[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 131 (Monday, October 17, 2005)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2088-E2089]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 CELEBRATING NATIONAL REVIEW'S SUCCESS

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. JOE WILSON

                           of south carolina

                    in the house of representatives

                        Monday, October 17, 2005

  Mr. WILSON of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, as a subscriber of 
National Review since high school I know personally its historic impact 
on American culture providing for conservatism to be the respected 
political philosophy of today.
  Despite withering assaults, the majority achievement of conservatism 
today is largely due to the courageous intellect of William F. Buckley, 
Jr.
  I am grateful to be identified as a National Review Republican. On 
October 8th, The Washington Times' lead editorial chronicled its 
significance:

                         National Review at 50

       National Review met the world on Nov. 18, 1955, on an 
     upbeat note. ``There is, we like to think, solid reason for 
     rejoicing:'' began founder and longtime editor William F. 
     Buckley Jr., which was just a little odd. No one, liberals 
     and conservatives alike, could quite understand Mr. Buckley's 
     enthusiasm. Surely, with America's destiny in the competent 
     hands of social planners and international bureaucrats, 
     conservatism was dead. What, then, is the point of a 
     conservative journal, especially one greeting the world with 
     a wink and a smile? Mr. Buckley appeared to concede the 
     point, admitting ``it seems altogether possible that did 
     National Review not exist, no one would have invented it. 
     Nevertheless,'' he added, in what would become the right's 
     rallying cry, National Review ``stands athwart history, 
     yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or 
     to have much patience with those who so urge it.'' And with 
     that the standard was raised, the battle joined, and the 
     rest, as they say, is history.
       This week in Washington, National Review celebrated its 
     50th anniversary. Once more there is, we're sure Mr. Buckley 
     still thinks, solid reason for rejoicing. The world has 
     changed: Communism, not conservatism, is dead or dying; the 
     social planners, not the capitalists, have retreated to the 
     universities; and America (not the international 
     bureaucracies) has spread freedom throughout the globe. Of 
     course, more needs to be done. But 50 years ago, few 
     conservatives would have predicted the country could ever get 
     this far. ``It is idle,'' Whittaker Chambers wrote to his 
     friend, Mr. Buckley, in 1961, ``to talk about preventing the 
     wreck of Western civilization. It is already a wreck from 
     within.'' Even if Chambers' prognosis was a bit too shrouded 
     in doom, it was still a lonely time to be a conservative. 
     With its trademarked irreverence and schoolyard sense of 
     mischief, National Review ``crashed through,'' as Mr. Buckley 
     put it, to break the dangerous lock liberals had taken for 
     granted and offer the ``non-licensed nonconformists'' (i.e. 
     conservatives) a place to call home.
       So to say that National Review had something of a monopoly 
     on the conservative audience is true, since there was simply 
     nothing else. It also diminishes the peculiar challenge Mr. 
     Buckley and his staff faced--namely, just what was 
     conservatism? On Thursday, President Bush lunched with Mr. 
     Buckley and others to mark the occasion, during which he 
     described this three-ring conservative circus: ``[Mr. 
     Buckley] had voices that included ex-communists who knew 
     better than most the threat posed to America by the Soviet 
     Union. He had voices such as free marketers who knew that 
     markets could deliver better results than bureaucracies. He 
     had voices from traditionalists who understood that a 
     government of and by and for the people could not stand 
     unless it stood on moral grounds.''
       By combining these [still] feuding factions into a 
     political philosophy with mass appeal, National Review worked 
     to remake the Republican Party. To do this, as well as to 
     purge the extremists, it made poking fun at liberals almost a 
     sideshow.
       With 50 years behind it, how has National Review done? 
     Columnist and former NR editor George Will called it ``the 
     most consequential journal of opinion ever,'' which is no 
     overstatement. On the Internet, in multimillion-dollar 
     institutes and in Washington, conservative ideas are 
     ubiquitous. They brought Ronald Reagan to the White House, 
     who in turn brought down the Evil Empire. It is as true today 
     as it was in the dark days of 1955 that one's conservative 
     journey usually begins with National Review. May it remain so 
     for another 50 years.

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