ABSTRACT
Historians are trapped by labels. Terms are indeed important, and scholars who write about the early republic must always define their understanding of such troublesome, broad concepts as “capitalism” or the “market revolution.” But political terms that have meaning for modern audiences are especially difficult to use. “Liberalism” certainly means something quite different today, in the wake of New Deal big government programs, from what it did in its classical phase, when it was a precise term embraced by small government advocates from Andrew Jackson to William Gladstone. “Conservatism” carries much the same cultural baggage. Can politicians who advocate bold new policies by definition be regarded as men who wish to “conserve” and preserve the old order? Must advocates of change, even if that change may not be for the best, always be regarded as “progressives?” And for modern scholars, who are notoriously left leaning, is “conservative” a positive or pejorative term?
