Customer Reviews

White Protestant Nation: The Rise of the American Conservative Movement

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Because of the provocative title, I at first thought that this was one of those in-your-face political harangues that populate the front tables of bookstores. However I quickly found that this was a serious, scholarly study of American conservative thought (and action) in the 20th century.

I think Lichtman is on to something. I had read Sean Wilentz'z "The Rise of American Democracy" a few months ago and this book seems that it could have been a good companion. I guess the central thesis that could be argued is that America was founded as a democracy, albeit a democracy only for white, anglo, Protestant, property-owning heterosexual males. Much of the dynamics of American culture and politics in both the 19th and 20th centuries has been both the attempt to expand this definition of democratic government and the resulting response to defend and/or restore the status quo. This really highlights how much the "idea" of America is a highly politically contested concept.

The strength of Lichtman's book is how he shows the continued line of conservative thinking from the 1920 (which was sort of a reset point for American conservatives after the upheavals of the Progressive Era and internationalism of Wilson) to the present. His discussion of the role of the woman's vote was very enlightening, showing how that otherwise conservative men supported woman's vote as a counterweight to the growing immigrant voting population. For me the whole discussion of the pre- 1970s conservative movement is the major strength of the book.

Now for the book's drawbacks. Lichtman seems to have fallen to the dreaded graduate student vice of "pump and dump," that is "pumping" as much data and historical information as possible from the archives and other historical sources and then "dumping" it all into the text. As a result. The read is hit with pages of detailed accounts of numerous characters, events and publications. This seems to be work ok when he is talking about the 1920s and the 1930s and the focus of his "White Protestant Nation" theme is clear, but the closer he gets to the present, the more the details seem to muddy the analysis.
Because of his emphasis on the details, there is a certain loss of focus and context in his analysis. For example the McCarthy anti-red campaign is only given cursory treatment. As he gets closer to the present, it only gets worse and his treatment of the Reagan era is at best a chronology.

Still, in spite of these drawbacks, the books is a valuable historical study that should become part of standard literature about American politics.

I've been curious for many years. We can talk about various economic or political systems as if they're acceptable. But one about which we cannot speak without being treated like we've used inappropriate language is "Communism." It struck me that the "conservatives" must have a pretty powerful platform since we can't even talk about that concept except negatively.

This volume I read not long after completing Alan Dawley's "Struggles for Justice," while listening to David Halberstram's "The Coldest Winter: American and the Korean War," and while reading a fine article by Thomas Frank in "Harper's" magazine about the neo-cons in today's government. Combined, they paint a fairly clear picture of the "evolution" of American conservatism.

The book is set up both chronologically and thematically; one can see the "evolution" (thought some might think of is as devolution) of America's right wing throughout the years. And that mix made the book compelling.

The book's first chapter is entitled "The Birth of the Modern Right: 1920 - 1928." Conventional wisdom seems to attribute the beginning of the "modern right" to the era of Goldwater, but Lichtman thinks it took place quite a bit earlier. This was the post-WWI era. During that war, Americans had to be stimulated by the Creel Commission, or Committee on Public Information to despise the heathen Huns (Germans). After the war, that zeal went against the bomb-throwing Bolsheviks. And this was the era of Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge.

What the "right" feared later took place when Franklin Roosevelt was elected. Lichtman seems to make clear--as have other authors--that Roosevelt wasn't some red-flag waving socialist. (Indeed, years ago I researched an article on Social Security in which I learned that Roosevelt used that and other economic benefits to sustain the system, not destroy it!) But by the time of Roosevelt's election, the anti-Communist fervor had been thoroughly institutionalized. So it was, indeed, used by many on the "right" to discredit the New Deal.

Subsequent to that experiment were born institutions like the John Birch Society and other far-right organizations which had credibility for a while.

Interestingly, by the way, when the book covers the Goldwater era, the author suggests that after Goldwater's defeat was when the right decided to regroup and rethink its strategy.

A name that came up many, many times in the book was J. Howard Pew. His foundation helped to fund many a right wing cause throughout much of the 20th century. (Indeed, without that foundation, many of such causes wouldn't have been able to survive). And the theme structure of the book led into later in the century, I think it was during the 70s, that many more foundations became the backbone of the right. Two that come to mind are Scaife and Bradley.

Another "theme" that evolved was the right's use of "think tanks." The American Enterprise Institute had been somewhat of a think tank earlier in the century. But, Lichtman points out, AEI was "pluralist." Later right wing think tanks included Heritage Foundation, which wouldn't exist if it hadn't been for great grants from foundations like the ones to which I referred. And they were anti-pluralist.

Another even more disturbing theme was that social science research was traditionally, like that of the "hard" sciences, scholarly. In other words, journals were peer reviewed, studied by others, and found to be credible. As the "right" became more institutionalized in the 1980s and 90s, some of that academic rigor disappeared. And then you had documents such as Hernstein and Murray's "Bell Curve"--and countless others-- which had not undergone any rigorous evaluation but appeared to have some credence because of the institution from which it came.

A subject of which I was unaware until I read this book is that Reagan was seen by many a conservative as being too liberal. Indeed, what appeared a little disconcerting about the text is that Lichtman seemed to justify some of Reagan's actions because of their apparent "success." Only later in the text did he list the consequences, e.g., the widened gap between the rich and poor, and the massive federal deficit.

The book finally got to our present state of affairs in which we have a fairly far right presidency, which, while claiming to be conservative, is really quite statist in more ways than many would like. Indeed, that section kind of summarized what had been repeated many times throughout the book: that while "conservatives" insist on rugged individualism and laissez fair economics, when they can get a piece of the action, they'll be the first ones in line to take it. And that's the depth of the hypocrisy of the allegedly conservative.

In any case, two words that I noticed were repeated again and again:

1) "anti-pluralist" I guess that's where the "Protestant" theme came from in the title. The conservatives struggled against Jews, Catholics, anyone representing any deviation from a pretty small segment of humanity. (Yes, there were occasional accessions to Catholics, on issues such as abortion, for example. But by and large they were rejected.).

2) Authority. Any time the prevailing, conservative movement was threatened, they appealed to "tradition" and its overwhelming theme "authority." It's interesting to see how such a concept can be used!

Now, I must confess that it's difficult to review this volume well without having taken extensive notes while reading it. There's a lot of material there. There are names I didn't cover in here, e.g., Sun Myung Moon, whose influence was referred to, and many others. Fortunately, as I've said, it's well written, and hard to put down. I cannot do it adequate justice in the space I'm allowed for a review. But it will grace my shelf as a reference book when I read similarly themed volumes in the future.

I have several books written by Allan Lichtman, The 13 Keys to the Presidency(1990) and The keys to the White House(1996,2000, 2005 and 2008 editions). When it comes to political history this guy knows his stuff. I want to get this book but i am trying to get away from buying physical books and collecting books on my kindle. This book is not available on kindle!! I think the conservative movement really exploded in the late 1970's early 80's during The election of conservative Ronald Reagan. It's peak was during President Bill Clinton's 8 years in power and sustained during President George W. Bush's 2 terms(2001-2008). I think the christain conservative right is gradually losing their power. Please make this book available on kindle!

This history of the evangelical Christian movement in the twentieth century is an important contribution to understanding both the recent political arena and the culture wars. It approaches history with a decided present-tense interest in helping to explain current issues. Author Allan J. Lichtman, professor of history at American University in Washington, D.C., demonstrates how conservative religious traditions coalesced in the first half of the twentieth century around issues of morality and society ranging from marriage patterns to economic priorities.

The author's assertion that this was born out of the split between the modernists and the traditionalists is not new, but his positioning of the movement in the context of a larger pro-business, mainly Protestant, coalition of interests is path breaking. Moreover, the rise of intellectuals and financiers such as J. Howard Pew, Frank Gannett, the Du Ponts, William F. Buckley, and William Kristol gave power to the movement beyond its insular borders as never before in the last half century.

These various groups and individuals disagreed with each other on many issues but were united in their hatred of the modern welfare state put into place in successive Democratic administrations between the 1930s and the 1960s and built a network of organizations to resist what they considered the evils both of social engineering and federal power. They used oftentimes misplaced fears of immigration, race relations, and sexual politics as triggers to create powerful political organizations. "White Protestant Nation" offers a well-reasoned, excellently and entertainingly written history of the rise of conservative political power.

I read some of the book, which helps to imform the reader about the history of the conservative religious movement in America and its influence on social issues from the 19th century till now. I do not agree about some of the issues that many conservative religious people were against (ie. civil rights).

Therefore, I know that true righteousness is found in Jesus Christ (John 14:6;18:36),not in American "Christian" values nor a political party.

I just picked up a copy of this for one whole dollar, brand new, at my local Dollar Tree dollar store. (Feb, 2011)

Allan Lichtman renders forth a dense, sophisticated, non-judgmental treatment of the phenomenon that most makes American culture, American. It is the "cultural mime" lying at the core of the nation's meaning, the American Conservative Movement. This movement is a virtual Gestalt of ominous, self-serving, immoral, greed-based and ruthless, fragments, strewn across American history and across the American heartland. And although one of its key components is religion, due primarily to it, the American DNA still clearly reveals a missing morally legitimate dimension.

But worse (and this is what is most scary about the American Conservative Movement), is the fact that Lichtman's book reveals that this unbridled existential beast roams about virtually unchallenged and lacks the ability for even a semblance of self-correction. It does this all the while it carries forth the mantle and the shield of everything that is supposed to be American. In short, the American Conservative Movement has commandeered and arrogated unto itself, calling its own, the entire symbolic machinery of the nation: To be patriotic, to be freedom loving, to be anti-Communist, to be capitalist Wasp, to be moral, indeed to be pro-American, is now taken for granted that one must be an American Conservative.

Thus, in no small way Lichtman's book is the voice in our heads telling us what we already are "pretending not to know" about our own country: that American culture propelled mostly by the American Conservative Movement, has always been firmly rooted in Fascist soil, and that with its not so well-disguised veneer of pseudo-religious and capitalist rationalizations, its racial myths, justifications and cover stories, underneath is a much scarier picture of little more than a home-grown plutocracy covered with a collection of Fascist elements (racism, anti-pluralism, sexism, anti-evolutionism, anti-abortionism, etc.) hurling off course into an uncharted orbit towards full-fledged Fascism.

Anyone who doubts that this is so, should do a Goggle search on the phrase "American Fascism." This book puts the phenomenon of Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Bill O'Rielly and the like, into frightening historical context.

But it is the other implications that also run along in the subtext that are even more disturbing: that the "would be corrective mechanism," liberalism, is not just worse than conservatism, but much, much worse. Liberalism, the ad hoc reaction to conservatism, whose sole existence seems only to be to keep conservatism in check, has failed miserably. For unlike conservatives who are certain about their reasons for existing (no matter how immoral those reasons may be), liberals are confused about their own reason for being. Thus the meaning of liberalism remains shadowy empty and hollow. It is less a movement than an ad hoc assemblage of angst-ridden, hand-wringing, worry warts. Unless, ultra or radical conservatism raises its ugly head, liberals just sit on their hands and wait for the next conservative shoe to fall.

Liberals simply fail to address the fact that conservatism is inherently morally corrupt, and instead of challenging its basic premises, liberals just "plays along" to passively reap its illegitimate benefits: that is, until it is too late to do anything about conservative excesses. So, except in abnormal times, when arguably it is already too late to do anything about it, there is no challenging political philosophy or ideology to correct the madness and insanity of the Gestalt that conservative political, cultural and social ideas represent. This is heady stuff, well researched but difficult to wade through at times, still well worth five stars.

WHITE PROTESTANT NATION: THE RISE OF THE AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE MOVEMENT is a full history of the modern conservative movement from its beginnings in the 1920s to current issues affecting its status and well-being. A political analysis blends with a social history and even analysis of the economic forces shaping the movement, making for a key acquisition for any library strong in either American history or social issues.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

Lichtman, Allan J., White Protestant Nation New York: Atlantic Monthly Press 598 pp., $18.50 cloth, $12.89 Paper ISBN-10: 0-87113-984-7 cloth ISBN-13: 978-0-87113-984-9 paper Original Publication Date: 2008

Allan Lichtman sets out to prove America has experienced a long term rising trend of conservatism (subject to some reversals) starting in the 1920s, specifically with Klan activity and the social, economic, and cultural upheavals surrounding World War I.[1] A more accurate description of the origins of modern conservatism would have combined the 1920s, the rise of Barry Goldwater, and the Roosevelt administration's restraint in implementing economic change during the 1930s and 40s.[2] According to Lichtman, the New Right grew out of opposition to pluralistic forces and cosmopolitan ideas, including but not limited to abortion, race, immigration, secularism, homosexuality, pornography, alcohol, vice, radicalism, and Darwinism. "The right has held together as a political movement since World War I through its core commitment to conserving white Protestant values and private enterprise, not free enterprise." [3] Lichtman correctly points out conservatives and conservative administration have frequently, in fact squarely, contradicted limited government, state's rights, individual freedoms, and free markets.[4]

To the author's credit, he mentions African-Americans in his introduction and their "...following their own path to cultural pluralism and liberalism."[5] Unfortunately, he goes astray here. African-Americans had an independent path forced on them. They actually may not be as pluralistic as the author portrays them, preferring their Christian based, family centered, modestly capitalist, and heterosexual society. Also in his introduction (to the author's credit) he acknowledges the contribution of Catholics to (or alliance with) this Protestant, conservative cause. This tempers the major problem with the book: Catholics and Jews play a huge role in the conservative trend.

This book could better be described as a selective history of conservatism (white and often male) over the last ninety years. It includes a good description of that movement, its people, ideas, facts, and trends. A random selection of these components includes prohibition, contraception, the Red Scares, fear of immigration, the 1937-38 recession, McCarthyism, the Dixiecrats, NSC-68, the women's movement, civil rights for African-American's, citizen's councils, Catholicism, COINTELPRO, the Contract with America, the Southern Strategy, and the Cold War. The book relies on over 500 books (covering various fields of study) and numerous magazine and newspaper articles, along with over 150 manuscript collections. It includes excellent bibliography and footnotes, and it references famous conservative books and periodicals.' In these respects the scholarship here earns the highest respect.

Lichtman's encyclopedic description of all the individuals and organizations making up this movement becomes the characteristic trademark of the book. A partial and arbitrary list of these people would include Jack Abramoff, William Anderson, Josemaría Escriviá de Balaguer, Albert Kohlberg, J. Howard and Joseph Newton Pew, Richard Reid, Phyllis Schlafly, and Willi Schlamm.' As for the organizations, a catalogue would include the American Council of Christian Churches, American Enterprise Institute, American Liberty League, HUAC, the KKK, Life Line, RNC, the black-silver-and brown shirt movements, and the Women's Patriotic Conference on National Defense (WPCND).*

Despite the excellent scholarship described so far, Lichtman's major mistake involves the participation of Catholics and Jews.* White Protestant Nation itself provides enormous evidence of Catholic and Jewish participation in this white, conservative movement. He describes the following Catholics' and their integral role in the conservative movement: William J. Baroody, Popes Benedict the XV and Pius the XI, Father Charles Coughlin, Father Patrick Scanlon, Bishop Fulton Sheen, Bishop Spellman, and Gov. Al Smith.[6] Above all, paramount leaders of the conservative cause included Catholics Pat Buchanan, Joseph McCarthy, and William F. Buckley, Jr., a fact under emphasized by Lichtman.[7] To a lesser degree he includes the Catholic Daughters of America, Catholic War Veterans, the Blue Army of Our Lady of Fatima, the Knights of Columbus, and the Association of Catholic Trade Unions.[8] He frequently mentions the Catholic Church as an organization supporting conservative causes and spices his book with phrases such as "to the chagrin of conservative Catholics."[9]

Lichtman's book provides almost the same amount of evidence regarding Jewish support of the conservative movement, listing the following Jewish conservatives: Barry Goldwater, Alan Greenspan, Milton Friedman, Willi Schlamm, James Burnham, and Frank Meyer-these last three edited The National Review.[10] Lichtman writes, "In the late 1960s a loosely connected group of ex-liberal and radical intellectuals, most of them Jewish and based in New York City, had begun making contributions to conservative politics."[11] These "neo-conservatives" included thinkers such as Gertrude Himmelfarb, Daniel Bell, Richard Scammon and Normon Podhoretz.[12] With extremists such as Podhoretz, and conservative Catholics previously mentioned, the white, conservative, Protestant nation described by Lichtman must be 40% non-Protestant.

Lichtman's failure to acknowledge the existence of white Protestants who do not share the values of the group he describes adds to his mistake regarding Catholics and Jews. Though begrudgingly acknowledging the contributions of FDR and Lyndon Johnson, the author ignores a host of famous white, liberal Protestants which could include Eleanor Roosevelt, George McGovern, Hubert Humphrey, and Adlai Stevenson. He continues by ignoring the white, Protestant liberals who voted for FDR and all the Sixties hippies (no they were not all Catholic or Jewish, nor all female). This reviewer, a Protestant, liberal, Democrat does not fit Lichtman's mold either. Neither does his family or most member of his local, Protestant church. Furthermore, this reviewer has met numerous conservative Catholics and Jews, both male and female whose existence contradicts the facts presented in White Protestant Nation. One might forgive an author for focusing on his argument, especially in terms of restraining a book's length, but to completely overlook the other side of the coin or an integral part of the situation reflects poorly on that historian's skills.

The failure by Lichtman to acknowledge facts contrary to his thesis leads to a problem voiced by David Frum in his review of the text. "Finally, "White Protestant Nation" fails as history because Lichtman will not think seriously about the relationship between causes and effects. He is fascinated by what might be called the inner story, and so he mines archives and clippings for conservatism's internal debates and struggles. But conservatism did not come to national political power in the 1980s by means of memorandums. It came to power because of the collapse of the governing liberal consensus of the 1950s and '60s. Riots, crime, inflation, rising taxes, gasoline lines, recessions, foreign policy humiliation: it was these things that elected Ronald Reagan in 1980. The story of conservatism cannot be told in isolation from the larger political story [emphasis added]. Yet Lichtman shirks that story -- perhaps because to tell it would require him to engage the possibility that the liberalism of the '50s and '60s had ceased to work."[13]

Lastly, Lichtman's moral judgment appears questionable (a view shared by Frum). Though the author approves of homosexuality, abortion, liberalism, all aspects of the women's movement, and does not see any problems with their affect on the American family, other people may disagree. Frum suggests Lichtman examine his prejudices and not engage in self flattery.[14] This reviewer agrees.

Despite the length of this book, and the tremendous effort it represents in terms of the author's scholarship regarding numerous conservatives and conservative organizations, the basic premise of the book, that this primarily lead to the ascendancy of conservatives in recent years, appears erroneous.

1) Lichtman, p. 2. 2) Alan Brinkley, Liberalism and It's Discontents (Cambridge:Harvard University Press, 1998), Chapters 3-5. This footnote only covers the Roosevelt administration. Goldwater's contribution to American conservatism is clearly established. 3) Lichtman, p. 3. 4) Ibid. 5) Ibid., p. 4. ' Ideas Have Consequences by Richard Weaver, The Conservative Mind by Russell Kirk, God & Man at Yale by William F. Buckley, Jr., The Road to Serfdom by Friedrich Hayek, Race and Reason by Carlton Putnam, and The Emerging Republican Majority by Kevin Phillips. A partial list of periodicals includes: Christianity Today, Farm Journal, Freeman, Human Events, National Review, Plain Talk, U.S. News & World Report, and The Wall Street Journal. ' Other conservatives include: George Bensen, Mortin Blackwell, John Carbough, Coolidge, Decter, Lawrence Dennis, Dewey, Terry Dolan, Wickliffe Preston Draper, Robert Dresser, David Gergen, Billy James Hargis, Harding, Albert Hawkes, Jesse Helms, Charles Hilles, E.F. Hutton, Richard Land, Gen. Curtis Lemay, Marvin Liebman, Charles Lindbergh, Seymour Lipset, Pat Manion, Reverend Moon, Paul Nitze, Richard Nixon, Lyn Nofziger, Raymond Pitcairn, John Raskob, Henry Regnery, Karl Rove, Billy Sunday, Howard Taft, Rev. Norman Vincent Peale, Robert Snowden, Douglas MacArthur, Claude Pepper, Ayn Rand, Ronald Reagan, Fred Schwartz, Strom Thurmond, Richard Viguerie, George Wallace, and Wendell Wilkie. * Other organizations include: American Christian Alliance, American Conservative Union, Americans for Constitutional Action, American Security Council, Anti-Saloon League, Campus Crusade for Christ, Cardinal Mindzenty Foundation, Cato Institute, Christian Coalition, Christian Front, DAR, Heritage Foundation, Hoover Institute, John Birch Society, Liberty Lobby, National Association of Evangelicals, National Association of Manufacturers, Sentinels of the Republic, Unification of the Societies of America, World Anti-Communist League, and Young Americans for Freedom. * Religious identities of individuals have been determined by reference to White Protestant Nation or Wikipedia. 6) Lichtman, pp. Coughlin 97. 7) Ibid., pp. McCarthy 175. 8) Ibid., p. 155. 9) Ibid., references to the Catholic church as an organization are pp. 13 & 37; "the chagrin of Catholic conservatives" p. 267. 10) Alan Greenspan and Milton Friedman are both described in Wikipedia as having a Jewish heritage. Lichtman also fails to mention Jews such as Walter Annenberg who donated to the Reagan candidacy and served in his "kitchen cabinet." 11) Lichtman, p. 283, bottom. 12) Other Jewish intellectuals Lichtman mentions on page 284 are Nathan Glazer, Peter Berger, Seymour Martin Lipset, Gertrude Himmelfarb, Ben Wattenberg, Norman Podhoretz and Midge Decter. Religious identities of individuals has been determined by reference to White Protestant Nation or Wikipedia. The author also ignores all the white people in SNCC and CORE (they were not all Catholic or Jewish, nor all female), and all the members of the women's movement spanning seven decades (again not just Catholic or Jewish, or female). 13) Sunday Book Review in The New York Times, book review of White Protestant Nation by David Frum, [...] [accessed October 3, 2008]. 14) Ibid.

Note: I have used two, helpful, on-line book reviews and I quoted from one in the creation of my book review.

Sunday Book Review in the New York Times. White Protestant Nation by Allan J. Lichtman [...]

[...]. White Protestant Nation by Allan J. Lichtman. Review by Steve Goddard. [...] [accessed October 3, 2008].

Allan Lichtman, author of The Keys to the White House (an awesome read), has documented the history of the conservative movement since World War I in "White Protestant Nation". Most people believe that modern-day conservatism began in the 1950s with William F. Buckley, but Lichtman posits that the conservative movement, guided by a firm belief in Christianity and private enterprise, arose in the 1920s in response to the upheavals of the World War I years and attempted to ensure that America remained a white, Protestant nation.

The Right was indeed against civil rights in the early decades of the movement. Several GOP candidates backed by the Klan won gubernatorial elections in the 1920s, and the infamous editorials that National Review published in its first few years evince that segregation was supported by even the responsible Right in the 1950s. Today, however, the Right is far more likely than the Left is to follow Martin Luther King's standard of judging a person by the content of his character rather than by the color of his skin. Clarence Thomas and Bobby Jindal (neither white, neither Protestant) are two of the people in public life that many conservatives most admire today. Modern-day liberals are far more obsessed by racial (and gender) issues than conservatives are.

Lichtman rightly notes that the conservative movement opposes practices such as abortion, homosexuality, promiscuity, pornography, and easy divorce, and shows that Protestants and Catholics have worked together in recent decades against these practices. Such opposition is not merely Christian--Jews and Muslims, as well as many who profess no religious belief, oppose these practices as well. Even a liberal like Daniel Patrick Moynihan was a well-known prophet concerning the ill effects of illegitimacy on society.

This book is encyclopedic in its coverage of every right-of-center organization worth knowing about since the Twenties, and Lichtman skillfully weaves descriptions of these organizations around a solid account of American political history since WWI. It is probably best that a prospective reader already have a good working knowledge of American history and politics of the last 90 years before trying to tackle this book--those without that kind of knowledge base may become discouraged while reading a book as intensely detailed as this one is.

This book, though thought-provoking and worthwhile, is written with somewhat of a liberal bias. For example, Lichtman introduces the Strategic Defense Initiative and then refers to it as "Star Wars" instead of "SDI" throughout the rest of the book. And by juxtaposing a paragraph on Timothy McVeigh immediately following a sentence on Rush Limbaugh, Lichtman seems to advance the old canard that talk radio caused McVeigh's actions. There are many talk radio hosts (Hannity, Beck, Ingraham, Levin, Savage, Boortz, Bennett, Gallagher, Prager, Medved, Hewitt, Reagan) heard today that were not widely heard in the mid-1990s. If the constellation of nationally syndicated talk radio hosts has expanded exponentially since 2000, and the number of McVeighs has not, that strongly suggests that McVeigh was a lone nut and not the result of talk radio.

Lichtman closes with analysis of the conservative movement's future. He notes that there are many contradictions between factions of the Right, such as the schism between moral reformers and business. How these debates are resolved will determine whether the conservative movement can advance its agenda and provide the traditional morality and greater economic freedom cherished, not just by white Protestants, but also by millions of other Americans of all races and faiths.