"The two parties which divide the state, the party of Conservatism and that of Innovation, are very old, and have disputed the possession of the world ever since it was made... The war rages not only in battlefields, in national councils, and ecclesiastical synods, but agitates every man’s bosom with opposing advantages every hour.

.......and still the fight renews itself as if for the first time, under new names and hot personalities. Such an irreconcilable antagonism, of course, must have a correspondent depth of seat in the human constitution. It is the primal antagonism, the appearance in trifles of the two poles of nature."

–Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Conservative

As a college student in the early 1970s, I was puzzled by the consistency of political attitudes across different issues, in different spheres of life. At that time, political leaders who espoused conservative positions on economic and social issues also tended to be hawkish on questions of foreign policy. Liberal politicians, conversely, favored increased spending on social welfare programs and opposed increased military spending and the war in Vietnam. This consistency of political opinions, with some exceptions, remains true today, perhaps to an even greater extent, and includes many more issues. Liberals and conservatives differ in their opinions on health care, abortion, immigration, gun control, gay rights, and the threat of climate change. On all these issues, liberals are (most often) liberal, and conservatives are (most often) conservative.

I wondered, then and now, why do these attitudes and opinions go together? What is the logical (or, more likely, emotional) relationship of these different opinions? What is the inner coherence of liberal and conservative ideas? What is their “deep grammar”? What is the theme that can be heard throughout many different variations?

My........

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