Conservative Movement History

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christopher malagisi

Executive Director of Outreach, Hillsdale College (D.C.)

Christopher Malagisi is the Executive Director of Outreach for Hillsdale College’s Washington, D.C. Campus, where he oversees external relations, marketing, and communications, playing a key role in launching the Van Andel Graduate School of Government. With over five years of experience, he has significantly enhanced the college's profile in the capital through innovative outreach strategies. Malagisi is also Co-Chair of the Conservative External Relations Professionals group, which connects over 200 members from various influential organizations. His expertise in the political and philosophical history of the conservative movement has led him to teach at the university level and consult for multiple sectors. His previous roles include leadership positions at the American Conservative Union and The Leadership Institute, and he has been involved in multiple presidential campaigns and democracy development initiatives. Recognized with several awards for his contributions to the conservative movement, he is also a frequent media commentator and has published articles in notable outlets. Malagisi holds a Master’s in Public Administration from Syracuse University and a dual B.A. from American University, and has participated in various fellowships. Originally from Buffalo, NY, he has traveled extensively, sailed around the world, and recorded two piano albums.

What are Conservatives trying to Conserve?

  • American Exceptionalism

The Progressives

  • Woodrow Wilson
    • First federal income tax
    • Drastically increased federal spending
    • Federal Reserve Act
    • Amendment XVII - Direct election of senators
  • The Old Right included Harding and Coolidge, who swung the pendulum back to limited government
  • FDR and the New Deal legacy
    • If there was a Mt. Rushmore for progressive presidents it would have:
      • Woodrow wilson
      • Franklin Roosevelt
      • Lyndon Johnson
      • Barack Obama

The History of the Philosophical Foundations of the Conservative Movement

  • The Four P’s of a Political Movement
    • Philosophers
      • Conservative Three-Legged Stool
        • Classical Liberals / Libertarians
          • Laissez-faire economics 
        • Traditionalists
          • Shocked by the Red Scare, wanted to return to old religions
          • Robert Nisbet - “The history of the West since the end of the Middle Ages was the story of decline of intermediate associations b/t the individual and the state. The weakening and dissolution of such ties as family, church, guild, and neighborhood had not, as many had hoped, liberated men. Instead, it has produced alienation, isolation, spiritual desolation, and the growth of mass man. But man cannot live in Hobbesian isolation, and so, to satisfy his longings, he seeks out community eventually, finding it in the totalitarian state”
        • Anti-Communists
      • Conservative Fusion and the Popularizers
        • Buckley, meyer, and Fusionism
    • Popularizers
      • Human Events : Early Conservative weekly newspaper
      • The five tidal waves of conservative media
    • Philanthropists
      • Building the Movement Infrastructure
      • The Funding Fathers
        • SO MANY, including Joseph Coors, ULine, Peter Thiel & Paypal
        • They wrote a book about it called “Funding Fathers” 
    • Politicians
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