There was far too much death in 2023. Vladimir Putin’s continuing war on Ukraine. More senseless mass shootings, including those in Maine and Tennessee. The savagery of Hamas in Israel. For all of these reasons, I will be glad to see 2023 in the rearview mirror. In addition, among those we lost in 2023 have been some remarkable conservatives. They were thinkers and leaders who helped shape the movement that promotes and defends liberty, the rule of law, and Western civilization — all of which are increasingly under pressure these days.

(Thomas Fluharty for the Washington Examiner)

Two of the most consequential voices lost in 2023 were Paul Johnson and Fred Siegel. Both were talented writers. And both started on the Left, migrating rightward in reaction to progressive excesses and their own intellectual learning. Johnson wrote more than 50 books of history — on intellectuals, Christianity, America, Judaism (he could not abide antisemitism), and many other subjects. His powerful writing was widely read and admired. Vice President Dan Quayle read Johnson’s great work Modern Times while in office, infamously describing it “as a very good historical work about history,” and George W. Bush gave Johnson the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Johnson also helped promote Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative resurgence in England but refused a peerage because he felt journalists should retain a measure of remove from the politicians they covered.