The conservative movement is needed today more than ever, especially as the alternatives fail.
The following remarks were delivered by the author at National Review Institute’s William F. Buckley Jr. Prize Dinner in Palm Beach, Fla., on November 5, as he received the Buckley Prize for Leadership in Supporting Liberty.
This year marks the 100th anniversary of William F. Buckley’s birth, and I cannot help but think of my late father, John W. Pope. As a child, I remember him tuning in to Firing Line with William F. Buckley every Sunday afternoon. As a teenager, one of the first magazines I read was his copy of National Review. As a young college student, I found my intellectual home in a broad conservative movement that included libertarians and traditionalists — champions of liberty and virtue — brought together under the principles of the Sharon Statement adopted at Buckley’s home more than a decade earlier.
Those principles — the fusionism of the Sharon Statement — would guide me not only as I entered politics and public policy but also in our family’s philanthropy.
One of the oldest sayings about philanthropy is: “Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” The second part is self-evident. Education and training.
But there are additional versions of that wisdom that go further. One is to enable the man to sell his fish at the marketplace. With his earnings, he can buy a better boat, catch more fish, buy a truck, and deliver his catch directly to customers. Through hard work and investment, he can earn money to feed, clothe, and shelter his family — and even send his children to college, breaking the cycle of poverty.
Yet all three of these versions — give a man a fish, teach a man to fish, help the man take the fish to market — presume something fundamental: that the man has the right to fish. That what he catches, he owns. That there is a market where he can sell his fish. That the rule of law ensures contracts are honored and he will be paid — if necessary, in courts. That he has the right to keep most of his hard-earned money and to choose how best to provide for himself and his family.
This is why our philanthropy focuses not only on humanitarian aid and education — which are very important — but also on advancing the principles and policies of a free society to provide both justice and prosperity.
The Pope Foundation — and the many other philanthropists I have worked with, including the Bradley Foundation, the Koch Foundations, and last year’s honoree, Kim Dennis of the Searle Freedom Trust — are helping people by fostering voluntary exchange within a free-market economy governed by the rule of law under limited, constitutional government. In fact, center-right policy nonprofits — along with academic institutions, civic engagement groups, and yes, grassroots advocacy — must be supported by philanthropy if we are going to preserve liberty in order to ensure prosperity and human flourishing for future generations.
Our shared principles — those of the Sharon Statement and the more recent Freedom Conservatism Statement — are deeply rooted in the American experiment itself. “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” states the Declaration of Independence, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
We all know these boldly stated principles were not fully applied in 1776 — or in 1876, or even 1976. This is why I believe in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.
“When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence,” King said, “they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, Black men as well as White men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
It took many generations to redeem that promissory note. In fact, we Americans are still working at it. During my lifetime — going back to the 1960s — I’ve witnessed assassinations, riots, the rise of the then-“New Left,” stagflation and the folly of wage and price controls, Watergate and other scandals, government waste, and a struggle against international communism. But thanks to intellectual leaders like William F. Buckley, and his good friend President Ronald Reagan, our nation emerged from these ordeals with renewed strength, with a robust economy, and as victors in the Cold War. Anyone who says Ronald Reagan is “old hat,” that Reagan and his policies have no relevance to today, are in ignorance or denial of the challenges the country faced and tremendous, positive change in direction that Reagan and Buckley took for the country.
Indeed, America still faces challenges — some new, others all too familiar — from reckless federal spending and the threatening rise of China to technological disruption, family breakdown, and political violence, including riots and the recent tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk.
And today, we face not only a progressive left — often openly socialist — seeking to use government power to impose its vision of the “common good,” but also a nationalist-populist right determined to impose its own vision of the “common good” through government.
Rather than respecting the unalienable equal rights of the people, both camps — the progressive-socialist left and the nationalist-populist right — seek to impose government solutions, each confident that it can govern better than the other. Neither seems willing to leave Americans free to make their own virtuous choices.
I firmly believe the best way forward — the way to preserve and expand American greatness — is for conservatives to champion freedom and virtue, individual liberty and social order, and a limited but effective government that performs only those essential tasks for which it was designed. Beyond that, we must not simply allow but respect the rights, the freedom, of individuals, families, businesses, religious congregations, communities, and other institutions of civil society to function and flourish.
These ideas, of course, are not original to me. I got a great introduction from the work of William Buckley. I listened when I watched Firing Line with my father. I do want to mention four books that had an impact on me, that help form the foundation of the classical liberal tradition and the modern conservative movement: John Locke and the Second Treatise on Government; Adam Smith and The Wealth of Nations, Friedrich Hayek and The Road to Serfdom, and Milton Friedman, whom I did have the privilege to meet in person, and Free to Choose.
This path forward is not a single, narrow trail. That is why I embrace the term “conservative movement.” A movement envisions many people and multiple institutions united by shared principles and values, moving together in the same direction while choosing their own individual paths. Yes, we will debate and argue about which path is best — but to achieve a virtuous and prosperous free society, we must never lose sight of our common principles. Our disagreements should never become disagreeable.
From my youth — watching Firing Line, reading National Review, and learning about the Sharon Statement — I have admired the conservative movement that William F. Buckley helped create and lead. That movement, based on timeless shared principles, is needed today more than ever, especially as the alternatives fail. We should all rededicate ourselves to it. This is why I am so honored to receive the Buckley Award — as one small member of this great conservative movement.