Iceweasel
Diamond Member
Yep. And they didn't even use the terms in those days. So when one says liberal or conservative they are attempting to apply modern terminology to them. But it's always the libs claiming the founders were libs, go figure.To call some historical figure a liberal (or conservative) makes no sense out of context the way you presented it.
wrong of course, political labels can change from decade to decade and thus we don't expect the reader to know what a label meant in say the 1870's. If we say today for example that Jefferson was an arch conservative we mean conservative by today's definition which would be the definition the reader is most like to know and deploy first. Since Jefferson was for small govt as are modern conservatives the meaning is made clear as simply as possible without the need for further complications.