You may remember that in 2023, responding to the emergence of “national conservatives” and their statement of principles, a large group of more liberty-minded conservatives drafted and signed their own statement of principles. They called it “Freedom Conservatism.” Several of my (then-future) NR colleagues and I were among the signatories.

Whereas the national conservatives’ statement prioritized sovereignty, economic independence, moral regulation, and immigration restrictionism, freedom conservatives chose to emphasize natural rights, free markets, pluralism, and global security. In my view, they aligned best with NR’s founding principle of “ordered liberty“: a lightly regulated society of free people secured by the rule of........

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