Conservatives and the Sixth Catastrophe. One way to think about the history of conservativism in the United States is in terms of recovering from the latest in a series of catastrophes.

Catastrophe #1. The Election of Thomas Jefferson in 1800 and the decline of federalism as a dominant political force. The Federalist political project of aligning with the British monarchy, confining power to a narrow elite, and limiting the impact of the majority within Republican institutions failed. Jeffersonian Democracy introduced the specter of popular government to American society.

Catastrophe #2. The Election of Andrew Jackson and advent of Jacksonian Democracy in 1828. By the 1820's, conservatives had successfully fought back against popular government and re-established their ascendancy. But the election of Andrew Jackson introduced popular government and forced conservatives to fight their way back for another 12 years before they decided to adopt a popular politics themselves during the 1840 presidential campaign.

Catastrophe #3. The Defeat of the Confederacy. By 1860, the defense of slavery against abolitionism had become a core theme among conservatives South and North. The vanquishing of the Confederacy raised the specter of equal rights for African-Americans and temporarily overthrew the racial hierarchy in the South. White supremacy would not be fully re-instated until the 1890's.

Catastrophe #4. The New Deal. The Roosevelt administration openly attacked wealth and privilege, made poverty a political issue, and brought labor unions into the highest levels of presidential politics. The New Deal also legitimated an activist and supervisory role for the federal government in the economy with Keynesian economics, regulatory agencies, steep progressive tax rates, socal security, and AFDC. And the New Deal approach didn't stop with the end of the Roosevelt era. The National Defense Highway System, the GI Bill, and increasing levels of federal involvement in education were fundamentally New Deal initiatives. Unlike other catastrophes, American conservatives have never recovered from the New Deal.

Catastrophe #5. The Civil Rights Movement and the 1960's. With the Civil Rights movement, the specter of equal rights for African-Americans became at least a partial reality as the South's system of racial segregation was overthrown. The elimination of segregation as a system of racial hierarchy then inspired women, gay people, and other groups to redouble their efforts to end various kinds of social and political disabilities. The social ferment of the 1960's also gave birth to a counter-culture movement that had a long-term impact on American attitudes toward sex, abortion, marriage, drug use, and other social mores. Conservatives have been working even harder to undo the legacy of the Sixties than they've been working to reverse the New Deal. But they have only had limited success.

Catastrophe #6. The Failure of the George W. Bush administration. The Bush administration was the first authentically conservative administration since the Coolidge years during the 1820's. The Bush administration's reputation for arrogance and incompetence, the bungling of the war in Iraq, and the current economic crisis have confronted conservatives with the possibility that the incoming Obama administration will be a catastrophe for conservatism on the order of the New Deal.