So-called Conservatives of today have not changed.

[ThePilgrim]

 R.L. Dabney on Northern conservatives in 1870:

"And last: the State has committed the crowning outrage and inconsistency of not letting her be a man because God made her a woman! What an outrage this to be committed on so frivolous a pretext!
...
Has not the Radical version of the political gospel said, "All men are by nature mechanically equal?" And "man", Mistress Amazona ( as you will know when you acquire the virile right of learning Latin ) here means, not vir, but homo; the species irrespective of sex. It means that a woman has a natural right to do all the particular things that a man does ( if she can ), to sit on juries and shave her beard, to serve in the army and ride astraddle, to preach sermons and sing bass.
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He cannot consistently oppose it; he has himself naturalized the false principles from which that 'reform' will flow. The true principles from which its folly might have been evinced, the principles held by us "Rebels", he has trampled down with the armed heel, and drowned in blood and buried under mountains of obloquoy and odium and slander. He cannot resort to those sound premisses. To meet the argument of these aspiring Amazons fairly, one must teach , with Moses, the Apostle Paul, John Hampden, Washington, George Mason, John C. Calhoun and all that contemptible rabble of 'old fogies', that political society is composed of "superiors, inferiors and equals"; that while all these bear an equitable moral relation to each other, they have very different natural rights and duties; that just government is not founded on the consent of the individuals governed, but on the ordinance of God, and hence a share in the ruling franchise is not a natural right at all, but a privilege to be bestowed according to a wise discretion on a limited class having qualification to use it for the good of the whole; that the integers out of which the State is constituted are not individuals, but families represented in their parental heads; that every human being is born under authority ( parental and civic ) instead of being born "free" in the licentious sense that liberty is each one's privilege of doing what he chooses;
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It may be inferred again that the present movement for women's rights will certainly prevail from the history of its only opponent, Northern conservatism. This is a party which never conserves anything. It's history has been that it demurs to each aggression of the progressive party, and aims to save it's credit by a respectable amount of growling, but always acquiesces at last in the innovation. What was the resisted novelty of yesterday is today one of the accepted principles of conservatism; it is now conservative only in affecting to resist the next innovation, which will tomorrow be forced upon it's timidity, and will be succeeded by some third revolution, to be denounced and then adopted in it's turn. American conservatism is merely the shadow that follows Radicalism as it moves forward towards perdition. It remains behind it, but never retards it, and always advances near it's leader."

Robert Lewis Dabney was an American Christian theologian, Southern Presbyterian pastor, Confederate States Army chaplain, and architect. He was also chief of staff and biographer to Stonewall Jackson. His biography of Jackson remains in print today.

[John81]

Dabney was an astute man whose warning of dangers coming went unheeded and have proven correct.

Checking up on the political news after the Supreme Court decision that all States must grant and accept homosexual "marriage", it was very clear how much the so-called conservatives have shifted to the Left over the years.

Some Republicans were actually claiming the reason they lost the last election was because they nominated a candidate that was "too conservative": meaning Mitt Romney! Mitt wouldn't even qualify as a Moderate, he's too liberal for that, so he's certainly not "too conservative"! Yet that's the mindset of many in the Republican ranks.

Republicans were all over the news saying it's time to leave the homosexual "marriage" issue behind now. Many, even if they said they didn't like the way the Court handled the issue, proclaimed forcing homosexual "marriage" to be a good thing. They tried to declare homosexual "marriage" a matter of liberty and equality and thus "conservative"!

Along with these same lines of reasoning, many have been advocating for Republicans to drop the so-called "social issues" (which basically means anything that might involve morals, the idea of good and bad, right and wrong). What they advocate for is what many Republican "conservatives" have already done; dropping social issues and calling themselves conservatives based upon their economic views and calls for more military engagement around the world.

Those pretending to be "Reagan conservatives" today wouldn't even think of adopting half his platform because they consider such today as extreme right wing.

As a testimony against the so-called conservatives of today, liberal presidents of the past were to the Right of them in many ways, including such liberal icons as FDR and JFK.

Notice even there, in the time of FDR and JFK, conservatives claimed to be against them but eventually became like them and are now to the Left of them.

Our politics is so much smoke and mirrors and the news media, as well as the entertainment media, do their part to keep the illusions in play.