Daddy Dearest

WHERE do we stand as the Clinton trial winds down? Where we often do—in trouble, but with reason for hope.

The best guide to our troubles is an author who fits nicely into all the recent rummaging in theory and precedent— Robert Filmer (d. 1654). Filmer was a country gentleman from Kent who enjoyed scribbling essays on a variety of topics. The reputation of his most interesting essay, Patriarcha, was entirely posthumous. English Tories published it for the first time in the 1680s on the eve of the Glorious Revolution (John Locke attacked it); American Tories revived its arguments again in 1775, on the eve of the American Revolution; and apologists for slavery discovered it a third time during the Civil War. The White House legal team made no use of it, but it describes the president’s situation, and ours.

About the Author

Richard Brookhiser

Historian Richard Brookhiser is a senior editor of National Review and a senior fellow at the National Review Institute.

Featured Tags

WHERE do we stand as the Clinton trial winds down? Where we often do—in trouble, but with reason for hope.

The best guide to our troubles is an author who fits nicely into all the recent rummaging in theory and precedent— Robert Filmer (d. 1654). Filmer was a country gentleman from Kent who enjoyed scribbling essays on a variety of topics. The reputation of his most interesting essay, Patriarcha, was entirely posthumous. English Tories published it for the first time in the 1680s on the eve of the Glorious Revolution (John Locke attacked it); American Tories revived its arguments again in 1775, on the eve of the American Revolution; and apologists for slavery discovered it a third time during the Civil War. The White House legal team made no use of it, but it describes the president’s situation, and ours.