The Conservative Bookshelf: Essential Works That Impact Today's Conservative Thinkers

A list of works of interest to politcal and social conservatives includes titles ranging from the Bible, Cicero's Republic and Tocqueville's "Democracy in America" to present day works from Ann Coulter and Pat Buchanan.

One doesn't have to read much of this excellent book to wonder whether its subtitle is wishful thinking. Many of the works discussed are demanding, the likes of Augustine's City of God, Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France, and Richard M. Weaver's Ideas Have Consequences--hardly books that Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, or David Brock might curl up with. But as Williamson elucidates in the introduction, these books reflect conservatism, not the neoconservatism of current Republicans. And what is conservatism? "Man's willingness to discern for himself, and to accept from God, a fundamental, practical, just, human, and unchangeable plan for man--and to stick with it," Williamson says, later distinguishing two branches of conservatism, one "founded on eternal principles" and one "that appeals to historical context and the status quo, prudence, and pragmatism." Williamson presents 50 selected books in declension of categories, beginning with theology and ending with contemporary affairs. Book number 1 is the Bible; book 50 is Treason, by Anne Coulter, despite her support of the Bush administration. Ray Olson
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