Open Thread: What is Conservatism

So, a few weeks ago I had an open thread on "What is Liberalism?"

This diary gives us a chance to think about and discuss the other side of the coin.

A few definitions:

From Wiki's definition of Conservatism:

Conservatism is a term used to describe political philosophies that favor tradition and gradual change, where tradition refers to religious, cultural, or nationally defined beliefs and customs. The term is derived from the Latin, com servare, to preserve; "to protect from loss or harm". Since different cultures have different established values, conservatives in different cultures have differing goals. Some conservatives seek to preserve the status quo or to reform society slowly, while others seek to return to the values of an earlier time, the status quo ante.

Conservatism as a political philosophy is difficult to define, encompassing numerous movements, and conservatives sometimes disagree about which parts of a culture are most worthy of preservation. Thus religious conservatives may be at odds with nationalist conservatives. Today, conservatives are considered right-wing, that is, anti-communist, may sometimes be contradictions between alternative conceptions of conservatism as the ideology of preserving the past, and the contemporary worldwide conception of conservatism as a right-wing political stance. But Martin Blinkhorn asks the question, "who are the 'conservatives' in today's Russia? Are they the unreconstructed Stalinists, or the reformers who have adopted the right-wing views of modern conservatives such as Margaret Thatcher?"

Interestingly, it separates that from Conservatism in the United States

The Loyalists of the American Revolution were mostly political conservatives, some of whom produced political discourse of a high order, including lawyer Joseph Galloway and governor-historian Thomas Hutchinson. After the war, the great majority remained in the U.S. and became citizens, but some leaders emigrated to other places in the British Empire. Samuel Seabury was a Loyalist who returned and as the first American bishop played a major role in shaping the Episcopal religion, a stronghold of conservative social values.

In his book The Conservative Mind, Russell Kirk identifies John Adams as the first American Conservative. Adams' book A Defence of the Constitution of the Government of the United States of America is considered by Kirk as the first Conservative manifesto in America. Adams' believed in the supremacy of law and that liberty should be subordinate to law. Adams' also distrusted the people as a mass. Adams was the only member of the Federalist Party to become President of the United States. Adams rejected the notions of the French revolution, which Jefferson in part supported. And unlike Jefferson, Adams rejected the idea of agrarian republicanism. Adams outright rejected the ideas of Monarchy and Aristocracy demanding there be a government of laws and not of men. The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts was written by Adams and is the oldest written Constitution in the world.[dubious – discuss]

To me, this is an interesting take: that liberty is subordinate to law. This seems in line with modern conservatives' take on how the country should be run.

In my classes on the American Revolution and the general US History survey I frame it to my students that the Loyalists were conservatives. That gets many of them upset, since a great many of my students are self-identified conservative Republicans.

Thoughts on Conservatism? On the Republican Party's take on conservatism?