The Heritage Foundation drama continues, as Newsmax alleges that “more than 60 senior staff members, fellows, and trustees” have left the storied conservative think tank since November. Heritage, however, disputes the number. “Only 30 have departed since November,” they say in a post on their X account. “And we have brought on 14  new employees to our world-class team since October.”

As each malcontent slowly slithers out the door—once every couple of weeks, it seems, in order to strategically drag the drama out for as long as possible—they decry Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts for abandoning conservative principles. 

The best way to understand this rift within Heritage—and in the conservative movement writ large—is to imagine a large manor estate that has been passed down through countless generations of our family, burning down. That burning structure is called Western civilization. If that sounds familiar, it’s because conservative nonprofits—The Heritage Foundation included—have spent a great deal of money and time urging donors to “save Western civilization!”

Conservatives are distinguished by what each intends to save from the burning edifice that is the West. It clearly distinguishes the recent Heritage defectors from Roberts. 

Consider Josh Blackman, former editor of The Heritage Guide to the Constitution, who resigned in late December. He writes in The Wall Street Journal that during Roberts’ tenure, Heritage drifted from its conservative principles: “free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense.” 

The first three of those principles are Conservative Inc.talking points in defense of “capitalism.” In other words, he is deeply concerned—so concerned that it comprises the first three items on his list—about preserving tools for earning money. If he were a carpenter, he’d be rushing into the fire to save his toolbox. The fourth—“traditional American values”—means the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. The Declaration is an ordinance of secession from the British Empire, and the Constitution is an old list of laws and political compromises. This is akin to running into a fire to grab a drawer full of old legal documents. The fifth thing that concerns Blackman—“strong national defense”—means military preparedness. So, in a fire, Blackman would run in to save his gun.

Let the family Bible, the family album, and invaluable family heirlooms go up in flames, so long as we save our tools of wealth-getting, that old lawsuit grandpa filed, and our Saturday night special. None of these things, in any meaningful way, ties one to his heritage. God forbid that an organization named “Heritage” give a hang about the thing!

Roberts’ conservation objectives are clear from his record. He founded a liberal-arts high school in Louisiana (John Paul the Great Academy). He wrote a book defending liberal education, Dawn’s Early Light. And during his time as Heritage president, he created a website that helps parents find quality liberal arts schools in their home states.

Classical education is akin to those special items that connect one with their heritage—the family Bible, a wedding ring, the family album, heirlooms handed down through many generations. It is composed of signs and symbols that remind Westerners of who they are (their identity). 

The core of our Western identity is not legal documents and tools for making money. 

Hilaire Belloc famously said, “Europe is the faith, the faith is Europe.” Belloc explains, in his preface to The Catholic Philosophy by Fr. Vincent McNabb, that the “peculiar function” of Christianity—the faith—in “the story of our civilization” has been to conserve “the philosophic conquests of pagan antiquity and to expand them over an even greater range of discovery than the greatest of the ancients had commanded.”

The story of Western civilization—or “Europe” as Belloc calls it—is the story of Christians passing down their faith and the wisdom of the perennial philosophy. 

There are, no doubt, other things that compose Western civilization: the great poets, the great ballads, the conquering of the new world, art, architecture, scientific advancement, heroes, and holidays. These are all fine things, but the core of Western civilization lies in our faith and philosophy. 

Christ promises his followers that the gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church, but we have no similar guarantees for Homer, Euclid, or the rest of the Western canon. Classical education is the only force in the modern world working to pass on to our posterity the wisdom of those ancients—that core element of our Western identity. Therefore, it is the only path toward meaningful conservation. 

By supporting classical education, the Heritage Foundation is one of the few conservative institutions that is actually conserving anything. By living up to its commitment to conserve our Western patrimony, Kevin Roberts is owed the gratitude of those who say they admire the West. 

Roberts makes several references to the Trojan hero Aeneas in his book. When Aeneas fled during the sacking of Troy, he did not take legal documents or tools. He took his father, his son, and the household gods. 

When the house is on fire, a true conservative saves his family, and he reaches for special items that connect him to his heritage long before he even thinks about legal documents. 

Of course, a conservative would also save his friends from the fire if they were present. An accusation of loyalty to friends usually buttresses the indictments against Roberts. 

Former Heritage scholar Adam Mossoff wrote in his resignation letter addressed to Roberts (but published for our benefit): 

Aristotle observed in his seminal treatise on ethics that, in a choice between truth and friendship, it is to truth that we must always give our primary allegiance. Even with your mixed messages, one thing is clear: By your words and actions, Heritage is wedded to Tucker Carlson.

Contrary to Mossoff, Aristotle was saying, in a fraternal tone, that the Platonist concept of the forms wasn’t going to be too helpful for those trying to pursue the good life. He certainly wasn’t trying to expel (or cancel) the Platonists from polite society with an accusation of anti-Semitism or racism—as Mossoff and company wish Roberts to do with Carlson and other friends. If Mossoff had been classically educated, he might have known better, but his scoffing at friendship is revealing. 

Friendship, much like classical education, is nonutilitarian.

“The relationship of friend to friend is dramatic, not utilitarian,” Michael Oakeshott wrote in his essay “On Being Conservative.” “The tie is one of familiarity, not usefulness; the disposition engaged is conservative, not ‘progressive.’” 

In his essay “Rationalism and Politics,” Oakeshott similarly described the minds of the classically educated as nonutilitarian. They are not fashioned for the workplace, but they “give us the sense that they have passed through an elaborate education which was designed to initiate them into the traditions and achievements of their civilization.” 

Conservatives of old, Oakeshott among them, understood the value of nonutilitarian things, such as friendship and the symbols of one’s identity. Today’s establishment conservatives scoff at such things because they don’t boost GDP or fatten wallets. These so-called conservatives know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

Kevin Roberts may not be perfect, but the defectors from his organization who heap scorn on him have no right to lecture him, or anyone, on conservative principles. Heritage is better off with Roberts and without them. He matters for conservatism—they don’t.