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To: Nosterrex

Yes. But those individual freedoms extend beyond our borders because they are natural rights. Enlightenment era liberalism was non-interventionist in foreign policy for the most part. Our founders urged us not to make alliances (including Washington’s farewell address where he warned of “entangling alliances”).


49 posted on 04/08/2010 10:26:07 AM PDT by daniel885
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To: daniel885

Most of the discussions on liberty by John Stuart Mill center upon individual freedoms within a society such as you find in England at the time of his writing. The principle of negative liberty is often laid at his feet. I am not familiar with Mill’s position on international affairs. Burke would be worth studying on this issue since he was involved with the issues of colonization and war. He was opposed to the intervention of England in America, but he was not opposed to colonization or British force. I do not know enough about Burke to speak intelligently upon how he combined liberalism and colonization. Locke was the primary philosophical force behind Jefferson and others of that time. Locke was more about the social contract than anything else. I do not know what Locke’s views were on international relationships. My view is that Washington’s views on political affairs was based more upon commonsense and experience than upon a political philosophy. It seems to me that the issue with which we are debating is the relationship between Liberalism and international or global nexus. This is my question. Is the use of military force in international affairs contrary to Liberalism?


107 posted on 04/08/2010 1:11:21 PM PDT by Nosterrex
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