Well, those of us who made the case for Nixon in the fall of 1972 on college campuses, who cast our first vote for him that November, who were tempted to rationalize his behavior for at least a while as Watergate unfolded, and who couldn’t help but feel a pang of sorrow as he resigned amid victory whoops from his critics in 1974 remember those years all too well. They weren’t the easiest of years to be on the right.

But we also remember that the new and exciting conservative columnists in the Washington Post and the New York Times, George Will (in his early 30s) and Bill Safire (in his early 40s), were tough on Nixon. We remember that one of the most prominent conservative Republican senators, James Buckley, who had won dramatically as a Conservative third-party candidate in New York in 1970, did not join other Republicans in rallying to Nixon’s defense. We remember that Jim Buckley’s younger brother Bill made sure National Review was no cheerleader for Nixon. We remember that John Ashbrook, an eloquent and principled congressman from Ohio, then 43, launched a quixotic primary challenge against Nixon in 1972 to ensure that voters understood Nixon didn’t speak for conservatism. We remember Jack Kemp, a Republican congressman turning 40, who was shaping a new economic message for the party. We remember neoconservatives of all sorts who had very little history with Nixon or the GOP providing fresh thinking and new energy.

In sum, we remember that young Americans could look at the Republican party and the conservative movement and see fresh faces and other voices than those of Richard Nixon and his defenders.