William F. Buckley Jr. Is Dead at 82
By DOUGLAS MARTIN
William F. Buckley Jr., who marshaled polysyllabic exuberance, famously arched eyebrows and a refined, perspicacious mind to elevate conservatism to the center of American political discourse, died Wednesday at his home in Stamford, Conn.
Mr Buckley, 82, suffered from diabetes and emphysema, his son Christopher said, although the exact cause of death was not immediately known. He was found at his desk in the study of his home, his son said. He might have been working on a column, Mr. Buckley said.
Mr. Buckleys winningly capricious personality, replete with ten-dollar words and a darting tongue writers loved to compare with an anteaters, hosted one of televisions longest-running programs, Firing Line, and founded and shepherded the influential conservative magazine, National Review.
He also found time to write at least 55 books, ranging from sailing odysseys to spy novels to celebrations of his own dashing daily life, and to edit five more. His political novel The Rake was published last August, and a book looking back at the National Reviews history in November; a personal memoir of Barry Goldwater is due to be publication in April, and Mr. Buckley was working on a similar book about Ronald Reagan for release in the fall.
The more than 4.5 million words of his 5,600 biweekly newspaper columns, On the Right, would fill 45 more medium-sized books.
Mr. Buckleys greatest achievement was making conservatism not just electoral Republicanism, but conservatism as a system of ideas respectable in liberal post-World War II America. He mobilized the young enthusiasts who helped nominate Barry Goldwater in 1964, and saw his dreams fulfilled when Reagan and the Bushes captured the Oval Office.
To Mr. Buckleys enormous delight, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., the historian, termed him the scourge of liberalism.
In remarks at National Reviews 30th anniversary in 1985, President Reagan joked that he picked up his first issue of the magazine in a plain brown wrapper and still anxiously awaited his biweekly edition without the wrapper.
You didnt just part the Red Sea you rolled it back, dried it up and left exposed, for all the world to see, the naked desert that is statism, Mr. Reagan said.
And then, as if that werent enough, the president continued, you gave the world something different, something in its weariness it desperately needed, the sound of laughter and the sight of the rich, green uplands of freedom.
The liberal advance had begun with the New Deal, and so accelerated in the next generation that Lionel Trilling, one of Americas leading intellectuals, wrote in 1950: In the United States at this time liberalism is not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition. For it is the plain fact that there are no conservative or reactionary ideas in general circulation.
Mr. Buckley declared war on this liberal order, beginning with his blistering assault on Yale as a traitorous den of atheistic collectivism immediately after his graduation (with honors) from the university.
All great biblical stories begin with Genesis, George Will wrote in the National Review in 1980. And before there was Ronald Reagan, there was Barry Goldwater, and before there was Barry Goldwater there was National Review, and before there was National Review there was Bill Buckley with a spark in his mind, and the spark in 1980 has become a conflagration.
By DOUGLAS MARTIN
William F. Buckley Jr., who marshaled polysyllabic exuberance, famously arched eyebrows and a refined, perspicacious mind to elevate conservatism to the center of American political discourse, died Wednesday at his home in Stamford, Conn.
Mr Buckley, 82, suffered from diabetes and emphysema, his son Christopher said, although the exact cause of death was not immediately known. He was found at his desk in the study of his home, his son said. He might have been working on a column, Mr. Buckley said.
Mr. Buckleys winningly capricious personality, replete with ten-dollar words and a darting tongue writers loved to compare with an anteaters, hosted one of televisions longest-running programs, Firing Line, and founded and shepherded the influential conservative magazine, National Review.
He also found time to write at least 55 books, ranging from sailing odysseys to spy novels to celebrations of his own dashing daily life, and to edit five more. His political novel The Rake was published last August, and a book looking back at the National Reviews history in November; a personal memoir of Barry Goldwater is due to be publication in April, and Mr. Buckley was working on a similar book about Ronald Reagan for release in the fall.
The more than 4.5 million words of his 5,600 biweekly newspaper columns, On the Right, would fill 45 more medium-sized books.
Mr. Buckleys greatest achievement was making conservatism not just electoral Republicanism, but conservatism as a system of ideas respectable in liberal post-World War II America. He mobilized the young enthusiasts who helped nominate Barry Goldwater in 1964, and saw his dreams fulfilled when Reagan and the Bushes captured the Oval Office.
To Mr. Buckleys enormous delight, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., the historian, termed him the scourge of liberalism.
In remarks at National Reviews 30th anniversary in 1985, President Reagan joked that he picked up his first issue of the magazine in a plain brown wrapper and still anxiously awaited his biweekly edition without the wrapper.
You didnt just part the Red Sea you rolled it back, dried it up and left exposed, for all the world to see, the naked desert that is statism, Mr. Reagan said.
And then, as if that werent enough, the president continued, you gave the world something different, something in its weariness it desperately needed, the sound of laughter and the sight of the rich, green uplands of freedom.
The liberal advance had begun with the New Deal, and so accelerated in the next generation that Lionel Trilling, one of Americas leading intellectuals, wrote in 1950: In the United States at this time liberalism is not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition. For it is the plain fact that there are no conservative or reactionary ideas in general circulation.
Mr. Buckley declared war on this liberal order, beginning with his blistering assault on Yale as a traitorous den of atheistic collectivism immediately after his graduation (with honors) from the university.
All great biblical stories begin with Genesis, George Will wrote in the National Review in 1980. And before there was Ronald Reagan, there was Barry Goldwater, and before there was Barry Goldwater there was National Review, and before there was National Review there was Bill Buckley with a spark in his mind, and the spark in 1980 has become a conflagration.
SNIP
