TheOld Right, also called theOld Guard, is an informal designation used for a branch ofAmerican conservatism that was most prominent from 1910 to the mid-1950s, but never became an organized movement. Most members were Republicans, although there was aconservative Democratic element based largely in theSouthern United States. They are termed the "Old Right" to distinguish them from theirNew Right successors who came to prominence in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.
Most were unified by their defense ofauthority,tradition,morality,religion,limited government,rule of law,civic nationalism,capitalism,social conservatism,anti-Communism,anti-socialism,anti-Zionism, andanti-imperialism, as well as their skepticism ofegalitarianism anddemocracy and the growing power ofWashington.[1] The Old Right typically favoredlaissez-faireclassical liberalism; some werefree market conservatives; others were ex-radical leftists who moved sharply to the right, such as the novelistJohn Dos Passos. Still others, such as the DemocratSouthern Agrarians, weretraditionalists who dreamed of restoring a pre-moderncommunal society.[2] Above all,Murray Rothbard wrote, the Old Right were unified by opposition to what they saw as the danger of "domestic dictatorship" byDemocratic presidentFranklin Roosevelt and hisNew Deal program.[3]
The Old Rightper se has faded as an organized movement, but many similar ideas are found amongpaleoconservatives andpaleolibertarians.
The Old Right came into being when theRepublican Party (GOP) split in 1910, and was influential within that party into the 1940s. They pushedTheodore Roosevelt and his progressive followers out in 1912. From 1933, many Democrats became associated with the Old Right through their opposition toFranklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) and hisNew Deal Coalition, and with the Republicans formed theConservative Coalition to block its initiatives. Conservatives disagreed on foreign policy, and the Old Right favored non-interventionist policies on Europe at the start ofWorld War II. After the war, they opposed PresidentHarry Truman's domestic and foreign policies. The last major battle was led by Ohio SenatorRobert A. Taft, who was defeated byDwight D Eisenhower for the presidential nomination in 1952. The new conservative movement later led byWilliam F. Buckley, Jr.,Barry Goldwater andRonald Reagan adopted much of the domestic anti-New Deal conservatism of the Old Right, but broke with it by demanding free trade and an aggressive, internationalist, interventionist, and anti-communist foreign policy.
HistorianGeorge H. Nash argues:
Unlike the "moderate", internationalist, largely eastern bloc of Republicans who accepted (or at least acquiesced in) some of the "Roosevelt Revolution" and the essential premises of President Truman's foreign policy, the Republican Right at heart was counter-revolutionary. Anti-collectivist, anti-Communist, anti-New Deal, passionately committed to limited government, free market economics, and congressional (as opposed to executive) prerogatives, the G.O.P. conservatives were obliged to wage a constant two-front war: against liberal Democrats from without and "me-too" Republicans from within.[4]
The Old Right emerged in opposition to theNew Deal and to FDR personally; it drew from multiple sources. Hoff says, "moderate Republicans and leftover Republican Progressives like Hoover composed the bulk of the Old Right by 1940, with a sprinkling of former members of the Farmer–Labor party, Non-Partisan League, and even a few midwestern prairie Socialists."[5]
By 1937, partisans of the Old Right had formed aConservative coalition that controlled Congress until 1964.[6] They were consistently non-interventionist and opposed entering World War II, a position exemplified by theAmerica First Committee. Later, most opposed U.S. entry intoNATO and intervention in theKorean War. "In addition to being staunch opponents of war and militarism, the Old Right of the postwar period had a rugged and near-libertarian honesty in domestic affairs as well."[7]
This anti-New Deal movement was a coalition of multiple groups: business Republicans likeRobert A. Taft andRaymond E. Baldwin; conservative Democrats likeJosiah Bailey,[8]Al Smith andJohn W. Davis;[9]libertarians likeH. L. Mencken[10] andGaret Garrett[11] andmass mediatycoons likeWilliam Randolph Hearst[12] and ColonelRobert R. McCormick.[13][14]
In his 1986 bookConservatism: Dream and Reality,Robert Nisbet noted the traditional hostility of the right tointerventionism and to increases in military expenditure:[15]
Of all the misascriptions of the word 'conservative' during the last four years, the most amusing, in an historical light, is surely the application of 'conservative' to the last-named. For in America throughout the twentieth century, and including four substantial wars abroad, conservatives had been steadfastly the voices of non-inflationary military budgets, and of an emphasis on trade in the world instead of American nationalism. In the twoWorldWars, inKorea, and inViet Nam, the leaders of American entry into war were such renowned liberal-progressives asWoodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt,Harry Truman andJohn F. Kennedy. In all four episodes conservatives, both in the national government and in the rank and file, were largely hostile to intervention; were isolationists indeed.
Jeff Riggenbach argues that some members of the Old Right were actuallyclassical liberals and "were accepted members of the 'Left' before 1933. Yet, without changing any of their fundamental views, all of them, over the next decade, came to be thought of as exemplars of the political 'Right'."[16]
While outsiders thought Taft was the epitome of the conservative wing of the Republican Party, inside the party he was repeatedly criticized by hard-liners who were alarmed by his sponsorship ofNew Deal-like programs, especially federal housing for the poor, and federal aid to public schools. The real estate lobby was especially fearful about public housing. SenatorKenneth Wherry discerned a "touch of socialism" in Taft, while his Ohio colleague SenatorJohn Bricker speculated that perhaps the "socialists have gotten to Bob Taft". This distrust on the right hurt Taft's 1948 presidential ambitions.[17]
The Southern Agrarian wing drew on some of the values and anxieties being articulated on the anti-modern right, including the desire to retain the social authority and defend the autonomy of the American states and regions, especially the South.[18]Donald Davidson was one of the most politically active of the agrarians, especially in his criticisms of theTVA in his nativeTennessee. TheSouthern Agrarians articulated old values ofJeffersonian Democracy.[19] Paul V. Murphy explains that they "called for a return to the small-scale economy of rural America as a means to preserve the cultural amenities of the society they knew."[20] Instead of science and efficiency, they preferred to rely on religion to uphold social order and values.
Paleoconservatives andpaleolibertarians are often considered the successors and torchbearers of the Old Right view in the late-20th century and the 21st century. Both of these groups often rally behind Old Right slogans such as "America First" while sharing similar views to the Old Right opposition to theNew Deal and involvement in World War II (including Old Right objections to economic programs and loans of naval equipment to supply England, through the famous 'Blitz' of 1940–41'Britain's Finest Hour', viewing such aid as likely to involve the US further). Recently, it has been suggested that some of the ideas of the Old Right have seen a resurgence in the2008 and2012 presidential campaigns ofRon Paul[24][25] and the2016 and2020 presidential campaigns ofDonald Trump.[26][25]
Media related toOld Right (United States) at Wikimedia Commons
