eliot, russell kirk. it was part of a daylong at grand rapids state university in grand rapids, michigan. it's about an hour. host: we'll move forward in time now to the mid-20th century with a look at some of that era's most influential conservative thinkers as illuminated by the bradley,ip of been, and lisa. i use the word "influential" on purpose. the trajectory of post-war conservatism was in many ways projected and formed by the panel discussion this morning. we believe this uniting theme on these three presentations, elements of common ground thinking will be apparent due to their complex and deeply informed philosophies. ben ledford is a professor of english at ben valley state university, the past president of the t.s. eliot society and the editor of the t.s. eliot and christian tradition, ben will be discussing elliott's contributions to the mid-20th century tradition. bradley birzer is the chair at hills vail college and is the cofounder of the imaginative conservative. his scholarship and imagi

we know that he was referring to russell kirk. it was to become somewhat more involved in the political fray than elliott, but who never held public office except that of justice of the peace in the cast the county. elliott and his brief talk by emphasizing that there should always be a few writers you occupied in penetrating to the court of the matter in trying to arrive at the truth. and to set it forth without too much hope. without ambition to alter the immediate course of affairs. and without being downcast or defeated when nothing appears to ensue. he terms this realm of thought pre-political. naming as exemplars christopher dawson in england and ryan niebuhr in america. such pre-political thinking , he says, with the fundamental question what is man? throughout his career, elliott attempt to do this type of philosophical political thinking rather than trying to offer solutions to immediate issues. one, as a student at harvard, elliott came under the influence of some of the leading conservative thinkers of that time, irving

today, his subject is russell kirk, in many ways, the barrier of post-war conservativeism. lisa zeffil is associate professor of history at pacific university. her scholarship focuses on the role of culture in the overnment and american values as well as social and political morrays. discussing thebe subject of her current project, a biography about peter viereck, the pullitser prize-winning poet the term new conservatism. please join me in welcoming them. [applause] ben: late in life, t.s. eliot delivered an address entitled the literature of politics, to the london conservative union. it begins with what i take to be mostly a statement of sincere humility. i am merely a man of letters, he says, who believes that the questions he raises may sometimes be of interest. even if the answers he can give are negligible. i have man of letters, never taken any part in politics other than that of a voter, a walking on part, and that of a part.r, a sitting down this is not merely, i think, a disarm a disclaimer to critical audience. liot had written much about political topics at tha

understood russell kirk.ote a book called "the conservative mind." ,n animated william f buckley barry goldwater. it is the idol of the modern conservative. it is still in print. still wildly -- widely read. intelligentsia will speak of this book. it was not a villainous philosophy. shouldat how society the. the conservative and the liberal way. johnattle goes back to adams and thomas jefferson. they started whenever he came through town. it haso it the way always been done. jefferson said we need a revolution every 20 years. he saw changes a good ring. two fundamental worldviews. thomas payne eventually supported the american revolution. he spent two weeks at his house. he got into this too-weeklong battle. wrote an entire book, "the rights of man," as a rebuttal. here is the modern english version. a ruling class and everybody else. manays it does no harm if a is servile as a candle maker. he iss violence if allowed to participate in the government. way, is the same kind of thinking that has animated laws a

eliot, russell kirk.t was part of a daylong at grand rapids state university in grand rapids, michigan. it's about an hour. host: we'll move forward in time now to the mid-20th century with a look at some of that era's most influential conservative thinkers as illuminated by the bradley,ip of been, and lisa. i use the word "influential" on purpose. the trajectory of post

scholars discusses influential conservative thinkers of the 20th century including writers ts, russell kirk, and peter furyk. the panel was part of a daylong symposium at grand valley state university in grand rapids, michigan. it is about an hour. let's move forward in time to mith

i'm a russell kirk, bill buckley guy, and you and i discussed this before, lou, and i don't see that guys have done anything conservative over the last decade or two, and so they've hijacked the term, and they expect everybody to think that what they do is true conservatism. it's not close. lou: i don't know about you, sam, nothing makes me laugh much harder than people explaining to me and to america how paul ryan and mitt romney are the appropriate arbiters of who is and who is not a conservative. i mean, it's hilarious. >> it's hilarious and it's nonsense, what i think has happened is a lot of times and i'll put the media into this as well. three things you do in a campaign. one is you raise money and starting to do that process, the second you get votes and we've been very successful in doing that. and the third is you have to educate the voting public. one of the things we're doing now is exposing a lot of the people out here inside washington, inside the media establishment, inside the donor class, inside a lot of other areas for what they really are. this is what they are. the

the letters between russell kirk and buckley are marvelous. teacher to student. kirk to buckley is how those letters come across. in a beautiful way. , when he first met your husband, 25 years old and young and full of fit, energy, and figure. vigor. -- and he had that chutzpah. thank god he did because he was able to do all of the things that he did because he had that energy. the 19 -- ihing think two things, there are two answers. they way into each other. thatirst is buckley knew american conservative tradition had many strands. were theig ones traditionalist strand, where we are society, society changes, we need to change slowly. we need to be conservative and how we move. we will move. the other strand is libertarian. going back to the american revolution. it is government is bad. we need to preserve our individual freedoms from the yoke of these burdens. buckley knew that for a large-scale conservative movement to happen, he needed to bring these movements together. professor nash is the one who helps describe this, we will hear from him later. i am not cl

. >> next, a panel of scholars discusses influential thinkers century, including russell .s. eliot, kirk. it was in grand rapids michigan, and it's about an hour. host: we'll move forward in time now to the mid-20th century with a look at some of that era's influential conservative hinkers as illuminated by the scholarship of ben latford, bradley berbinger and lisa zefil. i use the word influential on purpose. he trajectory of post-war