"And if the state becomes a communist oligarchy"
How odd it is that several people have decided to attribute extreme positions to me, that go far beyond anything I have proposed.
Shouldn't it be obvious that arguments predicated on the Declaration of Indpendence presume that government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed?
Oh, I beg your pardon. You've argued that government compel its citizens only for good purposes. Silly me.
You really seem not to get the fact that to justify a dubious principle with the proviso that it not be abused is ipso facto utilitarian.
Shouldn't it be obvious that arguments predicated on the Declaration of Indpendence presume that government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed?
No. These days the governed consent to a great many depraved things. You will not find a majority in this country prepared to vote for human life protections in line with those demanded by the Catholic Church. You have got to face the fact that some political theories implicit in the Declaration -- specifically, the notion that all power derives from the popular will -- are radically inconsistent with a Christian view.
It should be understood that the government receives its powers immediately from God, even if it is chosen by the people. This is Catholic teaching according to Pope Leo XIII:
But it is of interest to note at this point that those who are to be in charge of the state can in certain cases be elected by the will and judgment of the multitude, and Catholic doctrine makes no opposition nor resistance. By this election by which the prince is designated, the rights of principality are not conferred, nor is the power committed, but it is determined by whom it is to be carried on. There is no question here of the kinds of states; for there is no reason why the principality of one person or of several should not be approved by the Church, provided it be just and intent upon the common good. . . . But the Church teaches that what pertains to political power comes from God. . . . It is a great error not to see what is manifest, that, although men are not solitaries, it is not by congenital free will that they are impelled to a natural community life; and moreover the pact which they proclaim is patently feigned and fictitious, and cannot bestow as much force, dignity, and strength to the political power as the protection of the state and the common welfare of the citizens require. But the principality is to possess these universal glories and aids, only if it is understood that they come from God . . . (Encyclical Letter Diuturnum Illud, June 29, 1881)
This seems somewhat hard to reconcile with the Declaration.
Perhaps. Yet much has occured in this country without the consent of the governed. Government has become so huge that citizens feel helpless against it. Why shouldn't they in an era of "big government conservatism"?