Posted on 01/04/2002 5:34:10 AM PST by 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
Actually, all that is needed is men and women of honor that have the courage to uphold their constitutional oaths to defend the Constitution. We don't need a referendum, we need honest politicians and ethical justices.
And which parts of the Constitution then, are not a political question to be decided by Congress? The Constitution is primarily a document that proscribes the limits on the power of the federal government. If it is left to the federal government to interpret it however they please, then the only limits are those that the Congress imposes on itself.
Perhaps, but based on what I've studied and read, they firmly thought that American citizens would see to it that the federal government would never grow to the size and scope it has grown to today.
While the Constitution doesn't specifically give the federal government the power to buy territory, it does give them the autority to deal with foreign governments, and I believe this falls easily within that area.
A world composed of thuggish states, presumably. This fact, however, does not sanctify the ploughing-under of Natural Rights by lawyers and other state-sanctioned profiteers of human misery.
Firstly, the very existence of this nation under the Constitution of 1789 is a product of Washington's vision of an expanding, growing nation. Washington is never given enough credit for 1789. Madison & co. sold the public on the Constitution but the most important impetus for a new formulation between the new States came from Washington.
In 1794 (I think) Washington organized the "Potomac Corporation" (if memory serves here, I think that's what it was called; this was done over the bitter objections of Patrick Henry and his clan), a joint venture between Maryland and Virginia to build a canal along the Potomac River. Washington -- one of the nation's most important businessmen, hated the barriers to trade between the States, and from the beginning he viewed this compact between MD & VA to be a first step towards creation of a broader and general agreement between all of the States.
Next, the city of Washington itself marks the first President's genius and forward thinking. 100 sq. miles? Amazing: Washington thought not 10 years ahead, not 100, but 200 years ahead. He would hold no surprise that the nation consists of 280 millions today. The capital city he envisioned is only today being filled into its fullest space.
Washington insisted on the most westward Potomac River location as possible. The most convenient location would have been by the Cheseapeake Bay, but he was looking into the nation's future not the congressmen's travel convenience. The Capital might have been near to Cumberland, MD, but the the river proved unnavigable above Great Falls. So Washington chose the land between Georgetown, MD, and Alexandria, VA (Washington turned the congressionally authorized ten "square" miles into a diamond in order to fit in his beloved Alexandria -- he also had to force Congress to change the law to include land area below the Anacostia River: that's a whole 'nuther story).
As for the Louisana Purchase: Jefferson felt it was unconstitutional -- but such a great deal it just had to be done. His critics agreed, so it went through.
I disagree with that blanket assessment, and give you Jefferson as an example.Locke is as applicable today as he was in the 18th century---the problem is we've grafted a socialist welfare state on top of a federal democracy. Science, technology, and all the encumbent effects of modernization don't require a centralized, statist form of government.
Anybody know the current percentage of federal income tax filers paying no tax, or recieving credits?
Actually, the complaints here seem all to be about the extent of the government not the governmet itself. That means its not hopeless, anyway. For example, the arguments over whether public or private is better seems not to be an argument over the need for anything such as roads, railways, airports, etc., just how they shall be managed.
Anyway, I could start by pointing out that, like Crab Tree (see #26), that under the original Constitution the States could do whatever they wanted to make life miserable for freedom lovers. The only limitation was listed in Article IV (now that would be a great one to get into -- just what is a "republican form of government"?).
Or I could point out that the Founders' intent is useless if constitutional powers are "enumerated" -- so which is it? Do we take the Commerce Clause for its words or Madison's intent? Yes, it's much abused, but I don't hear any complaints here that it gives no such powers to the general government to regulate commerce (hee,hee... now: whatz that mean? Is manufacture for sale outside one state interstate commerce? Scotus didn't think so for quite some time...)
Or we could talk about how the 14th amendment, supposedly needed to force State hommage to the Bill of Rights has also turned all Federal law into State law...
I could agree with Sobran that the people get the government they want: that's called a democracy. In the 19th Century, that meant that property owners voted laws to their benefit. In the 20th Century that means welfare recipients vote to their benefit... Which is worse?
Oh, there's so much to do! But I won't get into it. No time. Thanks for the flag, though.
It is my own personal view that Alexander Hamilton, for one, wasn't a great friend of liberty. Actually, he was a lot like Clinton in many respects. Although Hamilton at least knew who his father was, his father was not his mother's husband. Hamilton was also an adulterous womanizer, though probably not to the same extent as Clinton. Like Clinton, Hamilton was more interested in power than money, but was always ready to facilitate others out to enrich themselves at public expense. His part in enabling speculators who for pennies on the dollar had bought up worthless paper money (Continental dollars ?), from merchants who had supplied the army, to obtain full face value from the government is one of the more egregious examples.
59 posted on 12/28/01 1:33 PM Pacific by Aurelius
I wrote Harry and told him that people who have a favorite government program are people who benefit from those programs. Such people pay little in taxes because they produce nothing. For that reason, anyone who has a favorite government program is sure to view what taxes they pay as the best investment they could ever make. His question, which he repeated every time he spoke on radio or TV that year, was ridiculous. His fans, though, appeared to be people who had no sense of the ridiculous.
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