I can’t recall where I found out about Garrett and American Affairs, but I know the Mises Institute was the first place I actually saw and read Garrett’s works. I tried some googling around online but it seems like the LvMI and John Zube are the only people who have ever heard of the periodical. This is most unfortunate, since it contains some really fantastic articles. Like Garrett himself the world seems to have lost American Affairs, and unlike Garrett AA doesn’t even have a Wikipedia entry.
I completely agree. It is the great periodical immediately following the war and before the invention of the so-called conservative movement. Until we posted it, it was nearly invisible. Not even Murray Rothbard was aware of it, or, at least, he doesn’t mention it in his histories of the period.
This publication is way better than most anything that followed. It was edited by a genius, and contained the best material ever. It is very striking to me that it just seemed to drop out of history.
It is the great periodical immediately following the war and before the invention of the so-called conservative movement.
It contained pieces whose free enterprise and non-intervention easily outdo Thomas Sowell and Patrick Buchanan (respectively), while seeing both as a facet of an integrated whole. At the same time, while its editor was obviously partisan, it is not blindly so - it shows a clear awareness of the political ideologies and problems of the day, and fairly selects representatives to comment on them even where they disagree with the main tenor of the magazine. You will never see National Review or Mother Goose doing anything of that sort.
Not even Murray Rothbard was aware of it
I recall someone at a Mises Instiute lecture saying that he once wrote a short article and received a letter with list of ‘recommended reading’ from Rothbard longer than the original article. If Murray hadn’t read something of this sort it is quite astounding, and given the solid character of the periodical it seems he would have mentioned it somewhere if he had. Perhaps it was just another victim of the post-war takeover of the entire American political scene by Communist fellow-travelers of the left and right.
This publication is way better than most anything that followed.
Aside from the Mises Daily, of course
It was edited by a genius
Garrett was a very clear thinker and had an excellent sense of style, very understandable but never simplistic. His editorials alone are worth reading the magazine for.
and contained the best material ever.
Mises, Isabel Patterson, et alia. Quite a line up.