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April 16, 2003

Freedom or Free-for-All? Throwing out the rulebook on "rights"

This essay by Lawrence Reed is an on-point appraisal of the great divide in U.S. politics over the purpose of government, and the meaning of "rights". I'll let him explain. Here's an excerpt, which includes one of my favorite quotes from my favorite quote creator, Thomas Jefferson:

The most profound political and philosophical trend of our time is a serious erosion of any consensus about what government is supposed to do and what it's not supposed to do. The “instruction books” on this matter are America’s founding documents, namely the Declaration of Independence and the original U.S. Constitution with its Bill of Rights. In the spirit of those great works, most Americans once shared a common view of the proper role of government — the protection of life and property.

Jefferson himself phrased it with typical eloquence: “... Still one thing more, fellow citizens — a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”

Today, there is no longer any common view of the proper role of government or, if there is one, it is light years from Jefferson’s. Far too many people think that government exists to do anything for anybody any time they ask for it, from day care for their children to handouts for artists.

His introduction uses a simple but very effective analogy:

Imagine for a moment what the world would be like if the art of political governance were treated like a game — baseball, cards, “Monopoly” or whatever — in which there was only one rule: anything goes.

What if you could discard the “instruction book” from the start and make things up as you go? If it “works,” do it. If it “feels good,” why not? If opposing players have a disagreement (an obvious inevitability) — well, you can just figure that out later.

What kind of a game would this be? Chaotic, frustrating, unpredictable, impossible. Sooner or later, the whole thing would degenerate into a mad free-for-all. Somebody would have to knock heads together and bring order to the mess.

OK, now that I've given away half of it, go read the whole thing.

Posted by Lance Brown at April 16, 2003 11:58 PM | TrackBack
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