In the most general sense, conservatism is a sort of Burkean traditionalism, emphasizing the wisdom of deference to inherited institutions and beliefs. It is not itself a belief system, but rather a disposition. This picture gets muddled in America, however. America’s traditions and customs are rooted in Enlightenment liberalism, which in Europe was the bane of conservatism. So American conservatives defend traditional American values, like rebellion against authority, radical individualism, and secularism in government. Or was that the traditional family, communitarianism, and law based on Christian morality? I can never remember, and American conservatives often can’t, either.

This tension in American conservatism leads to bizarre philosophical and historical contortions. Moses was a founding father. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a conservative. Liberty reached its zenith in 1789 with the adoption of the United States Constitution, and has steadily declined ever since. America is chosen among nations; freedom‐​lovers should be patriots.

Which brings me to conservative nationalism. The enlightenment liberals fought for the free movement of goods and people across borders, envisioning a future of peace, commerce, and community among people of diverse countries of origin. It is no accident that Romanticism’s parochial backlash against Enlightenment ideals coincided with the rise of the modern nation‐​state. The identification of ethnic and cultural heritage with one’s status as subject of the state was a powerful tool for social control. Two world wars later, the idea persists, albeit in weaker form.

Taken to an extreme, conservative nationalism, combined with the hero‐​worship of the founding fathers, starts to look eerily fascist. Robert Griffin, a scholar of fascism, went so far as to call “palingenetic ultranationalism” the central theme of fascist ideology. “Palingenesis” means “rebirth,” roughly. On Griffin’s theory, fascists tend to fixate on an idealized golden age, blame current ills on the corruption of the old values and customs, and promise a new era that recaptures the glory of old by purging the decadent old guard and replacing them with right‐​thinking new leaders. I don’t mean to suggest that American conservatives are fascist or approve of fascism. I just want to make it clear why it’s reasonable that libertarians squirm a bit when conservatives talk about the founders with rhapsodic reverence, rail against the perceived decline of American values, and insist that we must “restore” or “take back” the country. Myths–like the conservative mythicization of the founding era or Mussolini’s idea that fascist Italy was the successor of Imperial Rome–often serve rhetorical purposes. Pining for a return to an imaginary 1789 golden age seems like cover for conservatives’ more authoritarian impulses.

There’s a lot to admire about the founders, but they weren’t the last exponents of the classical liberal tradition. Where is the conservative love for Lysander Spooner? For Murray Rothbard? Why does conservative opposition to the growth of the state turn to a desire to preserve the status quo in the wake of every statist victory? And why does conservative support for small government mysteriously evaporate when one passes through the doors of the Pentagon? How can conservatives reconcile support for “traditional values” with support for capitalism, which we know undermines traditions and transforms societies?

The father of “fusionism,” the philosophical and political alliance of libertarianism and conservatism, was Frank Meyer. Meyer thought libertarianism and conservatism dovetailed nicely, that they weren’t even really separate things. The National Review article “The Fusionist” summarizes Meyer’s position thus: