Buckley’s positions were more extreme than the academics he cited for support

Evidence

McGeorge Bundy, wrote a withering review in the Atlantic Monthly that noted the irony of a Catholic calling for a return to religious traditionalism at Yale. Buckley’s support for laissezfaire was, Bundy added, far more extreme than that of the academics he and his allies cited for support. Positions that Buckley labeled “radicalism” could be found “in the work of such men as Hayek,” and “if Mr. Buckley read Lippmann and Knight, he would be horrifi ed.” — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, 352

Categorization

• QUESTION: Worth chasing: what specifically would have horrified Knight about Buckley’s version of laissez-faire? This suggests an early divergence between MPS economists and American populist conservatism.
• XREF: connects to: Buckley’s polemical force came from eliding the complexities of academic libertarianism — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free…, 352