The Evolution of a Conservative

Human decisions sometimes produce unexpected consequences. I would probably never have appreciated the values of conservatism if I had not decided, as a young and obscure freelance writer in 1922, to go to Moscow. At that time, although I was not a member of the Communist Party, I was a convinced sympathizer with the Soviet regime, a devout fellow-traveler. I went to Moscow in the spirit of the Moslem making his pilgrimage to Mecca.

Twelve years later I left Moscow with completely transformed ideas of what Soviet Communism meant in practice, with unforgettable memories of cruelties visited on many Russians whom I knew and uncounted millions whom I did not know. Instead of liberation I had found a tyranny far worse than that of the Czars; instead of my early vision of workers freed from so-called capitalist exploitation and advancing to ever higher standards of living, I took away memories of workers and peasants far more “ill- fed, ill-clothed and ill-housed” than the most “underprivileged” Americans. My original conception of the Communist Party as a dedicated élite had melted away as I watched this party, in power, appropriate to itself the luxury living standards of the pre-revolutionary high bureaucracy.

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William Henry Chamberlin

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Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Human decisions sometimes produce unexpected consequences. I would probably never have appreciated the values of conservatism if I had not decided, as a young and obscure freelance writer in 1922, to go to Moscow. At that time, although I was not a member of the Communist Party, I was a convinced sympathizer with the Soviet regime, a devout fellow-traveler. I went to Moscow in the spirit of the Moslem making his pilgrimage to Mecca.

Twelve years later I left Moscow with completely transformed ideas of what Soviet Communism meant in practice, with unforgettable memories of cruelties visited on many Russians whom I knew and uncounted millions whom I did not know. Instead of liberation I had found a tyranny far worse than that of the Czars; instead of my early vision of workers freed from so-called capitalist exploitation and advancing to ever higher standards of living, I took away memories of workers and peasants far more “ill- fed, ill-clothed and ill-housed” than the most “underprivileged” Americans. My original conception of the Communist Party as a dedicated élite had melted away as I watched this party, in power, appropriate to itself the luxury living standards of the pre-revolutionary high bureaucracy.