1776 and Today: Charlottesville February 2026 conference

Charlottesville Conference Plan: February 20–22 (Friday evening to Sunday morning) 2026

Organizers: Dan Klein, Erik Matson, Gerard Alexander (Blue Ridge Center), Kenneth Elzinga (UVA)

Also in the loop: Teresa Manning (Virginia Association of Scholars, VAS; and NAS)

This page last updated: 27 May 2025

The year 2026 is the 250th anniversary of The Declaration and Adam Smith’s WN (which appeared a few months prior to July 4).

In 2024, Gerard, Ken, Erik, Dan, and members of VAS worked together to do a splendid conference— Liberal Civilization Scholarship Conference—in Charlottesville with sessions held in the Blue Ridge Center:

And a dinner generously hosted by Professor Elzinga in his home:

For this year, the plan is:

For those who arrive Friday evening, dinner opportunities. Again, Professor Elzinga is generously offering his home for a Friday night dinner. Whether there will be room enough for all who would like to join that occasion is to be seen — unfortunately the weather will not permit expanding the scene into the outdoors. If there are more than can be accommodated at Professor Elzinga's home, other dinner venues will be coordinated.

Saturday: The main day of sessions. Again, expect dinner venues to be coordinated.

Sunday morning: For those who wish to lodge in Charlottesville on Saturday night and participate in possible morning events before departure.

This year we aim to make it larger, to better network with scholars throughout Virginia schools:

The map above is colleges and universities in VA. (I notice that it does not include Patrick Henry, Christendom, Liberty, btw.)

Also, VAS people from around the state are likely to participate.

The conference would again be a broad conservative/classical liberal scholarly conference—with 1776 themes.

We will need to be on the UVA campus or somewhere else with meeting rooms larger than at Blue Ridge. Gerard, Ken, and we have begun to confer on getting the space.

If we attract much more people, we would have to have concurrent sessions during some time slots, just to give people the opportunity to present — which will motivate their participation. Also, that is how we learn about people. So maybe two or three time slots with two concurrent sessions, and then other slots plenary.

I think that if we got a plan set up we could attract people from many of the schools. There are people at at least 9 schools to reach out to. I know of people or at least have contacts who at:

GMU
UVA
JMU
URichmond
Patrick Henry
Christendom
Hampden-Sydney
Shenandoah
Liberty

We also aim to pull some Carolinians into it. I’ve mentioned to several of my associates in North Carolina, include Ethan Alexander-Davey, Matt Kelly (Campbell), Jane Shaw Stroup, Mike Munger, and they are interested in getting to it.

It will be a good networking event: Schools gaining exposure to graduate students soon on the job market.

Last year the GMUers drove back to Fairfax after the dinner on Saturday evening; I suppose we would do that again. However, I might want to spend the Saturday night in Charlottesville, as well.

If you are interested in participating or have any questions, write to Dan at dklein@gmu.edu.

We look forward to a rewarding convention to appreciate the Semiquincentennial!