The Paleo Conservative Reading List, Part 1 (Books)
The trouble with reading lists is that sometimes a reader knowledgeable about a subject will have gathered bits and pieces from books that have no direct relevance to the list being made; yet those bits and pieces can be vital keys to putting together a broad understanding of a given topic. Obviously I cannot include here every book I’ve read.
For instance, some of the way I understand the Old Right, or the traditionalist conservative impulse in America came from my libertarian years, when I read their own commentary about the meaning of Conservatism; yet it doesn’t seem right to put some libertarian economic anthology in a paleo-conservative reading list. Or in other instances, perhaps one must understand the roots of political philosophy by comprehending certain themes in Plato. Must I add the Greeks to my list?
Thus, I will try to limit my suggestions to this general framework: Paleo-Conservatism was a moment in American conservative politics, primarily in the 1980s and 1990s that sought to recover an approach to political problems that preceded the universalist bent of the post 1950s New Right in America, led by Bill Buckley and National Review. This New Right eventually got taken over completely by Neoconservatives who continued the censorship campaign against traditionalists, the dissident right, and others who general opposed the new ideology of liberal-democracy in America.
In my list, I will include right wing non-Neoconservatives of many stripes: the Paleos as a formal group (Gottfried and Francis), the Paleo-adjacents (Russell Kirk), and the pre-Paleos (people like Garet Garrett or Robert Taft or influential Anglo-American traditionalists (like TS Eliot or Chesterton). I will try to keep them American, or at least influential for the Americans. This means that I will sometimes be forced to leave out important topics like criticism of modernity, or the genius historical works of Christopher Dawson. Maybe another reading list for the Right more generally is needed, which will be much bigger.
With such limitations in mind, I am glad, at long last, to produce this reading list for those seeking to understand the paleo-conservative impulse in its theoretical and historical expressions. (And please message me if I missed someone obvious)
Economics
Beyond Capitalism and Socialism, edited by Tobias Lanz
New Agrarian Mind, by Allan Carlson
Income Tax: Root of all Evil, by Frank Chodorov
The American Way
American Way: Family and Community in the Shaping of the American Identity by Allan Carlson
Natural Family: A Manifesto by Allan Carlson
Nullification, by Thomas E Woods
Forgotten Conservatives in American History, by Brion McClanahan
No Liberty for License: The Forgotten Logic of the First Amendment David Lowenthal
The Southern Tradition at Bay, but Richard Weaver
Myth of American Individualism by Barry Alan Shain
Nature of Rights at the American Founding and Beyond by Barry Alan Shain
Calhoun and Popular Rule by H Lee Cheek
America's British Culture, by Russell Kirk
Rights and Duties: Reflections on Our Conservative Constitution, by Russell Kirk
The Roots of American Order by Russell Kirk
Regionalism and Nationalism in the United States: The Attack on Leviathan by Donald Davidson
Basic Symbols of the American Political Tradition Willmoore Kendall
Sweetness of Life: Southern Planters at Home by Eugene Genovese
Criticism of American Politics
Historical
Who Owns America: A New Declaration of Independence, edited by Herbert Agar and Allen Tate
I'll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition, by Twelve Southerners
Who Killed the Constitution? by Thomas E Woods and Kevin Gutzman
Government by Judiciary, by Raoul Berger
Salvos Against the New Deal by Garet Garrett
Progressive Era by Murray N Rothbard
Failure of American Conservatism, Claes G. Ryn
New Jacobinism, by Claes G. Ryn
America the Virtuous: The Crisis of Democracy and the Quest for Empire Claes G. Ryn
War Collectivism, by Murray Rothbard
Wall Street, Banks, and American Foreign Policy Murray Rothbard
Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement by Justin Raimondo
Betrayal of the American Right by Murray N. Rothbard
Southern Agrarians and the New Deal: Essays after I'll Take My Stand
Great Wars and Great Leaders: A Libertarian Rebuttal Ralph Raico
America First! by Bill Kauffman
Roosevelt and Stalin by Robert A. Nisbet
Present
Our Borders, Ourselves by Lawrence Auster (Essays)
Foreign Policy for Americans, by Robert Taft
Present Age: Progress and Anarchy in Modern America by Robert Nisbet
Look Homeward America: In Search of Reactionary Radicals and Front-Porch Anarchist by Bill Kauffman
From Union to Empire (Essays) by Clyde Wilson
American Diplomacy by George Kennan
It Didn't Start With Watergate, by Victor Lasky
The Paleoconservatives by Joseph Scotchie
Revolt from the Heartland Joseph A. Scotchie
Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy Christopher Lasch
Alien Nation: Common Sense About America's Immigration Disaster by Peter Brimelow
Age of Entitlement, by Christopher Caldwell
Conservatism Inc.: The Battle for the American Right by James Kirkpatrick,
From the Dissident Right, by John Derbyshire
Joseph Sobran: the National Review Years, by Joseph Sobran
Suicide of the West: An Essay on the Meaning and Destiny of Liberalism by James Burnham
Homo Americanus, by Zbigniew Janowski
Beautiful Losers: Essays on the Failure of American Conservatism by Sam Francis
Revolution from the Middle, by Samuel T Francis
Shots Fired: Sam Francis on America's Culture War Samuel T. Francis
Political Theory
Democracy and Leadership, by Irving Babbitt
Conservatism: Dream and Reality by Robert Nisbet
The Sovereign Collection by Carl Schmitt
On Power by Bertrand de Jouvenel
Populist Delusion by Neema Parvini
Sociological Tradition, by Robert Nisbet
Great Debate: Edmund Burke, Thomas Paine, and the Birth of Right and Left by Yuval Levin
Society as a Department Store: Critical Reflections on the Liberal State by Ryszard Legutko
Demon in Democracy: Totalitarian Temptations in Free Societies by Ryszard Legutko
Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy: A Conservative Critique by Grant Havers
Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt: Toward a Secular Theocracy by Paul Gottfried
Paleoconservative Anthology by Paul Gottfried (this is the book my essay was published in, chapter 6)
Revisions and Dissents by Paul Gottfried
Search for Historical Meaning: Hegel and the Postwar American Right by Paul Gottfried
Leo Strauss and the Conservative Movement in America by Paul Gottfried
War and Democracy by Paul Gottfried
Vanishing Tradition by Paul Gottfried
Conservatism in America: Making Sense of the American Right by Paul Gottfried
Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom by James Burnham
Politics of Human Nature Thomas Fleming
Morality of Everyday Life by Thomas Fleming
Leviathan and Its Enemies by Samuel T Francis
Virtue and the Promise of Conservatism: The Legacy of Burke and Tocqueville by Bruce Frohnen
Rethinking Rights by Bruce P. Frohnen
Power and History by Samuel T. Francis
History
Century of War: Lincoln, Wilson & Roosevelt John V. Denson
Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America
Dispossessed Majority by Wilmot Robertson
The Costs of War: America’s Pyrrhic Victories, by John Denson
Civil War and Reconstruction
Look Away!: A History of the Confederate States of America William C. Davis
North against South: The American Iliad, 1848-1877 Ludwell H. Johnson III
Politics of Dissolution by Marshall DeRosa
Story of Reconstruction by Robert Selph Henry
Story of the Confederacy by Robert Selph Henry
Southern Reconstruction by Philip Leigh
World War
Defend America First by Garet Garrett
Back Door to War by Charles Tansill
America's Second Crusade, by William Henry Chamberlin
New Dealers' War: FDR And The War Within World War II by Thomas Fleming
Stalin's Secret Agents: The Subversion of Roosevelt's Government by M Stanton Evans
America First by Wayne S. Cole
Charles A. Lindbergh and the Battle Against American Intervention in World War Two by Wayne Cole
Storm on the Horizon: The Challenge to American Intervention, 1939-1941
Roosevelt and the Isolationists, 1932-45, Wayne S. Cole
Postwar Politics
Silent Coup: The Removal of a President, by Len Colodny
JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters By James W. Douglass
Nineteenth Century
Essential Calhoun: Selections from Writings, Speeches, and Letters
John C Calhoun, Selected Writings, edited by H Lee Cheek
Social Criticism
Equality, Decadence, and Modernity: The Collected Essays of Stephen J. Tonsor
Portable Conservative Reader by Russell Kirk (Editor)
Ideas Have Consequences, by Richard Weaver
In Defense of Tradition, by Richard Weaver
The Southern Essays of Richard Weaver
Quest for Community by Robert Nisbet
Tradition and Revolt by Robert Nisbet
Twilight of Authority by Robert Nisbet
If We Do Nothing: Essays and reviews from 25 years of white advocacy by Jared Taylor
State of the Union: Essays in Social Criticism by Albert Jay Nock
Superfluous Southerners: Cultural Conservatism and the South, 1920-1990 by John J. Langdale III
Southern Front: History and Politics in the Cultural War, by Eugene D. Genovese
Revolt of the Masses by José Ortega y Gasset
Steps Toward Restoration: The Consequences of Richard Weaver's Ideas, Edited by Ted Smith
Better Guide than Reason, by Mel Bradford
Southern Writers in the Modern World by Donald Davidson
Remembering Who We Are: Observations of a Southern Conservative by Mel Bradford
The Reactionary Imperative, by Mel Bradford
Superfluous Men: Conservative Critics of American Culture, 1900-1945, edited by Robert McCrundun
From Eden to Babylon, by Andrew Lytle
A Wake for the Living by Andrew Lytle
Southerners and Europeans: Essays in a Time of Disorder by Andrew Lytle
Selected Political Essays, by Orestes Brownson
Lament for a Nation, by George Grant
Biographical and Intellectual Studies
Vision of Richard Weaver, by Joseph Scotchie
T. S. Eliot and Ideology, by Kenneth Asher
Political Philosophy of Alexander Hamilton by Michael Federici
Life and Thought of Herbert Butterfield, by Michael Bentley
Encounters: My Life with Nixon, Marcuse, and Other Friends and Teachers by Paul Edward Gottfried
Carl Schmitt by Paul Edward Gottfried
Founding Fathers: Brief Lives of the Framers of the United States Constitution, by Mel Bradford
Witness, by Whittaker Chambers
Prophets on the right: Profiles of conservative critics of American globalism by Ronald Radosh
Andrew Jackson, Southerner, by Mark Cheathem
John Tyler, Champion of the Old South by Oliver Chitwood
Around the Cragged Hill: A Personal and Political Philosophy by George Kennan
John C. Calhoun: American Portrait, by Margaret Coit
George Kennan for Our Time by Lee Congdon
George Kennan: A Study of Character John Lukacs
Edmund Burke: A Genius Reconsidered Russell Kirk
Eliot and His Age: T. S. Eliot's Moral Imagination in the Twentieth Century by Russell Kirk
Political Principles of Robert A. Taft Russell Kirk
John Randolph of Roanoke by Russell Kirk
Contra Mundum: Joseph de Maistre & The Birth of Tradition by Thomas Garrett Isham
Joseph de Maistre's Life, Thought, and Influence: Selected Studies
George Kennan: A Writing Life by Lee Congdon
Southern Agrarians Paul K. Conkin
Lee: A Biography Clifford Dowdey
Unsanctioned Voice: Garet Garrett, Journalist of the Old Right by Bruce Ramsey
John Randolph of Roanoke David Johnson
Stonewall Jackson by James Robertson
James Burnham and the Struggle for the World: A Life Daniel Kelly
Lindbergh of Minnesota Bruce L. Larson
Teachers and Scholars Robert Nisbet
Barbarians in the Saddle: An Intellectual Portrait of Richard M Weaver by Joseph A. Scotchie
Carolina Cavalier by Clyde Wilson
Richard Weaver: A Life of the Mind by Fred Young
A Defender of Southern Conservatism: M.E. Bradford and His Achievements by Clyde Wilson
Mencken: The American Iconoclast by Marion Elizabeth Rodgers
Mr. Republican: A Biography of Robert A. Taft James T. Patterson
Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology W. Wesley McDonald
Robert Nisbet by Brad Lowell Stone
Crusader: The Life and Tumultuous Times of Pat Buchanan by Timothy Stanley
Great list, CJay. Thank you. It was good to see the "Southern Agrarians" and also Thomas Fleming.
Thanks so much for doing this C.Jay. This is huge for me. Starting with Caldwell's book. Please release as many of these lists as possible.