Brian A. Smith Subscribe

Brian A. Smith is the managing editor of Law & Liberty. He is the author of Walker Percy and the Politics of the Wayfarer (Lexington Books, 2017). Before joining Law & Liberty, he taught politics and great books at Montclair State University from 2009-2018. He tweets at @briansmith1980.

August 30, 2019|Alexis de Tocqueville, Equality, fraternity, Liberty, road trip, Susan McWilliams Barndt, Walker Percy

Wayfaring in America

by Brian A. Smith|1 Comment

Motorcyclist traveling on Route 66 in Arizona (Michael Urmann/Shutterstock.com).

Americans take to the road because it turns out that Bruce Springsteen was on to something: democratic souls are born to run.

June 14, 2019|Antonin Scalia, George Washington, James Madison, John Adams, Joseph Ellis, Robert Bork, Second Amendment, Thomas Jefferson

Joseph Ellis’s American Monologue

by Brian A. Smith|30 Comments

Junius Brutus Stearns, "Washington as Statesman at the Constitutional Convention," 1856 (Virginia Museum of Fine Arts).

In Joseph Ellis’ view, it’s just fine for us to love the Founders, but not for anyone to understand them in ways that might derail the march of progress.

March 29, 2019|authoritarianism, Johann Chapoutot, National Socialism, Nationalism, Populism

The Nazis Aren’t Who We Think They Are

by Brian A. Smith|14 Comments

SS troops marching with victory standards at the Party Day rally in Nuremberg, Germany 1933 (Everett Historical/Shutterstock.com).

Reading The Law of Blood can help us understand the beliefs that animated National Socialism, and help us see what they were not.

January 24, 2019|Beto O'Rourke, Equality, Kamala Harris, Liberalism, post-liberalism, radicalism

The Woke and the Dead

by Brian A. Smith|3 Comments

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii addresses the National Guard Association of the United States General Conference in Baltimore, MD, Sept. 12, 2016. (Photo by Sgt. 1st Class Jim Greenhill/Alamy Stock Photo).

The Democratic primary may well offer the most demanding test of virtue-signaling ever yet devised outside of Ivy League presidential searches.

November 26, 2018|Anglo-American tradition, Edmund Burke, Friedrich Hayek, Isiah Berlin, João Carlos Espada, Leo Strauss, Michael Oakeshott, Natural Law, Winston Churchill

To Sustain the Anglo-American Tradition, Conversation Is Not Enough

by Brian A. Smith|6 Comments

Statue of Sir Winston Churchill in Parliament Square Garden in London, U.K. (Pajor Pawel / Shutterstock.com).

Why is it that the English-speaking peoples historically combined a deep love of liberty with a passionate devotion to their political duties? Can it last?

November 21, 2018|Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Dan Crenshaw, Donald Trump, Fusionism, Mike Gallagher, Republican Party

A Republican Party After Trump?

by Brian A. Smith|31 Comments

Rep.-elect Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, is seen on the Capitol on November 14, 2018. (Photo By Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

If the Republican Party finds its way past the Trump-inflicted losses of November 6 and those to come, it will need new leaders.

November 2, 2018|great powers, Matthew Kroenig, nuclear deterrence, peace, United States, War

The Long Nuclear Peace

by Brian A. Smith|1 Comment

Still image from Operation Crossroads, U.S. nuclear test at Bikini Atoll, July 25, 1946 (Everett Historical/Shutterstock.com).

Prudence sometimes dictates that we contemplate the unthinkable, if only to keep it at bay.

September 26, 2018|Brett Kavanaugh, Carl Schmitt, Democracy, Liberalism, Partisanship

Are We Living in Carl Schmitt’s America?

by Brian A. Smith|9 Comments

Protestors dressed as "Handmaidens" line the hallway near Judge Brett Kavanaugh's nomination hearing to become the next Associate Supreme Court Justice, September 3, 2018 (Patsy Lynch/MediaPunch/Alamy Stock Photos).

We should be mindful of what is lost when a politics of enmity becomes our way of life.

August 17, 2018|Abraham Lincoln, Augustine, Carl von Clausewitz, grand strategy, John Lewis Gaddis, Niccolo Machiavelli, Sun Tzu