Carl T. Bogus, a professor of law at Roger Williams University, is the author of "William F. Buckley Jr. and the Rise of American Conservatism."

The modern conservative movement began 60 years ago with the publication of a book by a 26-year-old first-time author. Reflecting on that work teaches us something important about the nature and trajectory of modern conservatism, about the energy that propelled the movement and about serious problems with the movement today.

The book was "God and Man at Yale." The author was William F. Buckley Jr.

GAMAY (as conservatives often call this iconic work) was an attack on the young author's alma mater. Buckley excoriated Yale for two things:

First, he complained that Yale's economics instructors were not indoctrinating their students in a pure version of laissez-faire economics. Buckley claimed that less than half of the economics department advocated that ideology, which Buckley called "individualism." The rest were Keynesians who advocated some governmental regulation of the economy, and therefore as Buckley saw it, economics training at Yale was "thoroughly collectivist."...