Principles & Heresies: Thinking Aloud about 1968

Like most conservatives with whom I have talked over the last year or so, I have been much perplexed by the problems of the 1968 Presidential election. Until recently, it was possible to say that it was still early, that the passage of time might clarify the situation; but it is now considerably less than a year to the first primaries and very little more than a year to the conventions —not so very long, as political time goes. It seems to me that two factors are standing in the way of clear conservative understanding. On the one hand, there is a failure to see that 1968 is not 1864. The nomination of a conservative candidate this time will not be the result of a mass campaign of the Goldwater type, but rather the outcome of a complex of pressures applied in a more conventional way through the inner processes of the Republican Party, coming to a climax in hard bargaining at the convention itself. As much as one can predict at this stage, it would seem more than likely that no candidate will enter the convention with anything approaching a clear majority, that in fact the decisive power at the convention will be in the hands of uncommitted and ‘favorite son” delegations. The true issue of the convention will not be one of personalities; it will be whether the process of gaining conservative control of the Republican Party, dramatically inaugurated in 1964, will be consolidated, in however low a key, or whether the liberals will regain the control they exercised from 1940 to 1964. It is here that I think the second factor in conservative confusion comes into play: the failure to recognize the degree to which 1964 represented, despite the electoral defeat, a potential massive victory for conservatism through the rehabilitation of the Republican Party as an available institutional vehicle for conservatism. As M. Stanton Evans said recently (NR, 5/30/67): “November 1964 generated a natural but misleading sense of conservative despair. In the pale glow of that sulphurous Tuesday, all Barry Goldwater had said and done from 1960 forward was bathed in retrospective gloom. The trick of lighting causes us to forget that the Goldwater candidacy — the mere fact of his nomination—marked an enduring victory for conservatism.” The strategic point at which conservative energy can be applied to achieve the most lasting success is in so working within the Republican Party from the bottom up that the liberal grip which was loosened in 1964 is permanently broken. This patently does not mean in 1968 an emotionally satisfying pre-convention campaign, such as that of 1964. It means hard patient work that can eventuate in a decisive conservative voice at the Republican convention. It may not bring about the nomination of an ideal conservative candidate, but it can make certain that no liberal of the stripe of Percy or Romney will be nominated. Furthermore, it will insure that the candidate nominated will be acceptable to conservatives, that he will owe his victory to conservatives and will hold to broadly conservative principles, and that the course of the Republican Party will be firmly set in a conservative direction.

THESE ARE the general considerations with which I think conservatives ought to approach the problems of 1968. Still they are only guidelines; they do not answer the question of what candidate or candidates might meet their requirements. It seems to me that there are two questions that have to be answered in this respect: the question of a principled position and the question of fitness for office. On the question of principle, one can rule out, to begin with, Percy, whose miserable position on Vietnam and on Communist aggression has earned him the support of both Martin Luther King and writers for the New Republic as a potential candidate. Romney, who has no discernible principles at all, can similarly be ruled out. Of all the leading candidates, Reagan obviously has the most consistent principled conservative stand, on both domestic and foreign policy. Nixon has an honorable anti-Communist record and, if he has been somewhat ambiguous on domestic questions at times, he would seem to be, on balance, acceptable to conservatives—if he can avoid the temptation to which he has succumbed in the past, the temptation of assuming that the conservatives are in his pocket and therefore distorting his position to court the liberals.

FS

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Frank S. Meyer

Frank S. Meyer was a senior editor of National Review.

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Like most conservatives with whom I have talked over the last year or so, I have been much perplexed by the problems of the 1968 Presidential election. Until recently, it was possible to say that it was still early, that the passage of time might clarify the situation; but it is now considerably less than a year to the first primaries and very little more than a year to the conventions —not so very long, as political time goes. It seems to me that two factors are standing in the way of clear conservative understanding. On the one hand, there is a failure to see that 1968 is not 1864. The nomination of a conservative candidate this time will not be the result of a mass campaign of the Goldwater type, but rather the outcome of a complex of pressures applied in a more conventional way through the inner processes of the Republican Party, coming to a climax in hard bargaining at the convention itself. As much as one can predict at this stage, it would seem more than likely that no candidate will enter the convention with anything approaching a clear majority, that in fact the decisive power at the convention will be in the hands of uncommitted and ‘favorite son” delegations. The true issue of the convention will not be one of personalities; it will be whether the process of gaining conservative control of the Republican Party, dramatically inaugurated in 1964, will be consolidated, in however low a key, or whether the liberals will regain the control they exercised from 1940 to 1964. It is here that I think the second factor in conservative confusion comes into play: the failure to recognize the degree to which 1964 represented, despite the electoral defeat, a potential massive victory for conservatism through the rehabilitation of the Republican Party as an available institutional vehicle for conservatism. As M. Stanton Evans said recently (NR, 5/30/67): “November 1964 generated a natural but misleading sense of conservative despair. In the pale glow of that sulphurous Tuesday, all Barry Goldwater had said and done from 1960 forward was bathed in retrospective gloom. The trick of lighting causes us to forget that the Goldwater candidacy — the mere fact of his nomination—marked an enduring victory for conservatism.” The strategic point at which conservative energy can be applied to achieve the most lasting success is in so working within the Republican Party from the bottom up that the liberal grip which was loosened in 1964 is permanently broken. This patently does not mean in 1968 an emotionally satisfying pre-convention campaign, such as that of 1964. It means hard patient work that can eventuate in a decisive conservative voice at the Republican convention. It may not bring about the nomination of an ideal conservative candidate, but it can make certain that no liberal of the stripe of Percy or Romney will be nominated. Furthermore, it will insure that the candidate nominated will be acceptable to conservatives, that he will owe his victory to conservatives and will hold to broadly conservative principles, and that the course of the Republican Party will be firmly set in a conservative direction.

THESE ARE the general considerations with which I think conservatives ought to approach the problems of 1968. Still they are only guidelines; they do not answer the question of what candidate or candidates might meet their requirements. It seems to me that there are two questions that have to be answered in this respect: the question of a principled position and the question of fitness for office. On the question of principle, one can rule out, to begin with, Percy, whose miserable position on Vietnam and on Communist aggression has earned him the support of both Martin Luther King and writers for the New Republic as a potential candidate. Romney, who has no discernible principles at all, can similarly be ruled out. Of all the leading candidates, Reagan obviously has the most consistent principled conservative stand, on both domestic and foreign policy. Nixon has an honorable anti-Communist record and, if he has been somewhat ambiguous on domestic questions at times, he would seem to be, on balance, acceptable to conservatives—if he can avoid the temptation to which he has succumbed in the past, the temptation of assuming that the conservatives are in his pocket and therefore distorting his position to court the liberals.