Jon Huntsman’s recent piece in the American Conservative won the former Utah Governor publicity (and some praise) for its endorsement of gay marriage as a “conservative cause.” The article, indeed, nicely encapsulates the divide among conservatives today. Some, like Governor Huntsman, take a relatively libertarian approach. They argue that the GOP should build its arguments off of economic positions, celebrating the free market and economic freedom. Others defend a more traditional position, arguing that conservatism properly understood counters the dangers of today’s hyper-individualism.
If the Republican Party is to remain intellectually coherent and substantively relevant, it must reject Jon Huntsman’s conservatism of compromise.
Conservatives must recognize that the free market is and has always been a means to an end. It commands no moral or political authority by itself. As Senator Ted Cruz argues, we support conservative policies “because they work.” What the free market does not do, however, is provide any sort of national identity. What it means to “be an American” constitutes economic freedom, but does not end there.
Yet to Huntsman, being a Republican and being a Democrat are just differences in scale. The true debates have nothing to do with culture or social norms. Instead, for Huntsman, the true philosophical divides are whether top marginal rates should be 35% or 39.6%, whether children should be covered on their parents’ health insurance plans until they are 21 or 26, and whether we should halve the interest rates on student loans.
Those are all important questions (and have right answers), but they are completely separate from the heart of conservatism. At stake are some much more fundamental questions – the role of the state with regards to public and civic morality, the status of religious institutions, the health of civil society, and general cultural wellbeing of the nation. To Hunstman, these questions have been all but answered.
For Hunstman, conservatives should talk about “crony capitalism” and “cleaning up government,” but should remain silent on anything beyond. Quite strikingly, Huntsman appeals to Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments, in arguing that the state can strengthen “our moral fiber by reinforcing the community of shared and reciprocal economic interests.” Economic contract now forms the foundation of civic and moral identity.
Huntsman has long been a voice of leadership on questions of American economic and cultural reform. In 2011, I, like many young conservatives, was swept up and convinced by Huntsman’s bold vision and strong record. But his recent piece suggests that maybe he is the political panderer his critics always denigrated him as.
Whatever the case may be, following Huntsman’s lead and embracing the progressive philosophical framework with only a difference in scale, spells utter disaster for the future of American conservatism.