Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free? What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners? What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society? What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways? What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?

[Via: Marxism of the Right]

The fact is freedom is a very consistent and logical term that means a very specific thing. And coercion is a very consistent and logical term that means a very specific thing that is the logical antithesis of freedom. You cannot coerce people into being free. It is a logical contradiction which should be enough to make Mr. Locke’s (what an ironic surname) questions laughable on face value. However, let me take each one of these questions in order, since apparently they are the hard question to be answered by all Libertarians:

1. “What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free?”

The mere existence of a draft precludes the existence of a free society. I’m not saying that we live in an absolutely totalitarian state, far from it because America is the most free society in history. However, the draft is definitely a black mark on our history. Those that make this argument forget that free men will engage in conflicts when they consider it in their best interests, even if they are mistaken in their interests. In other words, if men do not wish to fight for their freedom and would rather live under, for example, Hitler, it is the sign of a free society that let’s them sit out of that fight and to be subjugated. And that man will deserve exactly what he’ll get. However, by forcing people to fight for their own “freedom”, you negate the existence of choice which is the primary necessity of freedom. In other words, without my ability to choose my actions, my freedom is nothing more than a fiction.

2. “What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners?”

So, let me get this straight, by limiting which products I can buy you will increase my economic freedom? Now, if you want to argue that by buying products dumped into the American market I’m hurting my future ability to have choice in the market, that’s one thing and I’m willing to listen to that argument and choose according to its merits. However, if you limit my choice by eliminating that foreign product you have effectively done the same thing as the foreign competitors. At that point, how can I consider my “economic freedom” to be anything but a fiction?

3. “What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society?”

Well, I’ve seen enough of the public education system to see how well this coerced education system has done in protecting this free society. May I consider you a product of this same system? Any system that teaches force as a equivalent to freedom will do nothing to sustain a free society. Sorry, this one is so silly I can’t say anything more about with without turning this into a complete parody. I’ll say that in a forced education model (sounds like re-education camps to me), the most fundamental freedom of man, freedom of thought, becomes nothing more than a fiction.

4. “What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways?”

I can actually answer this one in a couple of ways. From a simple pragmatic argument (not really my cup of tea), this ridiculously assumes that without eminent domain that people would simply lock the country down so that no transportation routes would exist. What a joke. Hell, take a look at the early history of this country when many of the cross country roads were private and responsible for the term turnpike.

Secondarily, from an actual moral argument, what is the “freedom of movement”? If you believe in private property, which you seem to most of the time, then freedom of movement would seem to contradict this principle unless you consider trespassing to be a perfectly legal action. No the fact is, either property rights exist or they don’t. If they do, then freedom of movement is really nothing more than an agreement between consenting individuals one of which is the owner and the other is, by some means of mutually agreed upon compensation, gaining access to that land to travel across. Without that, property rights are nothing more than another fiction.

5. “What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?”

Outside of the silly jingoistic notion that foreigners are less interested in freedom than native born Americans, this final question strikes at the very heart of freedom. Freedom is not a privilege granted by a government but is the natural right of all men until such time as they prove themselves unworthy of it (e.g. committing murder, theft, or any other action violating the natural rights of others such as running for congress). This very argument assumes that Americans are more deserving of freedom than other people. If freedom is a just a privilege granted by government to its citizens and to no other men, then aren’t we just arguing about nothing? Aren’t we just fighting for a government benefit along the lines of a Social Security or Food Stamps? Aren’t we arguing about nothing more than a fiction?

So, what’s the conclusion? We don’t have freedom to choose our own actions. We don’t have the freedom to choose how to spend out money. We don’t have the freedom to choose our own thoughts. We don’t have the freedom to control our property. In fact we don’t even have a right to freedom. And I’m supposed to be the kook in this argument.

If you read the rest of the article (not for those diagnosed with high blood pressure), it goes on to claim that Libertarians are the naive mystics looking for a Utopian future. However, I would like to know how much mysticism must exist to believe that man can be forced to be free? Would you care to answer that hard question Mr. Locke?

Not that I have any strong opinions on the subject.

That night he defined a country as a border, language and culture. With this as a basis, he went on to propose ending bilingual education and the complete closing of the borders. I had an instinctual revulsion to this diatribe but like all emotions, they are best consumed when understood. So the question really is what is an American?

Let’s take the statement that a country is defined by its border, language and culture. First, from an historical perspective this is most definitely true. Every country in history, save one (I’ll get to that in a moment), has been defined in its entirety by a combination of these three things. The Romans or the Ottomans or the Russians or any of the other empires of history may have many languages being spoken within them but there was certainly a defining culture, nationality and language that ruled over these other cultures and ethnicities. Secondly, from a pragmatic point of view, all countries, including the United States, are defined by a geographic border. However, there is one difference; one shining contrast that separates America from every other country in history and defines our greatness for all time . . . American was founded on a principle.

America was founded on the real and immutable fact that man is a rational and independent being granted by nature (we can argue about the word “Creator” later) with rights to use the gifts of his nature. This was the country that gave man a place to execute his rights without hindrance; to truly pursue life, liberty and happiness.

Now I can already hear the shouts that this just isn’t true, the Soviet Union was founded on the principle of universal collectivism. To put it clearly, collectivism isn’t a principle, value or even a practical reality. It is merely the old notion that man must serve the state. This is the same governing notion that gives all of those countries who have used border, language and culture as their justification. In other words, most countries must have their people feel attachment to their state based on their ethnicity, language or even by the simple fact that they live in a particular area.

No, it was America that defined their country by the choice of its citizenry to accept its founding principle. A country defined by nothing but its citizenry’s acceptance of the truth of its foundations. It is this difference that draws the best and brightest to this country. They join not by force or by the usurpation of their lands, but by their recognition of our guiding principle.

How does this apply to the definition of what is an American? Well, there is no such ethnicity as an American. We are a country of mutts. While most of us speak English, we are still a country of immigrants who at any given moment is accepting the next wave of new citizens to whom language is only a barrier to be overcome for success in this country. And hell, to be perfectly honest, we stole our language from the British the moment we declared our independence. So there is no language called American. There is a geographic boundary to this country. But this alone is the only similarity with the other countries of the world. This land is home to any man who says, “I am an independent being who will think for himself and act as a rational creature” is immediately an American. By contrast, any man who demands that others care for his lack of ability pledges his allegiance to the rest of the world. And that applies even to those, who by chance of birth, happens to have a US passport.

I will not die for my neighbor because he is the closest man to me. I will not die for my neighbor because he speaks the same language as me. I will only die for a man who by action and spirit represents a value to me. I will only fight for the independent man. Any man who demands the allegiance of another without offering value is a charlatan at best and a despot at the worst. So the next time a man begins to talk about himself and his neighbors as Americans who are granted some special privileges that other men aren’t, let’s make sure they really are. I think the results of such an examination will be nothing but terrifying.

First, my friend Dylan (a.k.a. Cyberhobo, a.k.a. The Dutchman), challenged me on my first political post to my forums section. I had written a comment about the latest Democratic web campaign in which they portrayed George Bush’s Supreme Court nominees as mindless monsters intent on destroying the lives of Americans. Unfortunately, in the spirit of comradeship, he has removed the post but the gist was this: Responding to the various entities of modern politics is beneath me. It is a waste of time to worry about the ramblings of the various parties and that I should find something far better to consume my mind.

Then today, my parents and I had a very long conversation about the relationship between an individual and the state. This oddly enough sprung from the question on how a majority of the learned individuals on the Supreme Court could honestly say that on one hand the notion that a man should be judged based upon the color of there skin is not only unconstitutional but reprehensible (GRATZ v. BOLLINGER) and then on the same day say that the State has a “compelling interest” in backing such a corrupt action (GRUTTER v. BOLLINGER)? However, the gist of the two-hour conversation was that man’s liberty is not defined by the state, or political figures, or the society in which he lives but is instead defined by the individual man who seeks his own autonomy.

While these two conversations may seem very to concern disparate subject matter, they have led me to the following conclusion:

Not only is politics beneath me but it has also been a sin for me to have spent any time commenting on it. Sin may seem a strange word to use but I have been committing the sin of forsaking my own mind for the mind of others. All of my political debates, discussions and diatribes attempt to convince someone else to share my viewpoint. In a strange way this is not that much different from the dictator who compels me to act by pointing a gun at my head. Both of us are worried about the behavior and thoughts of someone else. No, I do not have to accept the ultimate guilt of being a man who used someone else as an ends to a means. However, I do have to accept the guilt of a man who has used himself as a means to change someone else’s ends.

Therefore, I resolve to quit worrying about what all of the power hungry politicians are saying. I am blessed to live in a country where the worst that we do is far better than the best of most countries throughout history. I do not have to feel compelled at this point to pick up my gun and fight the forces of evil that are destroying the spirit and lives of men. Instead, I can happily and contently go out and vote my conscious (yes, I’m still going to vote Libertarian) and spend the rest of my time thinking about something far more interesting, my own life, ideas and happiness.

The first reason is the very structure of the U.N. In 1960, Richard Harkness described a committee as “A group of the unwilling, picked from the unfit to do the unnecessary.” The U.N. takes this model to a new level of insanity. Comprised of dozens of committees, sub-committees, funds and councils, the U.N. chief purpose seems to be to publish bureaucratic reports and statements read by nobody and serving no purpose. How many of you are familiar with the work Social Dialog department of the International Labour Organization or were enthralled by the United Nations Forum on Forests’ “Private Non-Industrial Forest Owners Discussion Paper”? Fascinating stuff, I assure you and certainly worthy of our tax dollars. The basic chart of the U.N. shows some 84 organizations, committees, etc. and this doesn’t even begin to list the more than 1000 sub organizations of sub organizations and committees and offices. If the U.N. wants to serve any purpose at all, it must trim its organization down to a clear list of purposes.

Even more absurd than the structure of the U.N.; the make up of these councils seems borders on sheer stupidity. Guinea, whose population is 7.7 million (only 450,000 more than New York City), is the President on the Security Council. Libya serves on the Commission on Human Rights. Nothing about the U.N structure is designed to serve a purpose. The notion that any state should have an equal standing as the more powerful nations on the various committees of the U.N. is ridiculous. Why should obscure nations, who should have equal footing only as a member of the body at large, be able to represent a 15th of the committee on world wide security. The purpose of a republic is to represent its citizens in an equitable manner. That means that to be fair, you must have some notion of the size and scope of its various constituencies. A country like the United States or any other populous and powerful nation should not have to be subservient to a country a tiny fraction of its size. If I were running the show, which I’m sure will be very soon, the committee structure would have a provision that the worth of any one vote would be determined both by the population of the member country and the amount of monetary and personnel support given by the member country.

Finally and the most important reason for failure begins with the U.N. charter whose preamble reads:

“WE THE PEOPLES OF THE UNITED NATIONS DETERMINED

• to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and
• to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and
• to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and
• to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,

AND FOR THESE ENDS

• to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours, and
• to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and
• to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and
• to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples,

HAVE RESOLVED TO COMBINE OUR EFFORTS TO ACCOMPLISH THESE AIMS”

Preable to the U.N. Charter

While this reads, for the most part, like the charter of a organization in defense of liberty, this institution does not seem to exclude any nation state whose stated purpose is to thwart these very purposes. For example, China, North Korea, Iran, and Viet Nam are all members on the U.N. These brutal regimes that have violated every point of the U.N. charter and yet are allowed to participate on equal footing with countries that not only affirm but believe in these stated principles. How can a congress consist of members who are opposed to the very principles of the congress? It cannot.

The United States was formed on the notion that the various states agreed on the founding principles of the Constitution. While there have been some failures on these principles, most notably the disastrous and immoral practice of slavery (which was ended not through diplomacy but through bloody conflict), at no time would a state have been admitted who did not believe in the principles of the Constitution. If the U.N. wants to be an effective institution it must expel all members opposed to its principles and only admit those nations that agree to uphold its values in their own nation. As Abraham Lincoln most eloquently put it, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”.

I am not opposed to the U.N. as a concept. But as it stands, it represents nothing but a black hole of corruption, waste and absurdity. The U.S. should only listen to bodies of thought worthy of listening to and the U.N. certainly is not one of them.

So, what is "Justice"? Justice is defined by Webster’s Dictionary as:

1a. The maintenance or administration of what is just esp. by the impartial adjustment of conflicting claims or the assignment of merited rewards or punishments.
1b. JUDGE.
1c. The administration of the law, esp: the establishment or determination of rights according to the rules of law or equity.
2a. The quality of being just, impartial or fair.
2b. (1) The principle or ideal of just dealings or right action. (2) Conformity to this principle or ideal: RIGHTEOUSNESS.
2c. The quality of conforming to law.
3. Conformity to truth, fact or reason.

The first two of these definitions deal with the practical nature of justice. The third is the one we should start with. Taking it at face value, to administer justice is to live by using your faculties of reason to ascertain the truths/facts of the world. But how does that get us any closer to the proper way to root out and prosecute evil? Well, I guess we would have to answer the question of what is evil. That is a treatise of its own. Hell, every culture, religion and epoch has produced volumes of work on that subject. I guess they have on justice as well, but we all must do are part.

Let’s just say, for the purpose of this work, that evil is actions or deeds that run contrary to the truth of existence. If that sounds like a weak definition of evil, here is an example of what I mean. If we take the right to life as an unalienable right (a fact of the world), then to take that life in the pursuit of ill gotten gains (e.g. murder) would be to deny the truth of existence.

So where does that leave us? At the root, justice is the recognition of truth, evil is the denial of truth and to dispense justice is to decide the good ("justness") or evil of an action. Ah, now we’re getting somewhere.

On September 11th horrendously evil acts were perpetrated by ruthless men set upon the achievement of the destruction of life and liberty. These evil men deserve the strongest measure of justice possible and all effort must be made to bring it to them. The United States has the crowning achievement of a rights-based judicial system. A system based firmly on and individual’s unalienable rights to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". Rights that can only be taken away when our system finds irrefutable evidence that the individual has taken those very rights from another. For this to happen, the accused must be able to state his case and to confront his accusers with his own faculty of reason and judgement. Yes, this does mean that more guilty men will go free in order to protect the minority of the accused innocents. However, this notion, that these rights are so precious that we must give every possible means to the accused to keep those rights, is why this country is the bastion of liberty that it is.

When it comes time to prosecute the offenders of September 11th, the same standard of justice that we use to hand down punishments to the most common thug must be used to try these most vile of murders. If it is not, then we have forsaken those principles that put us on the side of justice. That we are a people who value the lives of our fellow men (as well as our own) and will fight to protect them. But also, that we who value our rights will not take them at the expense of the innocent.

Now the argument will come that in times of war, certain "liberties" must be taken in the name of expediency. I will counter that wartime is exactly the time when our values must remain as strong as ever. To win a war, you must maintain the values you are fighting for. If we act with expediency at the cost of justice then we have weakened the very core that we are protecting.

So, let us find the men who conspired to these recent murders. Try them on the merits of the evidence and let the chips fall where they may. If they are guilty, let them be found so by our great system of justice and not by our fears or insecurities. Like so many of my thoughts, Shakespeare summed it up completely in many fewer words:
"He who the sword of heaven will bear should be as holy as severe."