It Is Dangerous to Be Right When the Government Is Wrong Read online

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  The Freest Nation in the World: The United State of Nature

  In his second treatise, Locke traces the evolution of man from when he is born in a state of nature, to being part of an organized society governed by the laws of nature. Locke starts off his theory with a description of the state of nature; where all men are born equal, free, in possession of certain natural rights, and governed by the natural law of morality. This theory of equality means no one has rights that are superior to any others’, and these natural rights are rights that are possessed by all people, given by our Creator, as a consequence of our humanity.

  Societies will form naturally because individuals will come together in an attempt to acquire various goods and property, which will inevitably lead to conflict because of man’s fallible nature. It is for this reason alone that governments will form, with their only roles being the protection and preservation of every individual’s natural rights, and the only way the government gains this power is through the consent of the individuals involved. According to Locke, if governments abuse their powers, or if individuals do not consent to their governance, it is the right of the people to revoke their consent or to alter or abolish the government. What is the role of government today? Did anyone actually consent to this government? Where and how do you go about giving your consent, do they even ask for it, is it assumed that you implicitly consent, and more importantly, how do you revoke that implied consent?

  Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right

  As we can see, our liberties, rights, and freedoms existed before governments are formed, or as French lawyer Frédéric Bastiat stated in 1850, “Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.” This is a far cry from the mainstream view of rights and liberties in America today; but wasn’t Locke’s theory the foundational theory upon which America was created in the first place? It seems modern American thought has replaced the theory that the only just role of government is to protect our natural rights, with a theory that the role of government is to give us our rights. How can the government give us what it does not have? What path has this led us down? Does the individual have the right to live his own life as he wishes anymore? It actually seems that some tyrannical central government has assumed this role for him, all supposedly in the best interests of the general welfare, of course.

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  You Cannot Purchase Rights from Wal-Mart!

  It is very important to understand what a right is, especially since Big Government progressives in both the Democratic and the Republican Parties have been trying to trick us. These folks, who really want the government to care for us from cradle to grave, have been promoting the idea that some goods are rights. In promoting that false premise, they have succeeded in moving the debate from whether the feds should micro-manage our lives to how the feds should micro-manage our lives. This is a false premise, and we should reject it.

  What is a right? A right is a gift from God that extends from our humanity. Thinkers from St. Augustine to St. Thomas Aquinas, from St. Thomas More to Thomas Jefferson, from the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to Pope John Paul II to Justice Clarence Thomas, have all argued that our rights are a natural part of our humanity. We own our bodies; thus, we own the gifts that emanate from our bodies. So, our right to life, our right to develop our personalities, our right to think as we wish, to say what we think, to publish what we say, our right to worship or not worship, our right to travel, to defend ourselves, to use our own property as we see fit, our right to due process—fairness—from the government, and our right to be left alone, are all rights that stem from our humanity. These are natural rights that we are born with. The government doesn’t give them to us, and the government doesn’t pay for them, and the government can’t take them away, unless a jury finds that we have violated someone else’s rights.

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  John Locke advanced our understanding of Natural Rights with his theory which explained what humans were naturally able to do in the perfectly free state of nature. In this state, humans were free to order their own actions, exercise their free will, employ their own person, and acquire and dispose of their own possessions. The state of nature (human existence without government and without the need for government) was also a state of equality; where no one’s rights were subordinate to any others’ rights. Thus, no person has the right to tell another person how to order his life, and no human may impose his will forcibly or coercively to deprive another human of his free will.

  More generally, a right involves a sphere within which we are free to make our own decisions without any interference from the government, individuals, or entities. Just as we gain personal property when we mix our labor with nature to allocate food to ourselves, we then gain the right to be the sole decider of what to do with that property. From this it follows we should also be the sole decider of what to do with all of the other emanations from our bodies. If government were to regulate any of our rights, we would lose our personhood. Rights ensure such a result will not happen.

  What is a good? Locke also spoke of humans as animals who naturally need to acquire property. Goods are those “things” we want or need as humans. In a sense, a good is the opposite of a right. Similarly, we have a right to acquire these goods in order to be able to fulfill our wants and needs, at least to the extent that these goods are scarce (unlike air, except for a scuba diver, who then must possess exclusive rights to his oxygen tank). The easiest good to analyze is food because it is such a basic necessity for all human beings. Prior to being claimed by any person on earth, a piece of fruit is no one’s property. If fruit is the property of all humans on earth, and could never be privately owned, then every time we bite into an apple, we would be eating someone else’s property; or if it is no one’s property, then we would be stealing each time we bite. It is unreasonable to believe in a theory that results in humans violating another’s rights every time they wish to eat; this would lead to the choice between constant violations of others’ rights or starvation.

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  Nor is the scheme of natural rights a uniquely religious concept. The only premise one need accept is that humans are created; it is immaterial whether it is by God or by nature. If a Catholic scholar declares that the female birth cycle is a miracle from God, and an atheist scientist explains the process with a focus on human biology, anatomy, chemistry, and physics, does it undermine the occurrence of human pregnancy? Of course not; they are just two explanations of the same naturally occurring phenomenon, and though they start off with differing premises, they end up in the same place. Why then should a Catholic scholar’s interpretation of Natural Rights being a gift from God be any different from an atheist scientist believing our Natural Rights come from our humanity? Just as pregnancy exists no matter how it is explained, the different explanations of the source of Natural Rights, God or rational humanity, do not change humans’ possession of Natural Rights upon our entering into existence.

  Governments Protect and Serve Others; You Don’t

  It is worth noting that the Founders, having experienced the tyranny of both kings and democratically elected majorities, adamantly rejected the notion that rights came from a society, rather than by virtue of being human. But how is such a notion possible? Is society not just a collection of individuals? How could you have the right to liberty, yet at the same time be forced to serve others’ best interests? It is impossible, and best explained by Ayn Rand: “It only stands to reason that where there’s sacrifice, there’s someone collecting the sacrificial offerings. Where there’s service, there is someone being served. The man who speaks to you of sacrifice is speaking of slaves and masters, and intends to be the master.”1

  The word collectivist is appropriate for this view not only because it is a collective view of society, but also because it is the guardians who are the ones that are collec
ting our sacrifices, which in their view, we have no right to. No one’s rights to life or liberty or property are protected in this system, because if your life and your liberty and your property are not in the best interest of society, then society can take them away, or as the American lawyer, newspaper editor, and politician Gideon J. Tucker said, “No man’s life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session.”2 This is a purely subjective theory of morality; and since any behavior can be rationalized while using a subjective theory of morals, it is a horrible theory upon which to base the governing of a society. Take the southern states in this country in the pre–Civil War era; when viewed as a collective society, dominated by white southern male farmers, was slavery not in the best interest of those who dominated that society? Any theory of government where slavery could be justified is immoral and abhorrent. While slavery might be in the best interest of the majority of members in society, it is definitely not in the best interest of the minorities in that society (the slaves).

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  History is full of examples of atrocities perpetrated by societies acting under the will of the majority. People tend to forget that Adolph Hitler was democratically elected, but people will never forget what resulted from his reign over Germany. In the antebellum American South, slavery was also present in a democratic society. The majority of voters in the South were white people who were property owners. These people authorized themselves by law to own black people as slaves. The Los Angeles Times, in a 1992 editorial about California politics at the time, stated,

  Democracy is not freedom. Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch. Freedom comes from the recognition of certain rights which may not be taken, not even by a 99% vote. Those rights are spelled out in the Bill of Rights and in our California Constitution. Voters and politicians alike would do well to take a look at the rights we each hold, which must never be chipped away by the whim of the majority.3

  Amen.

  Liberty never lasts in a system where all laws are created by a majority vote; as Benjamin Franklin said, “When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.” It was for this reason the United States was not founded as a democracy. James Madison expressed this view in Federalist No. 10 of The Federalist Papers:

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  Hence it is that such democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths. Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of government, have erroneously supposed that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.4

  Our Duty to Protect Our Rights with a Locke

  After John Locke created the seeds of Revolution, it fell to someone in America to plant these seeds in the minds of his brethren in order to form a better society. Thomas Paine, a student of the Enlightenment, assumed this responsibility when he wrote and published a pamphlet entitled Common Sense on January 10th 1776. It was an instant success. At its time it was the best-selling book in American history, selling about five hundred thousand copies in its first year. This book was so popular because it was a beautiful argument premised on Locke’s revolutionary ideas, with the aim of solving the colonists’ woes. His solution, of course, was American independence from Britain and the creation of a new and just form of limited governance.

  Paine began Common Sense by restating Locke’s theory of man in the state of nature and why governments are formed. Paine understood his first goal was convincing Americans to go to war with Britain to win independence. To achieve this goal, Paine presented, and refuted, all of the arguments against maintaining the status quo and remaining loyal to Britain.

  I Pledge Allegiance, to the Crown, of the United States of America

  First, he tackled the theory espoused by British loyalists that since America had flourished under British rule, it should maintain its tight political bonds to Britain. Paine declared this just as absurd as concluding that because a baby had grown by drinking milk, it should never mature to eat meat. Paine even refuted the premise of this argument completely, and instead suggested that America had flourished despite British rule over the colonies and not as a result of British rule over the colonies.

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  This debate is eerily similar to a debate between American conservative political commentator Pat Buchanan and Thomas DiLorenzo, an economics professor at Loyola University Maryland.5 Buchanan suggested that it was because of the institution of central banking and protective tariffs that the American economy saw the greatest progress in world history, progressing from half the size of the British economy in the mid-nineteenth century into twice the size of the British economy in the early twentieth century. DiLorenzo correctly refuted this claim by stating that it was not only despite these government institutions and interventions that the American economy progressed, but that these interventions hindered progress by creating four stock market crashes, and several other boom-and-bust cycles. It is a shame that it is Buchanan’s, and not DiLorenzo’s, views that are accepted in the mainstream today. Sadly it seems that in the long run, the American Revolution did not change Americans’ loyalty to the throne of England; it only replaced the throne of England with the federal government of the United States of America.

  That Is Absurd to Me Because I Have Lost My Common Sense

  Paine then addressed the next argument, which was that Britain’s army and navy provided necessary protection to the American colonies. But the protection of the American colonies was for Britain’s own financial gain and nothing more. In addition, Paine pointed out that since the colonies were dependent on British rule, they were seen as allies with Britain, and thus forced to be enemies with Britain’s enemies. However, if they were independent, then they would no longer be enemies with nations such as France and Spain, with which they had no quarrel.

  Why Doesn’t the Earth Revolve Around the Moon?

  Paine then explained that if the colonies were to reconcile with the British government, the abuses of the present condition would only repeat themselves, which would make it impossible to return to a state of tranquility. Paine called it absurd to believe that Britain possessed adequate ability to govern such a large and intricate land, and we can see this when he wrote,

  Small islands not capable of protecting themselves, are the proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care; but there is something very absurd, in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island. In no instance hath nature made the satellite larger than its primary planet, and as England and America, with respect to each other, reverse the common order of nature, it is evident they belong to different systems: England to Europe, America to itself.

  This size and population disparity is the crux of Paine’s just form of government. The old system had a crown in the nation’s capital that ruled over all the subjects of the land. You can imagine a pyramid of power with the king being on top, then the nobles and military right below him, with the common folk, accounting for most of the population, all the way at the bottom. How could one man be expected to create all the laws that were designed to govern the lives of so many people?

  Pyramids Are Naturally Upside Down

  Paine attempted to flip this pyramid right on its head. The common folk, or every individual, would make up the laws that were to govern their own lives and property. They would then elect representatives who would create laws, in accordance with the laws of nature (natural rights), which governed social interactions between individuals with the only goal of preserving the individual’s rights. These representatives would elect a leader of the colony who would enforce the laws, once again in accordance with the Natural Law, regarding inter-colonial matters.

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br />   Surely a system with a localization of power, where every individual is in charge of dictating his behavior, based on what is in his rational self-interest makes a lot more sense than having some Congress with a few more than 500 members create the laws for approximately 310 million Americans. Happiness, peace, and liberty clearly cannot be achieved when one institution is making laws for an entire population, especially when the population it is making laws for is 620,000 times larger than the population of the people making the laws. We have seen in America what happens when 500 people are in charge of making the laws of the land; it is those 500 people whose best interest those laws are designed for. It is certainly not your best interest they are legislating for, but their own. Corruption, cronyism, favoritism, corporatism, and despotism are the likely results of a system that is run with this or any type of central authority. Happiness, peace, and liberty are only enjoyed by the central state, and the powerful elites with whom it is partners. Each individual can only experience happiness, peace, and liberty through a system where he is making the personal choices which govern his own life and regulate what he can do with his own property.

  The Military Presence Around the Globe Is Too Big Not to Fail

  Once Paine finished with his case for why the colonies needed to fight for independence, his next task assessed America’s then current ability to gain independence. He started this off by asserting that the contemporary brewing question was not if America would separate from Britain, but when. There was no better time than the present (1776), he argued, because at that time America had more than sufficient manpower to form a powerful army, and plenty of resources that could raise a navy, which could be used to defeat the British. Paine affirmed that not only should the colonists create a strong navy for the purpose of fighting a war for independence against Britain, but in addition as a result of Britain’s navy being spread thin around the globe during this time in history, Britain was unable adequately to defend the coast of the massive continent from the possible threat of a foreign invasion. Paine thus contended that if Britain continued its rule over the continent, its ability to defend America would become severely deteriorated.