The Voice of Treason

STATEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

America has lost one of its finest writers and thinkers. Bill Buckley was one of the great founders of the modern conservative movement. He brought conservative thought into the political mainstream, and helped lay the intellectual foundation for America’s victory in the Cold War and for the conservative movement that continues to this day. He will be remembered for his principled thought and beautiful writing — as well as his personal warmth, wit, and generous spirit. His legacy lives on in the ideas he championed and in the magazine he founded — National Review.

Laura and I send our prayers to Chris Buckley, the Buckley family, and all who loved this good man.

“Reading all the tributes that have poured in, one is struck by two things. First is that Bill’s life was a vivid refutation of the notion that great men don’t make a difference in history. Second was his personal decency, graciousness, and warmth. That is why so many of the tributes have been not only of respect, but of love.”

– Peter W. Rodman

“He was incomparably nice. One of the nicest men I’ve ever met.”

– Brit Hume on FNC

“Legend he was, but in a small group, it was always Bill who rushed to get a chair for the person left standing. It was always Bill who reached to fill your glass. (I can attest to him doing both of these things for me in the last six months.)

…. I just want to record one of his great qualities: Bill had the capacity to make everyone feel that they enhanced his life. If you ran into him on the staircase, he would make you think that you had just capped his day. It need hardly be said that few men are great. But even fewer great men are so good. I weep.”

– Mona Charen

“When I was fourteen years old I wrote a letter to William F. Buckley praising his works and the National Review. Much to my surprise, I received a letter back, and an invitation to an editorial session of the National Review board on Lexington Avenue. I was a fourteen-year old girl in shock as I met Richard Brookhiser, Jeffrey Hart and, of course, Mr. Buckley himself, who gave me a personal tour of the offices and engaged me in conversation for almost an hour. To this day, it is a highlight of my life.

For a man of his import to show such kindness to an unknown child exemplifies his greatness. He will never be forgotten.”

– Jeanne Judge

“Journalist and former White House press secretary Tony Snow stressed that Buckley’s human touch was responsible for much of his influence.

‘Bill Buckley made tremendous contributions to the conservative movement by virtue of his intellect, his wit, his determination, and, most of all, his compassion,’ Snow said. ‘Few men in public life were as generous with their time, encouragement, and praise.’

Snow noted that it was in fact Buckley who initiated the friendship between the two of them. ‘Bill reached out to many of us early in our careers and gave the benefit of his experience — and, most of all, his enormous heart. It was always humbling and thrilling to get a call from Bill. You never quite felt that you deserved it. But you always felt that you were the recipient of a very special gift.’

Snow further observed that Buckley’s imposing reputation didn’t get in the way of his personal warmth. ‘People tend to have this image of Bill as the television figure, the fellow with the enormous vocabulary,’ Snow said. ‘He was really just one of those folks you never forget and when you do remember him, you always do it with a smile on your face.’”

– Mark Hemingway

“When I was about fourteen years old, I sent Mr. Buckley a short manuscript on conservatism. I told him I’d appreciate his input as I would like to get it published. It was a pretty bold endeavor, bordering on the silly. But the manuscript wasn’t all that bad for a fourteen year old. It certainly wasn’t up to Mr. Buckley’s standard. Still, Mr. Buckley took time from his incredibly busy schedule to write a kind letter to me. He let me down gently, explaining that I might want to continue to my studies and give publishing another shot a few years down the road. LOL. I wrote him a few more times back then about different issues, and he always responded with a pithy and gracious note. When I go home this evening, I will rummage through some of my old boxes in search of those letters. And I will take some time to remember not only one of the greatest and most influential thinkers of our time, but one of the kindest men, too.

Thank you, Mr. Buckley. You made a huge different not just in my life, but in the lives of so many. My prayers and sympathies to the Buckley family.”

– Mark Levin

“In about 1994, as a newish urban public school teacher whose life-long love affair with the left was beginning to wane, I received a solicitation to subscribe to National Review. This was an expensive publication; very expensive to a guy living on a teacher’s salary with three kids and a non-employed wife at home. I wrote back saying I truly could not afford such a subscription, but was interested.

I received a letter with Mr. Buckley’s signature offering me a free year. I do not know if it was composed just for me (it felt as if it had been) or was a well-written form letter, but I took him up on the offer. It was a three-fold blessing. First, on the pages of this magazine I learned in gruesome detail just what was wrong with the beliefs troubling me. Second, I learned that religious people could be smart. I know that sounds feeble, but in my world, religion was reserved for those who, as Governor Ventura said, needed a crutch. And finally, this magazine became a core component of my curriculum. We read many articles. I have no idea how much of the complex thinking and vocabulary offered by NR was accessible to my well-trained and poorly educated young liberals. But I tried. And I know I made some headway. I have happily paid for my subscription since then, and have purchased gift subscriptions for those who were as I was in 1994. Thank you to Mr. Buckley and all those who worked in and for his world.”

– Jim Clark

“I could tell stories for hours about Bill and what he did for people, not only those he knew but those he didn’t know. He practiced what I consider perfect charity: doing things for others that no one knew about. The Vietnam vet blinded in action who wrote to Bill asking if NR came out in Braille. NR didn’t so Bill did the next best thing, he helped the vet get some of his eyesight restored by flying him to N.Y. and having a personal friend who happened to be one of the best ophthalmologists in N.Y. examine him and then successfully operate on him. Oh, and the vet married the nurse who took care of him. Or the time at a cover conference when I told him that a house I liked just came on the market and he asked me if I was going to buy it. I sheepishly told him that I couldn’t afford the down payment. A few days later his secretary brought me a personal check from Bill for the down payment with a promissory note to pay him back whenever. He was quite a guy and, although he’s in a better place, our world is definitely not a better place without him.”

– Ed Capano

“William F. Buckley was:

1. A good man;
2. A man whose few ill-considered remarks are more than overwhelmed by his net positive contribution to political discourse;
3. A master of the English language, despite it being his third language (after Spanish and French, I think);
4. A brave man both in the realm of action and in the realm of ideas;
5. A musician with the good taste to appreciate J.S.Bach:

He commented that, on the Voyager spacecraft, we should include the music of Bach amongst the recording of ‘the sounds of Earth’ but then demurred, saying (with, I fancy, that trademark grin of his), ‘but that would be boasting.’

6. He was a believing Catholic, and while he expounded and debated and extemporized in defense of his libertarian brand of conservatism, he never fell into the trap of believing that a political philosophy was a complete philosophy, a raison d’être. There is far more to life than politics, far more to the universe than the question of who may rightfully use what degree of coercion against whom in the name of social order. In this wisdom he (a.) maintained civility with his ideological components with the rare exception being those who refused to maintain civility with him (e.g. Gore Vidal), and (b.) lived life with joy and exuberance even when his own favored politicians and policies were not ascendant.

Thank you, Bill. May God bless and keep you; we’ll see you again some day. In the meantime we’ll miss you, being much the poorer without you.”

– R.C.

“Here’s really, the only thing I can say about the passing of this eloquent, fearless, polymath giant: words fail.

He will be worse than missed: in the coming months, in the coming election, in the coming struggles, he will be missing.”

– Rob Long

“Bill Buckley was the most gracious and generous man I have ever known.”

– Kate O’Beirne

“Part of Bill’s conservatism was his Catholicism. Our secular age is unfriendly to Catholics, to religion generally, but the irony is that secularists are often less jubilantly worldly than their Jewish and Christian compatriots. ‘God made the world and saw that it was good.’ That bulletin from Genesis might have been the motto of Bill’s life. He certainly did everything he could to broadcast it among his many friends. I have never known a more generous person. I do not mean only materially generous, though Bill’s largesse in that department was legendary. I mean spiritually, constitutionally generous as well. A telling anecdote: everyone knows that Bill commanded a formidable vocabulary. It was significant, therefore, that he should have telephoned us once in search of a word. ‘It means taking pleasure in the misfortune of others,’ he said to my wife. ‘Schadenfreude,’ she said. ‘That’s it!’ he said. How perfectly Buckleyesque that he should have forgotten it. It named an emotion that was as foreign to him as joy was native.”

– Roger Kimball

“I only met Buckley once, and only for a moment. I was in college, attending some sort of conservative conference at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington. I was with three friends, and we walked up to Buckley and introduced ourselves as the only four conservatives at American University (which was only a slight exaggeration). Buckley laughed at our travails, so familiar they must have been to him, and he said just two words, through a chuckle: ‘stay positive.’

He always did, and that was always an important part of his power and appeal. Conservatives easily get dour and down, and the rest of humanity finds such grumpiness unattractive. Buckley offered a smiling, confident, and very appealing conservatism that was at the same time also deeply serious. His good cheer was not an act. It was the proper response to the truth that moves conservatives: that the world we have inherited is a good place, worth defending and cherishing. As Buckley always seemed to understand, that’s a good reason to smile.

Others who knew Buckley will have much deeper and more meaningful things to say about him. But like most of those deeply in his debt, I didn’t know the man personally, and can think of nothing more profound and true to say in this sad moment than two plain and simple words I would have loved to say to him in person: thank you.”

– Yuval Levin

Charlie Rose: Do you wish you were twenty?

WFB: No. Absolutely not… If I had a pill which would reduce my age by 25 years I wouldn’t take it.

Charlie Rose: Why not?

WFB: Because I’m tired of life.

Charlie Rose: Are you really?

WFB: Yeah. I really am. I’m utterly prepared to… uh, stop… living on.

February 27, 2008 1:00 PM

William F. Buckley, Jr., R.I.P.

By the Editors

Our revered founder, William F. Buckley Jr., died in his study this morning.

If ever an institution were the lengthened shadow of one man, this publication is his. So we hope it will not be thought immodest for us to say that Buckley has had more of an impact on the political life of this country — and a better one — than some of our presidents. He created modern conservatism as an intellectual and then a political movement. He kept it from drifting into the fever swamps. And he gave it a wit, style, and intelligence that earned the respect and friendship even of his adversaries. (To know Buckley was to be reminded that certain people have a talent for friendship.)

He inspired and incited three generations of conservatives, and counting. He retained his intellectual and literary vitality to the end; even in his final years he was capable of the arresting formulation, the unpredictable insight. He presided over NR even in his “retirement,” which was more active than most people’s careers. It has been said that great men are rarely good men. Even more rarely are they sweet and merry, as Buckley was.

When Buckley started National Review — in 1955, at the age of 29 — it was not at all obvious that anti-Communists, traditionalists, constitutionalists, and enthusiasts for free markets would all be able to take shelter under the same tent. Nor was it obvious that all of these groups, even gathered together, would be able to prevail over what seemed at the time to be an inexorable collectivist tide. When Buckley wrote that the magazine would “stand athwart history yelling, ‘Stop!’” his point was to challenge the idea that history pointed left. Mounting that challenge was the first step toward changing history’s direction. Which would come in due course.

Before he was a conservative, Buckley was devoted to his family and his Church. He is survived by his son Christopher and brothers Reid and James and sisters Priscilla, Carol, and Patricia. Our sadness for them, and for us, at his passing is leavened by the hope that he is now with his beloved wife, Patricia, who died last year.

From reader and NR friend Matthew Mehan:

In memory of William F. Buckley, Jr.

“I call on all members” of all races,
To weep for loss and gain of graces
At the passing of one who lacks none
Of the noble traits. An Angel-Saxon,
A mighty mind with an impish hope
Of blending clan with misanthrope,
A champion of the inky lance,
Who wryly smiled and looked askance
At German Marx and Russian bears
In full advance from distant lairs.
Dame Liberty, all but bowed,
The shining city, weak and cowed,
The ways of old, they too seemed lost,
Mere artifacts in permafrost.
History with his thunderous roar
Crowed like fate and waved his sword:
“Communal state, communal press,
Communal manufactured dress!
Communal farm, communal crop—”

Till God and Man at Last cried “Stop!”

From John O’Sullivan:

“When news of Bill’s death reached me, I was in Prague. It was suitable and perhaps comforting place to hear such sad news since Prague is one of the great European cities Bill helped to liberate from communism…

When death came for him, said Churchill of George VI, ‘he came as a friend.’ I think the same is true for Bill. All his ambitions, public and private had been realized, more than triumphantly. He had lost the beloved wife of more than fifty years. His son Chris had long ago proved himself an independent spirit more than capable of sparring on his own two feet. He was as mentally sharp and as good company as he had ever been — I saw him for dinner last month in Palm Beach where he thoroughly enjoyed himself — but he was tired. He had enjoyed his vacation in this vale of tears but he wanted to go home.

We should be sorry for ourselves and his family over his death. We can be glad for him.”