Author: Redactor

Today

Stendhal

On January 23, 1783, novelist Marie-Henri Beyle, known by his pen name Stendhal, was born. Stendahl was an avid student of the French liberal philosophical tradition, a follower of Destutt de Tracy and an attendant at the count’s salons. His most famous works include the novel The Red and the Black and a treatise on romantic love.

On January 23, 1860, the Cobden–Chevalier Treaty was signed between France and Great Britain. The treaty was named after the two main proponents of the agreement, Richard Cobden (in England) and economist Michel Chevalier (in France). The treaty had been suggested the year earlier, in British Parliament, by Cobden’s colleague John Bright, who saw the measure as a peace measure, and an alternate to a military build-up.

Thought

Irving Kristol

“Our youthful rebels are anything but inarticulate; and though they utter a great deal of nonsense, the import of what they are saying is clear enough. What they are saying is that they dislike — to put it mildly — the liberal, individualist, capitalist civilization that stands ready to receive them as citizens. They are rejecting this offer of citizenship and are declaring their desire to see some other kind of civilization replace it.”

Irving Kristol, “‘When virtue loses all her loveliness’ — some reflections on Capitalism and ‘the free society,’” National Affairs, No. 21, Fall 1970.

Thought

Whittaker Chambers

“Then he asked in German (the only language that we ever spoke): ‘Ist die Sowjetregierung eine faschistische Regierung? – Is the Soviet Government a fascist government?”. . . . I sat silent for some moments. Then I said: “Ja, die Sowjetregierung ist eine faschistische Regierung — the Soviet Government is a fascist government”. . . . Krivitsky turned for the first time and looked at me directly. ‘Du hast recht,’ he said, ‘und Kronstadt war der Wendepunkt – You are right, and Kronstadt was the turning point.”

Whittaker Chambers, Witness, pp. 459–460.

Today

Kristol

On January 22, 1920, American neoconservative pundit and author Irving Kristol was born.

Thought

Irving Kristol

“When we lack the will to see things as they really are, there is nothing so mystifying as the obvious.”
Irving Kristol, “‘When virtue loses all her loveliness’ — some reflections on Capitalism and ‘the free society,’” National Affairs, No. 21, Fall 1970.

Today

Witness

On January 21, 1950, Alger Hiss was convicted of perjury, with Whittaker Chambers being the main witness in Hiss’s prosecution. Chambers confessed to having been a Soviet spy, and accused Hiss as an accomplice, which Hiss denied to his dying day. Chambers wrote a fascinating memoir about all this in Witness.

Today

ACLU

Post author By Redactor
Post date January 20, 2016
1 Comment on ACLU

On January 20, 1920, the American Civil Liberties Union was founded.

Thought

Montesquieu

The deterioration of a government begins almost always by the decay of its principles.
Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, Book VIII, Chapter 1.

Thought

Montesquieu

Christians are beginning to lose the spirit of intolerance which animated them: experience has shown the error of the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, and of the persecution of those Christians in France whose belief differed a little from that of the king. They have realized that zeal for the advancement of religion is different from a due attachment to it; and that in order to love it and fulfill its behests, it is not necessary to hate and persecute those who are opposed to it.
Montesquieu, Persian Letters, no. 60.

Thought

James Madison

“The Constitution supposes, what the history of all governments demonstrates, that the executive is the branch of government most interested in war, and most prone to it. It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the legislature.”