Since I stuck my neck out and challenged my fellow liberty-minded individuals about the social cost of implementing many libertarian policies up front, it's time to expand on this subject a little. Let's just come out and admit a sad truth about libertarianism: it often has an isolated, borderline sociopathic concept of freedom. Most people on some level reject this because on some level they recognize that there is a social cost to certain exercises of liberty. That is why I identify more with classical liberalism than the far more radical libertarianism.
It may seem counterintuitive first, but civic virtue and libertine values cannot coexist. The drug and easy sex culture in America have worked together with other factors to create a society where the average citizen no longer has the civic virtue to take up arms in their country's defense. Libertarians can shake their heads all they want, but history has shown this to be the case. The more hedonistic a society gets, the more freedom that the culture (as opposed to the state) tolerates, the less chance there is for civic virtue to flourish.
There is an equilibrium point, and we have gone past it on one end as badly as many societies have toward the collectivist end, where freedom is respected in a way that promotes an individual appreciation of a legitimate greater good. America has improved in some respects, but it is naive to say that America has become more liberal in any positive sense of the word. What passes for "anti-authority" rebelliousness today is lukewarm compared to the willingness to violently dismantle an abusive government that existed in the first generations of Americans. Part of this can be tied to the increasing dependency on the government, not the least of which being the disbanding of state militias in favor of a professional army. However, a lot of it came from the dismantling of traditional, societal morals and values.
The reason why I went so far as to say that our country is not ready for a return to liberty is that our culture has been so morally torn down that many of the prerequisites for sustaining liberty simply do not exist anymore. There can be no question as to whether or not the family has been fundamentally broken in the past few decades. A lot of libertarians foolishly call the "choice of family structures" a sign of increasing liberty, but the reality is that the family unit has always been a bulwark against powerful government. Why else would Karl Marx have considered the traditional family an enemy of Communism? The church and traditional "self-help organizations" that used to provide for the welfare of the poor and vulnerable have also collapsed in the past two to three generations since the introduction of a comprehensive welfare state.
I know that many libertarians consider it incredibly passe to suggest that Judao-Christian values are essential to a state of liberty, but there is an unfortunate truth to this. Religion is very important to the functioning of a free society because religious morality is immutable and can stand against those who say that "the times demand change." Consider the fact that the Bill of Rights only started to become ambiguous when the influence of religion started to fall away. There is an unfortunate truth that the more socially liberal the culture (as opposed to the state) has become, the more ambiguous and meaningless the Constitution has become.
Now I know that many libertarians would by now want to know how I propose to fix the system. It's a long process, and it would probably not be completed within my lifetime (and I'm only 22). I would propose the following constitutional amendments to start things off:
- A balanced budget amendment.
- A line item veto.
- An amendment to explicitly state that Congress cannot regulate anything inside of a state except where it directly relates to an enumerated power or is part of a purchase or barter that takes place between two states. Only retail sales on that one, not even production could be regulated.
- An amendment that states that the Bill of Rights cannot be regulate in any manner by Congress except where a citizen is attempting to use them to cause loss of life, injury or destruction to property that does not belong to him or her.
- An amendment that states that no citizen must ever obey an unconstitutional order or law, and that the members of Congress who supported it or the President (whoever handed it down) may be subjected to civil penalties if the enforcement of the law results in loss of life, liberty or property. The only exceptions allowed would be measures necessary to enforce basic discipline in the armed forces or to regulate the conduct of civilian employees in matters relating to due process of law or national security.
- An amendment that strips the President and Congress of all legal immunity from criminal prosecution, that retroactively subjects all officials to federal law and that allows the state governments to pursue criminal prosecution of such crimes in their own courts using federal law if the federal legal system is incapable of acting.
There need to be some major institutional reforms put into place that force the system to start constricting back into something manageable. From there, start with steep spending cuts and small business-friendly deregulations. After that, the process of incrementalism truly begins.
Consider the fact that the Bill of Rights only started to become ambiguous when the influence of religion started to fall away.
I would argue that the Bill of Rights only started to become ambiguous when the ubiquity of Christianity started to fall away (which is not the same thing). The influences of different religions and educations (all of them legitimate) on people's minds will inevitably lead them to interpret the same words in a different way; it's a question of context. The context in which I interpret certain words (being an Australian Agnostic) will be different to that of an American Christian, which will be different again to that of an American Jew. What needs to happen is that documents like the Bill of Rights need to be modified (yes, modified!) to make them unabmigious in a more varied, multi-religious, multicultural context than existed when they were originally written. The wordings of these documents needs to be based on what is held in common by all (or nearly all) those whom it affects (e.g. those who hold the rights mentioned in the Bill, and those who must respect them). Much as you might wish for a return of Christian values to society, you must realise that not everyone subscribes to Christian values, nor do they care to.
Also, while I'm here, having a family structure that is able to resist changes in the society surrounding it is a double-edged sword. They can resist the good changes as well as the bad.
Lucas,
Good point about the ubiquity of Christianity there. I guess I was trying to be a little... *ahem* neutral on that one.
Now for the families. While I agree with you that it can lead to some bad results, I think that on balance the majority of what it serves is fundamentally good. The reality is that a single parent or a homosexual couple cannot give their children the same breadth of experience when it comes to things like how a (wo)man should act or be treated that a heterosexual, stable marriage can. That generally leads to more balanced citizens who can better ascertain the benefits or drawbacks to a change.
For my part, I realized a while ago that you have to be morally conservative if you want to make political libertarianism viable. A society that ascribes to an anything goes attitude, and that doesn't pressure people to make certain basic choices is going to collapse. We both know that you cannot force things like stable marriage on people, but when society stops seeing them as important is when trouble starts to happen. Already many blacks think that marriage is for white people. Personally, I find that to be a very dangerous way of thinking because it speaks to the incredible chaos afflicting most working class and poor black communities.
Perhaps this is why I prefer other modifiers to small-l 'libertarian', like Christian (as Vox does) or even "messianic" or "patriarchal".
My comment would start with a seemingly minor point, but which I think goes to the heart of the matter:
"I know that many libertarians consider it incredibly passe to suggest that Judao-Christian values are essential to a state of liberty, but there is an unfortunate truth to this."
It's not really "unfortunate", Mike, any more than the laws of physics are. It is the way our Creator made us. (And it is the heart of the "free-will" and "choose life" issues, which is the very essence of Torah, and what Yeshua did for us, of His 'free will'.)
I would argue the "extreme" (true) libertarian viewpoint, that the God who gave us life gave us liberty. He wrote the Rules, made them clear via multiple witnesses, and then fleshed them out for us. He gives us the choice to "choose life - that you and your descendents might live" (Deu. 30) Where in !#$#%! does Big Brother think IT has the perogative to override God?
Every time we put an "obligation" on government to protect us, "decide" right and wrong for us, or (yes) license us to do what God told US to do, the result is literally hell on earth. (How LONG is takes is another, albeit interesting, story. Lag makes it easier for us to deny Him, in brief!)
"We must have this baseline in place first before more radical experimentation such as the elimination of the marriage licensing laws, war on drugs, pornography and other issues can be resolved in a satisfactory manner."
What we WILL do, and should do, are different things. I'll still argue that those thing are not "radical", just usurpations - both of Him, and our own Law.
Ultimately, I turn again to Scripture, and His commandment for us (repeated in Torah, and also Revelation):
"Come out of her, My people...be not a partaker of her plagues..."
Don't try to "serve two masters"; don't take a license to do His will (and have no other gods before Him). Just come out.
Mark,
The point about the Judao-Christian requirement being "unfortunate" is that it means that liberty cannot be established outside of that environment. That actually puts a burden on some aspects of liberty, such as requiring that our society take in immigrants from non-Judao-Christian societies in small numbers.
I call myself a "Fabian libertarian" because I favor a gradual, organized return to a liberal state. The shock that would be created in the marketplace and culture of a sudden 180 degree shift away would be too great for modern America to handle and the ensuing chaos could very well send us even deeper into the arms of big government.
My plan for a return to limited government is very simple. Force people to work within political constraints and live within their means. To accomplish that, I'd propose the following changes for the first generation of liberalization of this country:
1) Constitutional reforms to limit the powers of the three branches of the federal government, especially on the economic regulation front so that the interstate commerce clause would be rendered mostly impotent.
2) An end to all direct federal income taxation.
3) The abolition of virtually all business regulation.
4) The seizure of all military-grade weaponry possessed by law enforcement in jurisdictions which have any regulation on the private right to keep and bear arms.
5) The abolition of the welfare state.
If you disagree with me, think about this. God didn't just hand over the promised land. He made the Jews go 40 freakin years in the desert to get Egypt out of their system until he let them go to live in the promised land. That's the precedent I'm working from. America has been too thoroughly warped to just go liberal (classical) overnight. It needs its "40 years in the desert" if things are going to get any better.
I actually don't disagree for the most part, MikeT; certainly not with the concept.
I've been involved in the "freedom" movement for a number of years (ten, at least, going back to before I became a Bible believer) and perhaps have gotten a bit cynical. The first radio show I did on American Freedom Network was about the "line in the sand" and what would happen when it was crossed. I've lost count of how many such "lines" Big Brother has crossed since; not only has there not been a reversal of course toward any semblance of 'freedom', the out-of-control car on the highway to you-know-where continues to pick up speed.
Years later I did a series of shows about a hypothetical 'revolution' toward freedom, and came to the reluctant conclusion that -- IF the new 1776 were tomorrow, there wouldn't be enough Americans who still knew the principles of freedom to establish anything even like what we had, and blew.
My own perspective is more modest now, in line with Isaiah's mission. "Tell 'em what's coming, if they don't straighten up," a paraphrase from the classic article "Isaiah's Job" by Albert J. Nock.
Since the same ending seems to apply today ("They won't listen, but the Remnant will hear,"
I focus on the "come out of her, My people..." part.
Blessings,
What this country really needs is to get caught with its pants down where its military and economic power means nothing. I think that the illegal immigration issue might be a blessing for this country because it's starting to do what terrorism couldn't do, namely realize that we have no real leadership.
If the Libertarian and Constitution parties were smart, they'd try to run candidates with strong national security credentials who aren't sympathetic to open borders. They'd probably be able to clean up in a few states, especially the border states.