> Tonight in my college's chapel service, an illustration was used involving political liberals and conservatives. He gave the definitions as such:
>
> Liberals -- believe that the original documents of our nation's founding should be interpreted through the lens of modern times
>
> Conservatives -- believe that the documents should be applied in their original context to today

Oy. I don't want to come down too harshly here, but what exactly does it mean to apply the original context to the documents (I assume we're talking primarily about the Constitution here)? There is a sort of misconception that the Founding Fathers had something resembling a consensus regarding the intent of certain aspects the Constitution or the role of government. This isn't entirely so.

To give you an example, the absolute best defense and explanation of the Constitution are the Federalist Papers, a collection of letters and essays written primarily by Hamilton, Madison and Jay. And yet Madison and Hamilton were political arch-rivals, in complete disagreement about the role of the federal government in many areas. When two such monumentally important figures in the development of the Constitution were in such disagreement about so many things, it's hard to come to any sort of agreement about its interpretation in modern times. Hell, one of the things the Constitution is *purposely* vague on is which body gets to interpret the document (Madison and Hamilton would have agreed that it was the Supreme Court's job, but you're not going to find that by reading the document).

> I may have gotten the terminology a bit skewed here. But I have studied different constitutional interpretations and understand that part. What I am wondering is if these definitions can be said to be actual definitions or are they instead simply an aspect of liberal / conservative philosophy.

I think what you're perhaps hinting at is that modern-day conservatives really like less government, particularly less federal government, which is more in line with a literal interpretation of the Constitution (it's tricky, though, since there are some really vague clauses in there). Moreover, that's more in line with how the country was run for its first 130 or so years.

> However, can it all be traced back to what someone does, or would, think of interpreting the Framers?

The historical definition of the terms is a little fuzzier. The term liberal to refer to politics emerged in the 1700s to refer to somebody who embraced the political ideals of the Enlightenment -- particularly the right of people for representative government and freedom to act in their own affairs without governmental interference. A conservative, at the time, was somebody more interested in maintaining the status quo and opposed to liberal ideals. Pretty much every politician in modern American politics meets the classical definition of liberal. There aren't many monarchists left in this country.

The terms sort of mutated in the two centuries since. Since the Enlightenment, the term liberal has continued to mean people in support of "progressive" (this term was used in particular early in the 20th Century) ideas -- newer political ideas, basically. The evolution of politics in this country (and Europe, really) has essentially been toward a government that takes a more active role in providing social services for its citizens. Conservatives, then, have been largely opposed to this, and more interested in maintaining the status quo. These definitions, by nature, shift: as the status quo changes, the respective definitions adjust.

For example, there are very few mainstream political conservatives these days who would abolish unemployment insurance or the social security administration. When these concepts were introduced, they were extremely "liberal" and opposed by conservatives.

Anyway, I'm tired and certainly rambling. What I'm trying to say is:

1) I disagree that the differences between liberal/conservative ideologies can be drawn along Constitutional lines.
2) The reasons for the terms are somewhat involved, historical explanations.

Stephen