The Myth of 'Limited Government'

lewrockwell.com ^ | January 4, 2001 | by Joseph Sobran

[tberry]

The Myth of 'Limited Government'

by Joseph Sobran

We are taught that the change from monarchy to democracy is progress; that is, a change from servitude to liberty. Yet no monarchy in Western history ever taxed its subjects as heavily as every modern democracy taxes its citizens.

But we are taught that this condition is liberty, because "we" are – freely – taxing "ourselves." The individual, as a member of a democracy, is presumed to consent to being taxed and otherwise forced to do countless things he hasn’t chosen to do (or forbidden to do things he would prefer not to do).

Whence arises the right of a ruler to compel? This is a tough one, but modern rulers have discovered that a plausible answer can be found in the idea of majority rule. If the people rule themselves by collective decision, they can’t complain that the government is oppressing them. This notion is summed up in the magic word "democracy."

It’s nonsense. "We" are not doing it to "ourselves." Some people are still ruling other people. "Democracy" is merely the pretext for authorizing this process and legitimizing it in the minds of the ruled. Since outright slavery has been discredited, "democracy" is the only remaining rationale for state compulsion that most people will accept.

Now comes Hans-Hermann Hoppe, of the University of Nevada Las Vegas, to explode the whole idea that there can ever be a just state. And he thinks democracy is worse than many other forms of government. He makes his case in his new book Democracy – The God That Failed: The Economics and Politics of Monarchy, Democracy, and Natural Order

Hoppe is often described as a libertarian, but it might be more accurate to call him a conservative anarchist. He thinks the state – "a territorial monopoly of compulsion" – is inherently subversive of social health and order, which can thrive only when men are free.

As soon as you grant the state anything, Hoppe argues, you have given it everything. There can be no such thing as "limited government," because there is no way to control an entity that in principle enjoys a monopoly of power (and can simply expand its own power).

We’ve tried. We adopted a Constitution that authorized the Federal Government to exercise only a few specific powers, reserving all other powers to the states and the people. It didn’t work. Over time the government claimed the sole authority to interpret the Constitution, then proceeded to broaden its own powers ad infinitum and to strip the states of their original powers – while claiming that its self-aggrandizement was the fulfillment of the "living" Constitution. So the Constitution has become an instrument of the very power it was intended to limit!

The growth of the Federal Government might have been slowed if the states had retained the power to withdraw from the confederation. But the Civil War established the fatal principle that no state could withdraw, for any reason. So the states and the people lost their ultimate defense against Federal tyranny. (And if they hadn’t, there would still have been the problem of the tyranny of individual states.) But today Americans have learned to view the victory of the Union over the states, which meant an enormous increase in the centralization of power, as a triumph of "democracy."

Hoppe goes so far as to say that democracy is positively "immoral," because "it allows for A and B to band together to rip off C." He argues that monarchy is actually preferable, because a king has a personal interest in leaving his kingdom in good condition for his heirs; whereas democratic rulers, holding power only briefly, have an incentive to rob the public while they can, caring little for what comes afterward. (The name "Clinton" may ring a bell here.)

And historically, kings showed no desire to invade family life; but modern democracies want to "protect" children from their parents. By comparison with the rule of our alleged equals, most kings displayed remarkably little ambition for power. And compared with modern war, the wars of kings were mere scuffles.

Democracy has proved only that the best way to gain power over people is to assure the people that they are ruling themselves. Once they believe that, they make wonderfully submissive slaves.

January 4, 2001

[annalex]

The Cartesian in me says that while we hope that the society has enough saints and visionaries to preserve its virtue, politics operate under laws of political gravity. Thus the least virtuous, in pursuit of unenlightened self interest, will, in a free society, sell us all to the devil.

Monarchy is minarchy.

[annalex]

You need a bump (#112 - 114 - 121).

[Goetz_von_Berlichingen]

Submitted for your entertainment.

[x]

If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.

This policy of supplying, by opposite and rival interests, the defect of better motives, might be traced through the whole system of human affairs, private as well as public. We see it particularly displayed in all the subordinate distributions of power, where the constant aim is to divide and arrange the several offices in such a manner as that each may be a check on the other; that the private interest of every individual may be a sentinel over the public rights. These inventions of prudence cannot be less requisite in the distribution of the supreme powers of the State.

-- James Madison

But the system that Madison and his contemporaries left us did have loopholes that enabled the power of government to grow. You can't chain the federal government back to the explicitly delegated powers of the constitution. Madison and Jefferson talked that way when they weren't in power, but were not slow in assuming "implied powers" when they were in office, and so will it always be. But that pitting of power against power, interest against interest, may still work to safeguard us some measure of our freedoms.

Did the firing on Fort Sumter bring down the Old Republic and our liberties? You can blame those devil secessionists for a lot of things, but however bad the Confederates were, I don't think one can blame them for everything. It was clear from the beginning that the strictest of strict constructionism would not work, and was not intended by the founders. For the rest, look to the 20th century and the effects of two world wars, a global depression, the Cold War and the civil rights struggles.

[nicollo]

The philosophically pure fail to understand a truth taught us two thousand years ago: we are all sinners.

Only thus could anyone actually believe that American and Soviet leaders were all of the same or that children own themselves (Rothbard). Only thus could anyone actually conclude that Abraham Lincoln was V.I. Lennin (L. Neil Smith). Only through such acts of philosophical self-gratification could one actually enjoy talk of "anarcho-capitalism," as opposed to, I assume, "anarcho-communism," that twisted attempt to fit Stirner and Marx into a belief structure that justified theft (more on that later, if anyone's interested; oh, but I do enjoy to watch the crossing dressing of Rothbard & Charles Beard...).

Such foolishness comes from people who cherish only ideas. They are the adolescelent who discovers something insightful in Nietzsche or Jim Morrison and proceeds to apply it to everything around him. At least the youthful sophist is soon salvaged by the hormonal onslaught, after which he applies all tenets to the immutible quest to reproduce... -- how does that fit into libertarianism, btw? And if it does, can we not conclude that Hamilton was as great a lover of liberty as Jefferson?

Buckley spoke of the "practical limits of anarchy." I wonder where the exit lane awaits the scribes of UNLV, the school whose basketball team once found a great joy in the application of anarcho-capitalism? Do the UNLV libertine rebels look at their pay checks? Or does the direct-deposit preserve their hands from the stain of hypocrisy in this subjegation? Or do they rationalize an employment fed by State taxation to a freely chosen contract between the people of Nevada and their philosophers? And if so, then why such anger at the rest of us who have done but the same?

Anyway, and again, I am encouraged by the general questions in replies here of quantity: how much (tax, government, etc.) not why. Which brings us back to Sobran's article and the silly thesis of Hans-Hermann Hoppe (say that name three times fast) that a monarchy will better attend the interests of the people. Hoppe's model is at least an attempt to salvage reality from theory. Silly, but a try. And I do credit him for taking seriously the Constitution's, "to form a more perfect union." But is the 15th century to where conservative-anarchism takes us? I just wonder how one could be so blinded by theory to actually see things this way.

A key libertarian error comes of its general definition of freedom as money. Libertarian defense of other rights is alchemy: it always dissolve into coin. I've pointed to this in the past, but I it must be repeated with every libertarian rant: all economics are politics.

The Germans applied these kinds of ideas in the late 1800s. By 1910 the country was considered the greatest economic threat to the U.S. (we had already and by far surpassed England). The free-trading Germany was on the rise. That economic model served the Kaiser marvelously. Too bad he was such a moron.

How do Sobran and Triple-H propose to protect us from inbreds?

Yes, I am proud to be of Rome. So don't bother telling me how my city will fall. Put on the libertarian blinders like 3-D glasses and you get queezy, for it seems we've been falling since the first tax on a bottle of whiskey. No, I'd rather you learn a thing or two about how great we are. Here's a start: On another thread I asked, "America has produce[d] more greatness in a shorter period of time than any other nation in history. Why?"

AustinTparty replied (#30),

"Unfetter the human potential and it is amazing what will be produced... A country based not on class, not on race, not on linguistic affiliation, nor yet upon the cult of any one individual...but on a splendid, brilliant and daring idea which sprang from the Enlightenment: that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights (and of course, you know the rest).

I know that my proposition of greatness in and of America is inherently repugnant to some, but to those patriots whose glass is not 9/10th empty, a toast!

[Blade]

Democracy has proved only that the best way to gain power over people is to assure the people that they are ruling themselves. Once they believe that, they make wonderfully submissive slaves.

Bump for Joe Sobran.

[nicollo]

A few loose ends:

To: austinTparty -- Sorry to drag you into this... but I couldn't find any better way to say it than as you did.

To: tacticalogic -- your#102:

I believe the proper context for this proposition [that all men are created equal] with respect to the Constitution is best expeplified by the blindfold on the statue of Lady Justice. Our fidelity to that proposition is best measured by our degree of respect for the integrity of the idea of blind justice.

Well said. I'd add "...and equality in law."

To: huck, your #107: LOL!

To: annalex, your #112:

It is true that a well-written constitution can slow down the growth of government and decay of freedom, but it can't stop it let alone reverse it. As long as a society has elected leaders, they -- each single one of them -- have an organic interest in selling government power to the constituents. Thus, they have an organic interest in seeing to it that the total amount of power that the government possesses grow.

Just curious: are there any instances in American history where the people's freedoms have been augmented?

To: yatros from flatwater, your #113:

[Hoppe] points out that a monopoly of the application of force invariably leads to worse results under democratic conditions. Under democracy, universality of potential access to power and the transitory hold by any one group upon that power lead to decisions that deprive more of the "citizens" of more of their life, liberty and property than even under a traditional monarch. Hoppe argues that the Hobbesian outcome of democracy is inherent to it.

[bold mine] The same thing can be said of a monarchy. Does l'etat, c'est moi" have a place in Hoppe's book?

To: SteamshipTime, your#115:

I'd love to see a similar chart from 1900. Federal revenues were then derived from the tariff, excise taxes (tobacco and spirits, mostly), land sales, and minting. I'll let you tell me, but my guess is that the rich have always paid the most taxes and that today's top 95% of Federal taxes paid by 50% of the taxpayers would look more like 95%/20%. Just a guess.

Any thoughts?

[annalex]

Just curious: are there any instances in American history where the people's freedoms have been augmented?

Some. Slavery was abolished (a development that simply finished the job of individual liberation that started with the Declaration of Independence). Prohibition was repealed (and followed up by drug prohibition). On occasion we get a tax cut. Community standards of decency keep dropping, but I am not convinced that has anything to do with liberty. Nothing to form a counter trend.

[SteamshipTime]

The main difference would be that tariffs & excise taxes are paid, generally speaking, by everyone. Even though the rich would be buying more goods and, presumably, paying more taxes, lower income voters who outnumber the rich could not easily vote the tax burden off themselves to be borne by someone else.

[Chong]

Re: Your post #128
Great insightful post, nicollo.

I can't think of any country in history that accomplished so much in so little time. Our political system may not be perfect (darn the Rats!), but America is still the greatest on earth to date, so I am thankful to be part of this great nation and its people.
Say, how many other countries are people literally dying to get in?

Regards,

[Chong]

Oops, I almost forgot.
TOAST!

[Chong]

Hello there.
Thought you might find this interesting.

[x]

19th century Germany was freetrading in so far as the tariff borders between the old independent German states were torn down in the 1830s or so. Once the country was unified in 1871, it was protectionist as concerned the rest of the world.

But in general, your points are well taken. So many libertarians and anarchocapitalist are utopian theorists. When they ask why reality doesn't accept the good results of the theory, they start looking for villains. It must be Lincoln's fault, or that of the founders for getting rid of the Articles of Confederation. But ideal economic models work because they simplify the world, and get rid of all the messy details, and all the political, military, social, and cultural factors that complicate the picture. When one asks why reality isn't like the economic model, one has to take those non-economic factors and how they interact with long-term economic development into account. One can admire the Rockwellite's dedication to liberty, capitalism or principle if one wishes, but their loose grip on reality exasperates those who aren't members of the cult.

A United States which remained under the Articles of Confederation would not have achieved the wealth and power of our America. It would have found it difficult to expand and may not have been able to defend itself. It's impossible to say whether it would have been freer or bound up by petty local regulations. Generally speaking, the kind of small units commended to us by paleo-libertarians aren't freer than larger ones (consider Hawaii, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Jersey).

The dirty little secret underneath Rockwell and Rothbard's view of the world, is that it's often taken state power to expand markets. The paleolibs talk up Jefferson, John Randolph and John Taylor, but they were theorists of self-reliant agrarianism. It's been statesmen like Hamilton and Lincoln who created capitalist market-oriented America, and warriors like Matthew Perry (to name the most benign case) who built the international free market. There are some good things to be said for the agrarians, but they point anywhere but in the capitalist direction. Rockwellism means having it both ways: enjoying the society created by the Hamiltons and Lincolns, while condemning them for not following the narrow path dictated by theoretical speculation.

[tacticalogic]

A key libertarian error comes of its general definition of freedom as money. Libertarian defense of other rights is alchemy: it always dissolve into coin. I've pointed to this in the past, but I it must be repeated with every libertarian rant: all economics are politics.

And what then, of the governments abuse of the Commerce Clause? By their reconing, all politics, unless explicitly declared otherwise, are economics.

[Rowdee]

..."We’ve tried. We adopted a Constitution that authorized the Federal Government to exercise only a few specific powers, reserving all other powers to the states and the people. It didn’t work. Over time the government claimed the sole authority to interpret the Constitution, then proceeded to broaden its own powers ad infinitum and to strip the states of their original powers – while claiming that its self-aggrandizement was the fulfillment of the "living" Constitution. So the Constitution has become an instrument of the very power it was intended to limit!"...

And where was this little 'conservative anarchist' and his buddies while all this assumption of power was occuring? Doubtless, they were busy protesting the unfair treatment of honeybees at some pasture out in Elko, Nevada; or maybe playing some dumb video game!