Therein lies a paradox that produces no end of misunderstanding and friction in these debates.
The Founding Fathers were revolutionaries. A conservative revolutionary is a blatant contradiction in terms.
"The Founding Fathers were conservatives, not libertarians.
Therein lies a paradox that produces no end of misunderstanding and friction in these debates.
The Founding Fathers were revolutionaries. A conservative revolutionary is a blatant contradiction in terms."
The paradox is easily resolved, because the Founding Fathers were not revolutionaries in any conventional sense, like the French or Russian Revolutionaries. The only revolution theirs really resembles might be the English Glorious Revolution, which was also a limited and conservative one. The Founders wanted to restore and preserve the liberties which had been won through centuries of struggle by the English, which were threatened by the increasing centralization threatened by British imperialism. They were conservatives in that regard.
The colonies already had local representative government, religious liberty, and many other features which might have required revolution in other countries. Other things which are not desirable in a free society, such as slavery, were left untouched by the Founders. Their only "revolutionary" action was in throwing off the yolk of an imperial power which had left them to their own devices for much of their history, and was trying to tighten control in the late 18th century.