Parish, Louisiana, and their wives agreed to swap spouses, and each deputy began living with the opposite deputy’s wife. Invoking his office’s code of [...]

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