I’ve long argued that the modern libertarian movement was born out of a visceral hostility to the state rather than an intellectual opposition to statism. (See Libertarianism: The Perversion of Liberty.) Over the years, part of that movement has “mellowed,” so that its anarchist leanings are no longer openly manifested.
There are still entities, like the Mises Institute, where the anarchism is overt. But then there are those that nominally endorse a system of limited government, but tacitly accept anarchist premises; the Cato Institute is one such organization. It does not regard anarchism (or “anarcho-capitalism”) as antithetical to, and destructive of, individual liberty. It does not view government force as the necessary means of protecting freedom. It welcomes anarchists as allies in the libertarian cause. And on specific political issues, particularly in the realm of foreign policy, it regularly condemns the use of military force, even where a demonstrable threat to America exists (such as from Iran and North Korea). It denounces, not the initiation of force, but “interventionism”—an amorphous “package-deal” that obfuscates the distinction between (legitimate) retaliatory force and (illegitimate) initiated force. It conveys to the public the view that just as the government should not tell employers that they can’t pay their workers less than some minimum wage, it should not—for the same reason—tell Iran’s mullahs that they can’t build nuclear weapons. Both, we’re told, represent “interventionism.”
Objectivists are not libertarians—not philosophically, and not politically (see “Libertarianism and Objectivism”). We should maintain a sharp line of demarcation between the two schools of thought—just as we should distance ourselves from the nominal defenders of capitalism on the “religious right.” Those who try to rest capitalism on a foundation that contradicts it in principle—whether on the religious premise of blind faith or on the anarchist premise of “non-interventionism”—pose far more of a danger than do outright socialists, whose irreconcilability with capitalism is at least obvious to the public.
I had occasion recently to exchange emails with Cato’s chairman of the board, Robert Levy, on the question of Cato’s tacit anarchism. I am reproducing here (with Mr. Levy’s permission) that lengthy exchange, which should prove illuminating:
(The initial email is Mr. Levy’s response to the following passage in David Boaz’s book, The Libertarian Mind, where anarchists are welcomed as allies in the battle for liberty: “There are many kinds of ‘libertarians,’ of course. . . . Some are so radical they think all goods and services could be provided without a state. In this book I welcome all those people to the libertarian cause.”)
LEVY: Ayn Rand founded Objectivism and can, therefore, determine who can legitimately identify themselves as an Objectivist. Neither David Boaz nor any other person has that status with respect to those who identify as libertarians. In the sentences quoted above, after listing a number of groups who call themselves libertarians, Boaz offers two observations: (1) the anarchists are “so radical they think . . . ”— a characterization that plainly connotes disapproval; and (2) all the groups are welcome to advance the libertarian cause a statement that does not suggest endorsement or even philosophical agreement, but rather the simple acknowledgement that advancement of the ideas that Boaz embraces requires confederates, including those who are apostates in one sense or another.
Fairly parsed, the quote from Boaz is critical of anarchists and concedes only that they are “welcome to the cause,” not that they share Boaz’s view of libertarianism, nor that Boaz is willing to accommodate his views to theirs. To me, that does not seem inconsistent with Rand’s “Anatomy of Compromise.” Instead, it merely recognizes that alliances in support of shared goal X do not betray principle Y even if X-allies are Y-adversaries.
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SCHWARTZ: Our disagreement revolves around the nature and the implications of principles.
When the Democratic Party declares, for example, that it supports “single-payer” medical care (along with many of its other statist measures), that is a tacit endorsement of the principle of socialism. It doesn’t matter that the Party nominally declares itself to be in disagreement with socialism. The logic of its premises leads to socialism and to the acceptance of socialists as allies in achieving its political goals.
The same applies to Cato, and other libertarian groups, with regard to anarchism. Yes, Cato nominally disagrees with anarchism. And there may even be explicit statements to that effect. But many of Cato’s positions represent an implicit acceptance of the premise behind anarchism—the premise that government force as such, regardless of its purpose, is an inherent evil, rather than a necessary good in the preservation of individual rights.
It’s somewhat disingenuous for David Boaz to be surprised that anyone would think Cato is sympathetic to anarchism. [EDITOR’S NOTE: Mr. Levy had orally described Mr. Boaz’s attitude.] It’s as if an official of the Democratic Party—after repeatedly demanding more government controls, after repeatedly denouncing the “haves” for exploiting the “have-nots,” after repeatedly welcoming socialists as allies in the battle for “social justice”—then wonders how anyone could possibly think the Party does not regard socialism as evil and as antithetical to the Democrats’ political beliefs.
When libertarians oppose American military force in situations that categorically demand its use—when Cato says that Iran “is not a direct military threat to the United States, even if it possesses weapons of mass destruction”—such a view can mean nothing other than a disapprobation of all “interventionism,” i.e., an endorsement of the principle of anarchism.
Here are three pieces I’ve written about libertarianism and Cato, which contain specific statements showing Cato’s implicit tolerance of anarchism. (The first two have online links to my website; the third is reproduced in full, below.)
—https://peterschwartz.com/isis-and-non-interventionism/
—https://peterschwartz.com/libertarianism-vs-liberty/
–“Libertarianism and Anarchism” (posted on the Harry Binswanger Letter):
“Ray Shelton asks why libertarians should be linked to anarchism when most of them are not anarchists.
“As I’ve said often, today’s libertarianism is characterized by tacit anarchism. Even the libertarians who nominally accept the institution of government are largely tolerant of anarchists, seeing the latter as comrades-in-arms in the battle against the state. Libertarians evaluate people like Murray Rothbard as defenders, rather than enemies, of liberty.
“Libertarianism attracts people who are motivated not by a desire to establish a political structure that protects individual rights, but by a hostility toward government. This is why they are so opposed to government’s legitimate function of military defense. This is why their guiding premise is the anti-concept of ‘non-interventionism.’ This is why the Cato Institute, for example, regards Islamic jihadism as no threat to us, and opposes military action on our part to destroy the jihadists.
“This anti-state attitude is why Cato has as its slogan, ‘Individual Liberty, Free Markets and Peace.’ The first two are absolute values; the third isn’t. The refusal to wage war is not a virtue if we face foreign threats to our freedom. A genuine advocate of individual liberty would not hold “peace” as a fundamental principle. But an anarchist—whether overt or covert—would.
“With respect to libertarian politicians, Ron Paul’s views on foreign policy are almost as bad as Rothbard’s. And while his son, Rand Paul, is moderately better, he too believes in ‘non-interventionism.’ For instance, Iran poses a demonstrable danger to America, but Rand Paul has said that even if it acquires nuclear weaponry, we should simply accept that fact and refrain from any military action against Iran.
“There are, sadly, a significant number of people today who have adopted the anti-state philosophy of ‘non-interventionism,’ and apply it as a package-deal to both the military and economic spheres (thereby smearing capitalism in the process). Consequently, there is a cognitive need to label the ideology they hold—and that label, widely accepted in the mainstream media, is ‘libertarianism.’
“It is now a term that does not represent the political philosophy of Objectivism—or of any supporter of actual liberty.”
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LEVY: Peter, not to trivialize your argument, but it reduces to something like this:
Yes, Cato has been for more than 40 years an avowed, vigorous proponent of limited government libertarianism.
Yes, Cato does not and has never advocated in favor of anarchism.
Yes, Cato is perceived by virtually every knowledgeable person as endorsing limited government and not anarchism.
Yes, Cato focuses its attention on public policy, not moral and political philosophy.
Yes, Cato has distributed millions of copies of its booklet containing the U.S. Constitution, which expressly and explicitly embraces limited government.
Yes, Cato supported the intervention into Afghanistan after 9/11.
Yes, Cato defends the use of force as a last resort as long as vital national interests are at stake, and the mission is achievable and supported by the public.
Nonetheless, neoconservatives and Objectivists and some others disagree with Cato’s foreign policy positions — especially as applied to the use of force against Iran.
Therefore, says Peter Schwartz: (1) Cato implicitly accepts that “government force as such, regardless of its purpose, is an inherent evil”; and (2) Cato’s non-interventionist foreign policy represents “an endorsement of the principle of anarchism.”
Those conclusions are, it seems to me, flagrant non-sequiturs. Indeed, scholars at Cato subscribe wholeheartedly to the critique of interventionism published by Brad Thompson and Yaron Brook — i.e., interventionism is fixated on national greatness, attempts to export democracy, promotes nation-building, encourages military responses to imagined crises, transfers wealth to corrupt dictators, results in the loss of American lives and treasure, and reflects an unwarranted confidence in the efficacy of government.
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SCHWARTZ: It doesn’t matter if Cato officially does not believe in anarchism, any more than if the “progressives” officially don’t believe in socialism. By its other words and actions, Cato shows that it implicitly accepts the basic premise of anarchism, even if the idea of limited government is nominally endorsed.
The clearest illustration of Cato’s anarchist thinking is its use of the insidious pseudo-concept of “interventionism” to identify what it fundamentally opposes. But “interventionism” is an obfuscating “package-deal.” It refers equally to, say, nation-building in Haiti and to the military elimination of the Iranian nuclear threat. It smears the second by equating it with the first. The two actions are condemned by Cato, for the same reason.
You refer to Yaron Brook’s “critique of interventionism.” What he is criticizing, however, is not “interventionism,” but a particular type of government intervention, namely, an altruistically motivated one, whose purpose is not the selfish preservation of Americans’ freedom.
Everything wrong with Cato’s views is encapsulated in its use of the term “interventionism.” No one who regards proper government action as necessary to protect our liberty would declare that “interventionism” is bad and “non-interventionism” good. It is only the anarchist element that allows the use of that “package-deal.” After all, every legitimate government action, from the military annihilation of al-Qaeda to a police arrest of a domestic bank robber, is “interventionist.” It is forcible interference with the activity of others.
Yet this is the principle that defines Cato’s foreign policy.
A foreign policy based on “non-interventionism” means a policy that refrains from using force, regardless of the purpose.
Worse still, this is the principle that defines Cato’s domestic policy as well. What should the government’s role be in the field of health care? Or schools? Or agriculture? “Non-intervention,” according to Cato. That is, its message to the public is: don’t let government “intervene” in the choices people make. Whether those choices involve taking a drug unapproved by the FDA or building nuclear weapons in North Korea—the principle is the same: no “intervention.” If this is the package-deal people are being offered, a reasonable person could well conclude: “If leaving people free to take drugs means we have to leave America’s avowed enemies free to build bombs, then I guess I’m against freedom.”
A genuine defender of liberty would make the distinction, not between “interventionism” and “non-interventionism,” but between initiated force and retaliatory force. He would distinguish between force employed to violate rights and force employed to protect rights. He would condemn the first—and urge the resolute, uncompromising use of the second.
Cato can come out with the correct views on hundreds of issues—but they are all negated by a single wrong fundamental view.
It’s precisely because of those seemingly correct views that Cato is a unique danger to the cause of individual liberty. It’s because Cato presents itself as supporting the radical principle of laissez-faire capitalism that its anarchist sympathies serve to undercut and discredit capitalism.
This problem can be readily resolved, however, if Cato were to state overtly what you claim it already believes. All it would have to do is to issue a public statement along the lines of the following:
“To make our position clear, we want to state explicitly that we repudiate all forms of anarchism, which we regard as incompatible with, and as a threat to, liberty. We are fundamentally opposed, not to the ambiguous notion of ‘interventionism,’ but to the initiation of force. We regard government not as a necessary evil, but as a necessary good—as the necessary means of defending individual rights— so long as it restricts itself to its proper function of using retaliatory force to defend the rights of its citizens against all threats, domestic or foreign.”
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LEVY: Peter, your assertion that Cato “nominally” endorses limited government is baseless. Everything we do or say is founded on the principle of limited government. Nothing we do or say is founded on the principle of no government. Our argument against military intervention in Iran no more ratifies anarchism than our (or your) argument for post-9/11 military intervention in Afghanistan validates unlimited government.
Intervention and non-intervention are simply opposite ends of a spectrum. The operative principle of our foreign policy staff is that military intervention should be limited to cases where we have vital interests, public support, a reasonable prospect of prevailing, and no better options. Rational people can differ about the application of that principle, but a predilection toward non-intervention does not constitute adoption of non-intervention as an absolute. We are not closet anarchists. Our demonstrated, albeit rare, support for intervention cannot semantically equate to “a policy that refrains from using force, regardless of the purpose.”
Your own principle is every bit as murky in its application. You say, “A genuine defender of liberty would make the distinction, not between ‘interventionism’ and ‘non-interventionism,’ but between initiated force and retaliatory force. He would distinguish between force employed to violate rights and force employed to protect rights.” That principle, like Cato’s, allows for considerable ambiguity.
Consider, for example, retaliatory force (i.e., intervention) to punish rights violators after-the-fact—e.g., a fine for contaminating a river. Compare that with retaliatory(?) force to punish conduct that might violate the rights of others but hasn’t yet done so—e.g., a speeding ticket. We both support punishing offenders, but we may differ about government directives intended to prevent endangerment. That’s an area where rights theory is difficult to apply. How much increased risk do I have to tolerate before your potentially (but not yet actually) harmful behavior is restrained. Surely government can impose safety requirements on nuclear power plants without waiting for a fatal accident. But should government be able to compel automobile manufacturers to install backup cameras or meet fuel efficiency standards? And how about retaliation against nuisances such as loud noises or bright lights? At what point do they violate rights?
The fact that we might disagree about endangerment or nuisances does not mean that either of us is an absolutist regarding intervention or the use of retaliatory force. Rather, it simply means that we have reached different conclusions about such things as the magnitude of the harm that might occur, the possibility of post-injury relief through payment of damages, the likelihood that a regulation will remedy the problem, the availability of alternative remedies, and the cost of the regulation.
Nearly every act imposes some risk on others—e.g., driving, carrying a gun, smoking in an elevator, lighting a campfire, developing a nuclear weapon. Which of those acts represents the initiation of force that justifies retaliatory action? Based on your answer, would I be warranted in concluding that you categorically reject or demand retaliation under all circumstances? Of course not. Instead, I should sensibly infer that you have applied your decision criteria and reached different conclusions to fit different underlying facts.
That’s how you should relate to Cato’s foreign policy. Disagree if you will on the use of retaliatory force against one country or another, but don’t make specious logical leaps about our sponsorship of anarchism.
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SCHWARTZ: I don’t think you understand what I mean when I say that Cato is sympathetic to anarchism.
Someone who genuinely rejects anarchism would declare, whenever the subject comes up: “I uphold the value of individual liberty—and any form of anarchism destroys it. Anarchism is a vicious, corrupt idea, and is antithetical to the principle of individual rights.”
He would not say, “Well, I believe in limited government, but at least I’m in agreement with anarchists on 95% of the issues, since we all want government to stop 95% of its current activities.” Rather, he would realize that he is in 100% disagreement with anarchists, since their system creates a perpetual threat to the lives, and the rights, of everyone in society. He would categorically repudiate anarchism, just as he would categorically repudiate communism and not say, “Well, I’m against communism but since there are many areas of agreement—e.g., opposition to ‘American imperialism,’ condemnation of ‘crony capitalism,’ disapproval of monopolistic franchises for big business, recognition of the need for a revolution against an immoral political system—I welcome communists to the libertarian cause.”
A true anti-anarchist would understand that freedom is as impossible under anarchism as it is under communism—that to permit force to be used at any person’s discretion is to endorse tyranny—that allowing anyone to walk down the street brandishing a machine gun violates everyone else’s rights, regardless of whether the brandisher will fire the gun or not—that life, human life, is not livable under anarchism.
Consequently, the true valuer of liberty would not regard anarchists, any more than communists, as allies. (And he would not describe Murray Rothbard, the father of “anarcho-capitalism,” as a hero in the battle for freedom, but as a villain.)
There is much additional evidence of a tolerance of anarchism at Cato. The anarchist premise is manifest in Cato’s belief that government’s use of force is at best a necessary evil and should always be a last resort. But on a non-anarchist premise, force is a first resort. When it is being used in retaliation, it should be encouraged and welcomed, not hindered and delayed. When the police encounter a bank robber, for example, their immediate response should be to forcibly stop and arrest him. They should not seek out “peaceful” alternatives, such as negotiating a deal whereby he can keep half his loot if he promises never to rob that bank again. Initiated force must be met unhesitatingly with retaliatory force. There is no other way to protect our rights.
The same is true of foreign policy. When there is a demonstrable threat to Americans’ freedom, the government must use force to remove that threat. If our rights are being endangered, force is the first resort (and if they are not being endangered, then force is unwarranted, even as a “last resort”).
More broadly, the anarchist premise is manifest in Cato’s use of the terms “interventionism/non-interventionism” to identify, as you put it, “opposite ends of a spectrum.” As I’ve said, these are pseudo-concepts, which are impossible to define clearly and which serve to obfuscate the distinction between legitimate, retaliatory force and illegitimate, initiated force.
You say in response, “Your own principle is every bit as murky” because there are areas “where rights theory is difficult to apply.” But a concept, or a principle, is not rendered murky simply because there are borderline cases where the proper application may not be clear. If you start with a valid concept or principle, you can readily show where it applies and where it doesn’t.
If you explain that your central principle is the sanctity of individual rights, and that rights can be violated only by initiated force (which includes the threat to use force), and that government is needed to defend rights by using retaliatory force—then the basic structure is clear. The referents of all your terms are graspable, even if occasional gray areas arise. (Though one of those areas is certainly not something like speeding. Retaliatory force occurs against someone who has initiated force, not someone who might do so. Driving at a sufficiently high speed in the vicinity of other cars does violate the rights of others, just as the brandishing of a machine gun does, whether it is being fired or not. An objective threat of force is a violation, not a “potential” violation, of rights.)
The problem with the term “interventionism” is not that there are some gray areas—it’s that there are no non-gray areas. What act of government would not be included under “interventionism”? Why isn’t the arrest of a bank robber “interventionism”? What makes one policy “interventionist” and another “non-interventionist”?
You say, “The operative principle of our foreign policy staff is that military intervention should be limited to cases where we have vital interests, public support, a reasonable prospect of prevailing, and no better options.” I’m sorry but that is not a principle. Leaving aside for the moment the “public support” element, the rest is just a conventional, uncontroversial hash of factors. Is this what you’re going to the barricades to defend? Who would disagree with it? Is there any ideology which holds that we should take military action in pursuit of trivial interests, or in the face of likely failure or when it’s our worst option?
(As to “public approval,” you’re not going to tell legislators to define a domestic crime only in accord with public opinion. Why then tell the makers of foreign policy to do the same with respect to international crime? Yes, the consequences of using force against other nations are far greater than using force against a thief—but so are the terrible consequences of not using force, i.e., of “non-interventionism.” If Congress decides that our freedom requires taking military action against, say, North Korea, should it do nothing if the public at the moment disagrees? Conversely, if Congress determines that no military action should be taken against, say, Syria, should we attack anyway because the polls show that the public wants a bombing? It’s the job of government officials to create the right policy—a policy that in fact protects our rights–and then to try to persuade the public of its validity. Their job is not to sacrifice our rights to public sentiment.)
Obviously, the key in your description is the phrase “vital interests.” Everyone believes that war should be undertaken only when needed to secure our “vital interests”—but the disagreements lie in how to define those interests. A proper foreign policy holds that America has one fundamental interest: the liberty of its citizens. When there is a demonstrable threat to that liberty, the government must act. Of course, when military action is involved, there are many other considerations—how much force to use, when, in what form, etc. But the basic principle is unmistakable: America has a single, overriding interest, and when it is threatened by force, the government must defend that interest by greater force.
Liberty, in other words, requires the presence of (government-provided) retaliatory force as much as the absence of initiated force. If Cato’s intellectuals accepted this idea, they would not be so reluctant to condemn anarchism. They would not be making statements such as the following (gleaned from a quick search of Cato’s website):
–More Libertarian Than Thou by Roderick T. Long https://www.cato-unbound.org/2012/04/25/roderick-t-long/more-libertarian-thou
“Whether anarchism is logically required by libertarian principles is going to depend on what those principles are, a question I’ll let stand for now. But even granting arguendo that anarchism is not thus logically required, I think there are still good reasons to consider anarchism as being at least prima facie more libertarian than minarchism. . . . But suppose it turns out (as so far it seems to have done) that the arguments for security’s being a special case fail, and that there is no inherent reason to treat the market for security as different from the market for shoes or insurance. In that case, the question of whether to be an anarchist as opposed to a minarchist will simply be one of deciding to open up one more monopolised field to competition. In that case, could one seriously claim that anarchism is no more libertarian than minarchism?”
–Defining Libertarianism by Alexander McCobinhttps://www.cato-unbound.org/2012/04/24/alexander-mccobin/defining-libertarianism
“Finally, in response to David’s question of whether I was excluding anarchism from libertarianism: I did not mean to exclude anarchists from libertarian thought. Note that I said ‘the need for minimal government’ rather than ‘a minimal government,’ as in it is a libertarian value in general to have less government than more government. The purpose was to encompass both minarchism and anarchism.”
— Minarchists and Anarchists in Libertarian History by David S. D’Amato https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/minarchists-anarchists-in-libertarian-history
“As a practical matter, given our current predicament, we might argue that the distinction between these variants of libertarianism—anarchism and minarchism—hardly matters. Indeed, it may never have mattered very much in the first place, for as we have seen, the differences between the proposed systems of anarchists and of minarchists often boil down to quibbling about words and definitions rather than real, substantive disagreements on principle.”
I haven’t labeled Cato’s intellectuals as “closet anarchists.” To the contrary, their tolerance of anarchism, while often tacit, is not conspiratorially hidden. There aren’t “two sets of books” at Cato. Again, this is similar to the attitude taken by the Democratic Party’s “progressive” wing toward socialism: they are nominally non-socialist, but are sympathetic to it; they do not repudiate socialism, because they don’t see it as fundamentally antithetical to their own ideas.
Now, even if you don’t agree with much of what I’m saying, at the very least you can see why people would infer that Cato is tolerant of anarchism. Since you think those people are mistaken, you should be eager to have Cato issue a statement disavowing anarchism, along the lines of what I suggested earlier:
“To make our position clear, we want to state explicitly that we repudiate all forms of anarchism, which we regard as incompatible with, and as a threat to, liberty. We are fundamentally opposed, not to the ambiguous term ‘interventionism,’ but to the initiation of force. We regard government not as a necessary evil, but as a necessary good—as the means of defending individual rights–so long as it restricts itself to its proper function of using retaliatory force to defend the rights of its citizens against all threats, domestic or foreign.”
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LEVY: On Dec 12, 2018, at 7:36 PM, Peter Schwartz wrote:
I don’t think you understand what I mean when I say that Cato is sympathetic to anarchism.
Peter, the statement that “Cato is sympathetic to anarchism” is self-evidently baloney Your contortions to validate such a notion means that our views on the subject are probably not reconcilable. I hope that cooler heads will prevail at ARI when the subject of cooperation with libertarians arises.
Someone who genuinely rejects anarchism would declare, whenever the subject comes up: “I uphold the value of individual liberty—and any form of anarchism destroys it. Anarchism is a vicious, corrupt idea, and is antithetical to the principle of individual rights.”
When Naziism comes up, we don’t declare that we “uphold the value of individual liberty — and any form of Naziism destroys it. Naziism is a vicious, corrupt idea, and is antithetical to the principle of individual rights.” No sentient human would believe that the absence of such a declaration means that Cato is therefore sympathetic to Naziism. Not only is the quoted statement unnecessary, but it would elevate Naziism to the status of an idea that’s worthy of debate. Ditto with respect to anarchism, which is far less of a threat than Naziism.
Consequently, the true valuer of liberty would not regard anarchists, any more than communists, as allies.
Millions of true valuers of liberty welcomed communists as allies in the battle against Hitler. And we welcome progressives in the fight for the right to same-sex marriage, and conservatives in the battle for deregulation. Accordingly, we are not “in 100% disagreement” with those groups, even as we vigorously oppose the principles, along with many, if not most, of the policies they advocate.
When the police encounter a bank robber, for example, their immediate response should be to forcibly stop and arrest him. They should not seek out “peaceful” alternatives, such as negotiating a deal whereby he can keep half his loot if he promises never to rob that bank again. Initiated force must be met unhesitatingly with retaliatory force. There is no other way to protect our rights.
It may be comforting to pose indisputable hypotheticals, but occasionally we have to deal with real-world situations. Suppose the bank is owned by Kim Jong Un; suppose the property to be stolen belongs legitimately to the robber; suppose the thief has hostages; suppose he possesses a bomb or explosive vest. Meeting the robber “unhesitatingly with retaliatory force” might be the worst way to protect our rights.
The same is true of foreign policy. When there is a demonstrable threat to Americans’ freedom, the government must use force to remove that threat. If our rights are being endangered, force is the first resort (and if they are not being endangered, then force is unwarranted, even as a “last resort”).
Foreign policy, especially, entails collateral damage and grave unintended consequences. Accordingly, force is almost never the first and best resort. Leaders who fail to appreciate those nuances will not be advancing, and might irreversibly threaten, individual liberty.
[A] concept, or a principle, is not rendered murky simply because there are borderline cases where the proper application may not be clear. If you start with a valid concept or principle, you can readily show where it applies and where it doesn’t.
Those two sentences are contradictory. If there are “borderline cases where the proper application [of your principle] may not be clear,” then you cannot always “readily show where [your principle] applies and where it doesn’t.” You may prefer to wish away borderline cases and gray areas, but you can’t treat endangerment and nuisance — to name two recurring problem areas — as bright line cases if your invariable principle is to retaliate against initiated force. Should all forms of pollution be illegal? Should we never examine cost-benefit tradeoffs — even where small impositions can yield huge rewards? What about emergencies and necessities? Or the rights of children? Similarly, the complexities of foreign policy and military engagement cannot be shoehorned into a Procrustean rule endorsing retaliatory force.
Driving at a sufficiently high speed in the vicinity of other cars does violate the rights of others, just as the brandishing of a machine gun does, whether it is being fired or not. An objective threat of force is a violation, not a “potential” violation, of rights.)
Clear as mud. What’s a “sufficiently high speed”? What distance is the “vicinity”? How many “other cars”? What constitutes “brandishing”? What about a semi-automatic handgun rather than a machine gun? And if your rule of application can contain such quandaries, why can’t my rule cite vital interests, public support, a reasonable prospect of prevailing, and no better options. Sometimes the luxury of clarity is accorded only to those who refuse to see the fog.
If Congress decides that our freedom requires taking military action against, say, North Korea, should it do nothing if the public at the moment disagrees? Conversely, if Congress determines that no military action should be taken against, say, Syria, should we attack anyway because the polls show that the public wants a bombing? It’s the job of government officials to create the right policy—a policy that in fact protects our rights— and then to try to persuade the public of its validity. Their job is not to sacrifice our rights to public sentiment.
That argument is just a rehash of the democracy-vs-representative-government debate. When it comes to the use of military force, with its life-threatening consequences, I am disinclined to put great faith in Congress and Donald Trump.
–More Libertarian Than Thou by Roderick T. Long https://www.cato-unbound.org/2012/04/25/roderick-t-long/more-libertarian-thou
–Defining Libertarianism by Alexander McCobin https://www.cato-unbound.org/2012/04/24/alexander-mccobin/defining-libertarianism
— Minarchists and Anarchists in Libertarian History by David S. D’Amato https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/minarchists-anarchists-in-libertarian-history
Cato Unbound and Libertarianism.org are forums for rational discourse, the exchange of ideas, and historical context. Posting articles or commentary is not synonymous with endorsement.
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