What “The Federalist” Really Says

By |2023-10-27T06:03:11-05:00October 26th, 2023|Categories: Abraham Lincoln, American Founding, American Republic, Equality, Featured, Federalist, Federalist Papers, James Madison, John Locke, Timeless Essays, Willmoore Kendall|

It is from careful textual analysis of “The Federalist” that the basic symbols of the American political tradition, and indeed the conservative tradition, may be found. III In his analysis of the Socrates of the Apology, Willmoore Kendall was hinting strongly at the probability that the contemporary John Stuart Mill-Karl Popper school in the United [...]

Democracy Is Beautiful: Conservatism as if the People Matter

By |2023-07-02T20:55:56-05:00July 2nd, 2023|Categories: American Republic, Community, Conservatism, Democracy, Film, Populism, Willmoore Kendall|

To rebuild their movement and society, and to rebuild a viable culture, conservatives must embrace the conservative populism championed by two men: filmmaker Frank Capra and scholar Willmoore Kendall. Pursuing this path will be challenging, for populism has become a bogeyman for the powers that be. Last December, my wife and I motored a couple [...]

A Bridge to Somewhere: Willmoore Kendall’s Teaching on Democracy

By |2023-08-04T09:29:51-05:00April 7th, 2022|Categories: American Republic, Democracy, Eric Voegelin, History, Leo Strauss, Willmoore Kendall|

Complex and perceptive, Willmoore Kendall's ideas remain relevant as the most important intellectual defense of the American people’s right to rule itself rather than to submit to the tyranny of experts. He is the man who engineered the foundation, structure, and superstructure of a bridge to democracy with his own formidable intellect and tremendous erudition. [...]

The Brilliant Enigma That Was Willmoore Kendall

By |2021-12-27T21:23:07-06:00December 26th, 2021|Categories: Books, Politics, Willmoore Kendall|

Willmoore Kendall's works on political science were pathbreaking and survive the test of time. Even today, it is impossible to understand the equal democratic legitimacy of the presidency and Congress without his “Two Majorities,” or the critical role of local-based political parties without his "American Party System," or how the whole Constitution works to solve [...]

The Americanization of Conservatism

By |2021-05-27T13:09:30-05:00October 25th, 2017|Categories: Constitution, Culture, Declaration of Independence, Featured, Federalist, History, M. E. Bradford, Russell Kirk, Willmoore Kendall|

We need to develop a fully American variant of conservatism; to advance our understand­ing of the conservative nature of the political traditions we have inherited; and to do so with a dignity that will permit us to stand before God, the American public, and our conservative forebears. In the next century, because of both need [...]

Willmoore Kendall: Forgotten Founder of Conservatism

By |2022-09-29T09:49:03-05:00March 29th, 2017|Categories: Constitution, Willmoore Kendall|

Willmoore Kendall held that American politics is not supposed to reflect universal values expressed through the rhetoric of a single leader, but rather the values or truths that American politics expresses must become known through the deliberate sense of the community… Willmoore Kendall is one of the most overlooked founding fathers of the conservative movement [...]

The Conservatism of Willmoore Kendall

By |2022-03-07T15:48:54-06:00June 20th, 2016|Categories: Conservatism, Featured, Federalist Papers, Richard Weaver, Willmoore Kendall|

(This essay is the fourth in a four-part series; the first may be found here, the second here, and the third here.)   It is clear that Publius’s deliberative process, with its emphasis upon accommodation, harmony, and consensus, is antithetical to the conflict-oriented majoritarianism of the egalitarians. As a corollary proposition, it is essential to note that [...]

The Lie of the Open Society

By |2022-02-23T11:00:53-06:00June 6th, 2016|Categories: Apology, Conservatism, Crito, Featured, Free Speech, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, Liberty, Plato, Willmoore Kendall|

II The related problems of “the public orthodoxy” and “the open society” were major concerns of  Willmoore Kendall throughout his professional career. In his reappraisal of John Locke in 1941, Kendall’s Locke emerged as an exponent of the public orthodoxy as expressed through the majority. As Kendall sees it, in Lockean thought, “In consenting to be a member [...]

What John Locke Really Said

By |2022-03-07T15:51:54-06:00May 30th, 2016|Categories: Conservatism, Featured, John Locke, Natural Law, Willmoore Kendall|

By any reasonable standard of measurement, Willmoore Kendall would have to be included in a list of the most important political scientists of the post-World War II era. Moreover, as regards the American political tradition, it is easily argued that Kendall is the most original, innovative, and challenging interpreter of any period. I believe these conclusions [...]

How to Read Willmoore Kendall

By |2022-09-29T09:52:07-05:00March 28th, 2015|Categories: Books, George W. Carey, Willmoore Kendall|Tags: |

Willmoore Kendall Contra Mundum. By Willmoore Kendall. New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House, 1971. 640 pp. When writing about Willmoore Kendall a strong temptation exists to deal with the man, not his teachings or theory. This I have always felt to be a shame, and, at times, a deliberate dodge because the reviewer or commentator [...]

Willmoore Kendall & the Deliberate Sense of the Community

By |2022-03-07T16:04:02-06:00June 2nd, 2013|Categories: Books, Federalist Papers, Political Science Reviewer, Willmoore Kendall|

The Basic Symbols of the American Political Tradition by Willmoore Kendall and George Carey (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1995). The Conservative Affirmation by Willmoore Kendall (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1963). John Locke and the Doctrine of Majority-Rule by Willmoore Kendall (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1965). Despite Willmoore Kendall’s (1909-1967) [...]

The Demise of Congressional Deliberation: Willmoore Kendall

By |2022-03-07T16:08:01-06:00March 22nd, 2013|Categories: Congress, Federalist Papers, Politics, Presidency, Willmoore Kendall|Tags: , |

The one teaching of Willmoore Kendall's toward which all his early thought tended and from which radiated all his later thought was this: America's vindication of the capacity of men for self-government rests upon its devotion to the idea of a virtuous people, under God, determining national policy by the deliberations of a supreme legislature [...]

Maverick Conservatism & Willmoore Kendall

By |2016-08-15T21:25:22-05:00January 26th, 2013|Categories: Books, Conservatism, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Willmoore Kendall|Tags: , |

Willmoore Kendall: Maverick of American Conservatives, edited by John A. Murley and John E. Alvis; foreword by William F. Buckley, Jr., 2002. Willmoore Kendall (1909-1967) remains one of the most important figures in mid-twentieth century conservatism. His penetrating scholarship on Locke, his writings on the internal tensions inherent in majority rule, his early involvement with [...]

Equality: Commitment or Ideal?

By |2020-07-02T10:40:31-05:00August 20th, 2012|Categories: Abraham Lincoln, Constitution, Declaration of Independence, Featured, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Politics, Willmoore Kendall|Tags: |

The whole case for our commitment to equality as a national goal comes from an isolated phrase—”all men are created equal”—in the Declaration of Independence. Was Lincoln right in his exposition of this phrase in the Gettysburg Address? The idea is as old, of course, as that magical first sentence of the Gettysburg Address: “Fourscore [...]

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