Liberalism is the political ideology of mainstream capitalism, particularly for the imperialist countries. As the global economic system for decades and decades, this makes liberals a conservative ideology, its members attempt to maintain the fundamental capitalist status quo. Its members that attempt to make substantial changes begin to push at the fringes of liberalism and end up working against it. Reactionaries try to "restore" a largely fictitious past glory and reinforce conservative social mores in order to scapegoat the problems of liberalism onto marginalized communities. Those on the anticapitalist left, those that actually oppose the system itself, are the actually progressive historical actors nowadays. You could have given liberals that label in the 1700s to mid 1800s perhaps, but they are not the defenders of the current order.