Reagan's Legacies  A review of The Reagan Presidency: Pragmatic
Conservatism & Its Legacies, edited by W. Elliott Brownlee and
Hugh Davis Graham and Reaganism and the Death of Representative
Democracy, by Walter Williams  Posted July 12, 2004 Print This
President Ronald Reagan's legacy has been debated since the
moment he left office. First came the kiss-and-tell memoirs, the
tentative scholarly appraisals, and of course the
straightforward ideological attacks. Then his supporters
launched a sustained counteroffensive, which proved more
insightful and influential than one might have expected. We are
now well into a third stage of commentary, of which these two
books are examples. Reagan's death and the subsequent
celebration of his life will doubtless hasten a new wave
(overwhelmingly favorable, to be sure), followed (after a decent
interval) by the inevitable rebuttals. As from an inexhaustible
but intermittently active volcano, ancient layers of controversy
are built upon, not expunged.  The Reagan Presiden