Disarming Conservatism
“I have always admired James’ willingness to hold visibly or publicly a viewpoint divergent from the popular views,” said Joseph Smeall ’10. “I’ve enjoyed his affinity for words and letters, and especially his kindness and generosity of spirit. I’ve never banged on his door and he hasn’t given me wine or tea, or little peach paste-filled cookies.”
Montana’s combination of conservatism and disarming humor makes his disposition endearing and some of his more unpopular views tolerable. Indeed, according to his girlfirend, Elizabeth Petrik ’08, Montana sometimes lets humor get the better of him. “To prove the point that liquor is harmless,” she recalled, “Jamie wrote an article for The Indicator after nine drinks and ended up semiconscious on the bathroom floor with his head in a basin of water.”
“I’ve never met anyone like Jamie before,” said Spencer Robins ’08, a longtime friend. “He exists simultaneously in the 13th and 19th centuries. He’s contrarian by nature. That’s got to be one of his deepest character traits. Part of me thinks that if you [the normally religious] plopped Jamie down in Inquisition-era Spain he would be one of the most aggressive atheists you ever met.”
As the political consensus of the campus tends to lean left, one might expect Montana to face scrutiny from classmates and faculty for his beliefs. However, his attitudes are more of a welcome diversion from the norm than an annoyance. “I love having him in class because he truly offers a different perspective,” said Professor of Philosophy Jyl Gentzler. “Jamie has a reputation for being quite conservative, and I think that could put off a lot of other students who come from quite a different tradition. The thing I’m surprised about is how loved he is by the other students in the class. It’s beautiful when they can argue with each other and laugh, and do it all in good fun ... His goal isn’t to put people down for their views, but just to figure out what the truth is.”
Still, that does not mean Montana has not experienced mild prejudice for his stances. “Amherst is faintly patronizing of conservatives,” he said. “When I was a freshman, a student said to me, ‘I never met someone who was religiously serious and yet intelligent.’ That’s generally the reaction I got. Many people in universities presume that if you’re educated, you can’t be religious.”
In the face of such resistance, Montana dared to step forward and challenge the College’s predominant liberal currents. “Just by being around and defending the principles he holds, he did the College a great service,” said Petrik. “As president of the Catholic Newman Club, he’s called people’s attention to a group and philosophy that isn’t popular on campus, or among the intellectual elite, and has made a lot of people realize it’s not as wacky as they assumed.”
Montana has held many other roles besides “campus conservative.” He has been president of both the German House and of the Newman Club, and he has worked as a research assistant for Professor of Philosophy Alexander George, helping him to write his book, “The Jokes of the Great Philosophers.” Montana has also written prolifically for many campus publications.
As a regular staff member of The Indicator, Montana has often led campus conversation, giving a voice to the silent opinions of many students. Earlier this year he was the first to come out and speak against the College’s public art project of posting giant portraits on the walls outside campus buildings, criticizing it as a vacuous display of narcissism, bereft of moral seriousness and any noble meaning.
Montana is also notorious for his satire. When asked what his goals were at the College, he replied, “To get a B.A. with a minimum of B.S.” Montana said that he has enjoyed writing from a young age because he could poke fun at “larger and tougher” peers without the fear of being beaten up. “The basic circumstances haven’t really changed much since then,” he added.
An Intellectual Par
Excellence
If asked what they think of Montana, most students would probably say something like what Indicator writer Ryan Milov ’10 said, “He’s conservative, yes, but a terrific intellectual.”
“Jamie cares more about beliefs than almost anyone I know,” explained Robins. “He thinks through everything he believes and everything he thinks, and then accepts their consequences and lives according to them. Most of us muddle along with a set of beliefs that isn’t necessarily coherent. Most of us don’t have an idea of the right way to comport ourselves. Jamie does. And he lives up to it. That’s something to be respected.”
When people think of Montana, the image that comes to mind is of a debonair gentleman in a white fedora and cardigan sweater sauntering under the trees and carrying a thick book. And, why not? After all, Montana describes his favorite way to pass time at Amherst as “smoking a cigar on the lawn while reading a 19th century edition of Reineke Fuchs and waving as friends walk by—that’s a beautiful thing.”
Montana’s intellectual qualities buttress his conservative beliefs. “He thinks carefully about what to do and what kind of person he should be,” remarked Gentzler. “He listens very carefully to what other people are saying. He pushes hard, but in a really respectful way. I think his main goal is not to push forward any particular agenda, but to figure out what is the right answer.”
A Man of Faith
Montana’s commitment to “the right answer” can be seen in his devotion to his religion. Despite being known as the standard bearer of traditional Catholicism, for most of his life, Montana was agnostic. “I converted at the age of 18 when I was in Germany. I got baptized, confirmed and first communion all in one night.”
After identifying as an atheist for a long time, Montana said that he realized the truth of what may be best expressed in one of Michel de Montaigne’s maxims: “Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head.”
Montana expounded, saying, “If you really don’t know, you should want to know. If religion is not true, then there are a lot of people wasting their time and doing awful things. If it is true, it’s the most important thing in life.”
For him, only the Catholic Church offered a good answer—that is, “that suffering on earth is just as good as suffering in Purgatory. That made me think that the Catholic Church had something going on,” he explained. His commitment to reason stands, however. “It is the most convincing religion on the market. If I find one more convincing, I will convert. That’s what everyone, I think, should do.”
Bridging the 19th and 21st Century
Montana has earned too many accolades to count. He is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa academic society, was nominated for summa cum laude and just recently won a German department prize for an essay he wrote. Montana’s thesis was a translation of a selection of poems by the German Romantic poet Heinrich Heine (1797-1856), a master of sardonic wit and multilayered irony who composed a number of original pieces addressed to various unknown females, presumably “ladies of the night” encountered during his exile in Paris.
What impressed Montana’s thesis advisor, Chair of German Christian Rogowski, was how he “brilliantly managed to render into delightfully readable English the vacillation between Heine’s frivolous eroticism and philosophical self reflection. In the critical commentary that goes along with the translation, Jamie reads the series of poems as a representation of the various stages of love, from infatuation and exuberance, to self-doubt and uncertainty and, finally, to wistful resignation to the ephemerality of desire.”
Rogowski saw the thesis as more than just evidence of Montana’s masterful writing and turn of mind. “The thesis is perhaps a testimony to how far Jamie, always inquisitive, enterprising and self-motivated, managed to push himself out of his comfort zone: brilliantly translating the poetry of a 19th-century politically controversial, religiously secular, ironic sensualist of Jewish descent is no small feat for a devout Roman Catholic with firmly conservative political convictions.”
Montana’s intellectualism belies his amicable personality. “He has a sort of austere, old-mannish front,” said Petrik, “but he likes the things ordinary guys like, too, such as going out on weekends and partying. The other night he went out with a group of guys to the bird sanctuary to play capture the flag.”
Finding Time to Volunteer
Montana is a man of compassion, civility and hospitality. “There’s a chance Jamie will be remembered as the stalwart defender of conservatism at a liberal school,” said Robins, “but I don’t think that’s his legacy. At least for me, his legacy is one of the best and most committed friends I ever had. I’d say that, as much as anyone I know, Jamie cares about people. I’ve seen him express that interest in me and in his fellow classmates time and time again.”
Montana’s generous spirit can be seen in the charitable work he did with the Newman Club. In addition to regular Habitat for Humanity builds, Montana would go with Newman Club friends to the co-op farm a couple of afternoons a semester to plant and harvest crops. Surplus food was later donated to the food bank.
Defining the Law
Next year Montana will attend Yale Law School. He intends to be either a federal prosecutor or a corporate lawyer. “I’m well suited to a career in law. I think that a good conservative wants to minimize law’s interference with human flourishing, but also wants the law stringently observed. Any legal career should allow me to do that.”
Montana is sure to go places, carrying his humor, generous spirit, commitment to reason and distinctive intellectual style, forever reminding us that the most boring discussion is the one in which everybody agrees.