Politics thinkers

Abraham Lincoln Sixteenth president, first Republican to hold the office, who led the Union through the Civil War and ended slavery. Alexander Hamilton First Treasury Secretary and principal author of The Federalist Papers, who built the early republic's finances and argued for an energetic national government. Alexis de Tocqueville French diplomat and political thinker whose Democracy in America studied how equality shapes liberty, civic associations and the risk of soft despotism. Ayn Rand Russian-born novelist and founder of Objectivism, a defender of laissez-faire capitalism who refused the conservative label and rejected religion. Barry Goldwater Arizona senator and 1964 Republican nominee whose book The Conscience of a Conservative helped lay the groundwork for the modern conservative movement. Booker T. Washington Born into slavery, he led Tuskegee Institute and became the leading Black American voice of his era, preaching education, thrift and self-help. Calvin Coolidge Thirtieth president, a Massachusetts Republican known for restrained government, tax cuts and a plain-spoken defence of limited federal power in the 1920s. Charles Krauthammer Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and former psychiatrist who named the Reagan Doctrine and the unipolar moment and argued for democratic realism. Clarence Thomas Associate Justice of the Supreme Court since 1991, an originalist who has written influential opinions on the Second Amendment, federalism and precedent. Edmund Burke Anglo-Irish statesman and writer whose Reflections on the Revolution in France made him the most cited philosophical founder of modern conservatism. Eric Voegelin German-American political philosopher who analysed totalitarianism as a political religion and warned against immanentizing the eschaton. Frank Meyer Former communist theorist turned National Review editor, whose fusionism joined libertarian and traditionalist conservatism into one movement. Frederick Douglass Escaped slave turned abolitionist, orator and diplomat who argued the Constitution is antislavery and the Declaration belongs to all. Frédéric Bastiat French economist and legislator whose essays on free trade, legal plunder and the broken window shaped the classical liberal case for limited government. George Mason Virginia planter and author of the Virginia Declaration of Rights who refused to sign the Constitution for lack of a bill of rights. George Washington Commander of the Continental Army and first president, whose Farewell Address warned against faction and foreign entanglement. Harry Jaffa Claremont political philosopher and student of Leo Strauss who made Lincoln and the Declaration of Independence central to American conservatism. Irving Kristol Editor and essayist called the godfather of neoconservatism, co-founder of The Public Interest and author of Two Cheers for Capitalism. James Burnham Philosopher and former Trotskyist who wrote The Managerial Revolution and Suicide of the West and was a senior editor of National Review from its start. James Madison Virginia statesman and fourth president, principal architect of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and a co-author of The Federalist Papers. Jeane Kirkpatrick Georgetown political scientist and the first woman U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, author of the essay Dictatorships and Double Standards. John Adams Massachusetts lawyer, first vice president and second president, who argued for independence and wrote the framework for republican constitutions. John Jay Founder, diplomat and first Chief Justice of the United States, co-author of the Federalist Papers and negotiator of the Treaty of Paris and the Jay Treaty. John Locke English philosopher whose Two Treatises of Government set out natural rights, consent of the governed and limited government. John Marshall Fourth Chief Justice of the United States, who served from 1801 to 1835 and established judicial review in Marbury v. Madison. Joseph de Maistre Savoyard diplomat and counter-revolutionary philosopher, a founder of European conservatism with Burke, who defended throne and altar against the Enlightenment. Leo Strauss German-born University of Chicago political philosopher who revived classical political philosophy and taught generations of American political thinkers. Lord Acton English Catholic historian and liberal politician remembered for the warning that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Margaret Thatcher Britain's first woman prime minister, who from 1979 to 1990 curbed union power, privatised state industries and championed free markets and a strong defence. Michael Oakeshott English philosopher whose essay On Being Conservative and Rationalism in Politics define conservatism as a disposition, not a programme. Montesquieu French jurist whose Spirit of the Laws argued for separating legislative, executive and judicial powers, an idea built into the U.S. Constitution. Phyllis Schlafly Attorney, author and founder of Eagle Forum who led the campaign against the Equal Rights Amendment and wrote A Choice Not an Echo for Goldwater. Richard Weaver University of Chicago English professor whose Ideas Have Consequences became a founding book of the postwar traditionalist right. Robert Bork Yale law professor, Solicitor General and appeals judge whose 1987 Supreme Court nomination failed and whose originalism and antitrust work were influential. Robert Nisbet Sociologist whose The Quest for Community argued that a strong state and weak intermediate institutions threaten freedom, in the line of Burke. Robert Taft Ohio senator nicknamed Mr. Republican, co-author of the Taft-Hartley Act and the leader of the conservative coalition that resisted the New Deal's expansion. Roger Scruton English philosopher and writer who gave modern British conservatism a philosophical voice, writing on beauty, architecture, home and belonging. Ronald Reagan Fortieth president and former California governor whose tax cuts, defence buildup and firm stand against communism defined the modern conservative era. Russell Kirk Michigan author whose 1953 book The Conservative Mind traced a tradition from Burke onward and gave postwar American conservatism its intellectual identity. Thomas Jefferson Principal author of the Declaration of Independence and third president, a champion of limited government, religious freedom and agrarian republicanism. Whittaker Chambers Former Soviet underground courier turned Time editor and National Review writer whose memoir Witness became a founding text of Cold War conservatism. Wilhelm Röpke German economist and social critic, an architect of the ordoliberal social market economy and a conservative critic of mass society and centralisation. William F. Buckley Jr. Founder of National Review and host of Firing Line, who built the postwar conservative movement by joining traditionalists, libertarians and anticommunists. William Rehnquist Sixteenth Chief Justice of the United States, who led the Court from 1986 to 2005 and revived federalism limits on Congress. Willmoore Kendall Yale political theorist and early National Review figure who defended majority rule, a society's orthodoxy and a conservative reading of the American tradition.