Posted on 04/19/2002 8:05:01 PM PDT by PsyOp
The federalist papers are one of the most important of the classical LIBERAL writings. They cannot be claimed by modern conservatives because liberalism was a far more dynamic philosophy than conservatism. There are many things that have driven me to be more philosophically in line with John Locke than Pat Buchanan, Robert Bork, Rush Limbaugh, et al.
I often see leftists decrying "neo-liberalism." So here is how I shall sum it up:
"A spectre haunting the Earth, the spectre of liberalism. Even now the police states of the Earth mobilize their forces to exorcise this sectre: billionaire aristocrat and anti-globalization protester, Western Parliamentarian and Chinese Politiburo Official, Radical Muslim and Communist Philosopher."
Where is the party in opposition that has not been decried as too liberal by its opponents in power? Where is the opposition that has not hurled back the branding reproach of seeking too much freedom for the citizenry, against the more advanced opposition parties, as well as against its reactionary adversaries?
Two things result from this fact:
The powers of the old order acknowledge liberalism to be a force of nature unto itself
It is high time that the liberals should infilitrate every corrupt social institution and undermine them for the public good, to corrupt any government official that must be corrupted in order to advance the cause of individual freedom and to do whatever it takes to bring about a new world order based on universal freedom rooted in the acknowledgement of inalienable rights
A government resting on a minority is an aristocracy, not a republic, and could not be safe with a numerical and physical force against it, without a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace. - Madison, Federalist #46.
Tree falling, some day, unless they suspend it with wires.
Yep! It cracks me up when liberals start spewing all that "constitution as a living-document" crap on the grounds that the Framers couldn't possibly have been that prescient. We must change with the times! they rant.
In over 2,000 years of recorded human history, human nature has not changed. The Framers new that. They also knew that it was unlikely to change during the next 2,000. Meanwhile, Dems and Libs continue trying to tinker with social engineering. They just don't get - and never will.
You do understand, of course, that Liberalism during the 18th and 19th centuries meant something entirely different than it does today. Locke, Hume, Rousseau, our founders, all understood Liberalism to encompass such notions as personal liberty, personal rights and responsibilities, economic and political freedom, individualism, religious tolerance, etc.
Those who claim the mantle of liberal today (though they don't always seem very proud of it), no longer stand for most of those things. Today, it is conservatives that have picked up the mantle of classical liberalism (as opposed to modern liberalism - if you want to really confuse a college student today ask them to define the difference).
Todays liberals can no longer point to classical liberalism as their touchstone. That touchstone has become socialism to one degree or another, which contradicts many of the key elements of Classical Liberalism.
But we stick with labels like conservative and liberal because they became common usage as applied to certain political parties - even if they do not really apply.
People now mistake the dictionary definitions of conservative and liberal for the classical definitions of the political ideas they once expressed - which are today about 180 degrees out of sync.
The dictionary loosely defines a conservative as someone resistent to change or looking fondly to the past (in this case, the ideas of Classical Liberalism as expressed by our Founding Fathers and those who preceded them in the development of this political philosophy like Locke, Hume, Adam Smith, Rousseau, etc.)
The dictionary loosely defines a liberal as someone open to change or who looks forward (in this case away from Classical Liberalism and torward socialism, monolithic government, restrictions on personal freedom and responsibility, constrictions on economic freedom, and religious intolerance).
Class dismissed.
Unless we share this post (and others like it) with as many people as we can and remind people what it takes to keep a Republic free.
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