Today, the United States government regulates almost every sector of its citizens’ lives. It supports citizens that cannot or could not support themselves. It funds public schools to ensure its citizens know what it determines they should. It even monitors marriage. Within the past several months, it has paid out $700 billion in taxpayer money to bail out the mortgage industry, and then proposed spending almost 800 more on a stimulus package. In the midst of all this activity, few people have stopped to ask whether the government should actually be doing any of these things. Fortunately, Frederic Bastiat answered this question over a century ago in his treatise, The Law. In particular, he masterfully addresses the distinction between the roles of government and society, and in particular why the law should enforce justice and not other sectors of society.
Government’s Role in Relation to Man’s Rights
Before Bastiat addresses these issues, he establishes what the natural rights of man are. He contends that they are life, liberty, and property, which, as he says, are the “independently-existing source of all laws. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.” (Page 2) Our nation’s founders made the contention in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” The use of the word inalienable indicates that the government cannot confer or remove those rights. This philosophy lays the foundation for Bastiat’s view of the role of the law.
This conclusion inevitably leads to the question: what is the role of government in relation to these inalienable rights? The next clause in the Declaration addresses this very issue. “To secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men.” Bastiat elaborates upon this principle. He defines the law as, “The collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense.” (Pg. 2) He contends that because all men have an inherent right to life, liberty, and property, they may also defend those rights. If then, it is permissible for them to defend their rights individually, it is logical that, for the sake of efficiency, they may defend them collectively. “If every person has the right to defend- even by force- his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights constantly.” (Pg. 2) The government provides this collective defense by enforcing justice.
This role precludes government involvement in other areas of society. Bastiat explains that, “Since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force- for the same reason—cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups.” (Pg. 2) The rights of a government are based upon the rights of an individual; if a single person cannot legally or morally perform certain acts, the government cannot justly perform those acts either. For example, if it is illegal and immoral for a man to steal money from his neighbor; it follows that it is equally unjust for the government to steal the same money.
Legal Plunder in U.S. Policy
The next term he defines is legal plunder- the law making legal for itself what is illegal for an individual. He argues that since men are inclined to avoid difficulty or pain, and since plunder removes the necessity of labor, man has a natural tendency toward plunder, despite its injustice. Thus the government also, being made of men, is inclined to plunder, and therefore will try to legalize theft for itself.
It is reasonable to inquire why rational citizens allow this legalized theft. It begins when the government redefines its actions: stealing is not stealing; it is simply taxation for programs that may or may not be strictly within the bounds of the Constitution. Bastiat submits that citizens allow this because they hope their government will benefit them by its plunder. They are looking out for their own interests, and forget their rights. However, there is a deeper reason this sort of government interference is allowed: men do not want to take responsibility for their own actions. This characteristic has been a part of man ever since the beginning of time. It is an interesting facet of the story of the Fall (Genesis 3) that the first action Adam and Eve take is to blame one another for their sins. Citizens do not want to educate their own children, and therefore let the government do it for them. They do not want to admit to their own unwise economic decisions, and therefore expect the government to bail out business. They do not want to care for those around them, and therefore expect the government to provide welfare. When these programs turn out to be unsuccessful, they blame the government for their failure and suggest that the government think up a solution. This encourages the law to intrude further into matters outside its just jurisdiction. Thus the problem of legal plunder is compounded.
There are many other examples of legal plunder. Three of these are as follows. First, the government commits legal plunder in the promotion of charity or excessive taxation. The legitimate purpose of a tax is for private citizens to devote part of their money to collectively protect their rights. This money should be just enough for the government to perform its function. However, when the government begins to take money in order to perform functions beyond its jurisdiction, it is essentially taking by force what is not its due, to perform actions which it does not exist to execute; in other words, stealing. Thus, charitable programs like welfare are run unjustly with stolen money, violating property rights. As Bastiat wrote, “See if the law takes from a person what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong.” (Pg. 17) This is exactly what government charity does.
The government also commits legal plunder through regulating education. This is a violation of property, since schools also fall under the category of charity, and of liberty. Through education laws, our government mandates what its citizens must do with their time by requiring that children spend a certain number of years in school. It also dictates the ideas that its citizens should be taught by controlling the curriculum. This gives the government far too much power: in a worst case scenario, it can deprive its citizens of all liberty by raising a generation educated to cede their natural rights for the sake of government protection.
Third and finally, the government commits legal plunder through instituting a state-sponsored religion. This violates both property and liberty. It violates liberty by taking the money of citizens who may or may not hold the same set of beliefs, and using it to fund whatever religion or moral code it prefers. This occurred during the Tudor dynasty: for four generations, Britain was locked in a massive controversy over which religion the state should sponsor. It also violates liberty by giving the government power to dictate what its citizens should believe. In addition, the only way to enforce such a policy is through continual surveillance of every citizen. In the long run, it is, as Bastiat writes, “a violent and futile effort… to use force in the matters of morality and religion.” (Pg. 28)
The Fatal Flaws of Socialism
A proper understanding of the role and boundaries of government, the difference between the responsibility of government and the responsibility of the individual is clear. Bastiat bases his critique of socialism on the fact that it confuses this distinction. In the beginning of his criticism, he makes the following statement: “Socialism… confuses the distinction between the government and society.” (Pg. 29) His interpretation of this statement is very narrow. He uses it to refer to a common socialist response to his arguments. “We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are opposed to any education. We object to state religion. Then the socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to state-enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality.” (Pg. 29) He is saying that socialists presume that if something must be done, the government must do it. In this way, they confuse the roles of the law and the individual.
The presumption that the government must regulate a cause in order to protect people comes from several sources. It first comes from the desire for power and ease- the disposition towards legal plunder that motivates most of the actions previously discussed. Second, it comes from a misunderstanding concerning the role of government which has become a cultural presumption. Because humanity tries to avoid personal responsibility, it has willingly allowed the government to take charge of some of that responsibility. While governmental growth may have been controversial when it first began, after several decades, it has become one of our cultural presumptions. Thus, new generations are raised with the certainty that the government must regulate certain sectors.
Socialism occurs when citizens begin to believe that a utopian society can be formed through sufficient regulation, specifically of the economy. In The Republic, Plato paints an idyllic picture of a society where the government (or, in this case, the immortal wisdom of Socrates an his companions) determines what role each individual should take in the society and the economy, how the upper class should be chosen and trained, and who should marry whom for how long. Unfortunately, history has proven his basic assumptions to be flawed. The whole society is formulated on the presumptions that a properly-educated man would be completely objective and selfless, and, second, that a group of rulers can effectively oversee everyone in a society. These same assumptions form the foundation of socialism.
The problem with the first is that mankind, no matter how well-educated, is still man, and as such, still inclined to grab power and make poor decisions. If a group of men are given significant, flexible powers to organize a society, the results will inevitably an infringement of liberty and poor, self-serving policymaking.
The flaw in the second assumption is evident: in a large society, such as the United States, a few educated men cannot possibly have enough time to successfully assign each individual a role, much less organize those individuals. This is even more true for Socialism, because not only does it require the government to determine what role each citizen should take, it also necessitates government organization of where, for how long, and in what situation each citizen must labor. The result has historically been bureaucracy and inefficien
The Responsibilities and Reward of Free Society
From this, we can see that a government cannot possibly perform the tasks that Socialist policies assign it. It is then reasonable to ask what institution ought to take on the functions which the government has usurped. The answer is that the community must fulfill this role. The family must provide for its members: fathers for wife and children, grown children for parents and siblings that cannot support themselves. If an individual has no family and cannot support themselves, the church should care for them. Paul explains this in I Timothy, Chapter 5. Charities are also effective tools in the community. If these groups: families, churches, and charities, are strong, then the community in general will prosper. This is because individuals can hold others accountable and ensure that help is given in the most constructive way possible. The government has proven that it cannot do the same.
When it comes to economics, liberty is far more efficient than regulation. The best thing that the government can do is to keep out. The free market encourages industry, creativity, and innovation. It rewards intelligent, efficient practices and punishes wasteful, reckless, and bureaucratic business. Ronald Reagan proved that the economy did not need government intervention in 1987, when he saw the nation through a drop in the stock market dramatic enough to match the record collapse of the Great Depression by doing nothing. There is a reason we remember the Great Depression and not the drop of ’87: because for 12 years after the Depression, our government busily interfered in citizens’ lives, instituting programs which still return to haunt us. By comparison, when Reagan allowed the market to work, the economy righted itself within a year and continued to grow. A free society is flexible, vibrant, and, in the long run, prosperous.
For over two centuries, this nation has been a beacon of freedom and opportunity. The United States was internationally known as the country where anyone could succeed with creativity and effort. However, because our government has grown beyond the bounds of its true role, our land of opportunity is in jeopardy. In order to preserve our nation’s promise, we must return to the timeless principles of The Law. Our nation was founded on the belief that liberty and personal responsibility make up the true foundation of a just and prosperous society. The law must remain within its rightful sector: justly defending the rights if the people that gave it authority in the first place. We must hold fast to our natural rights- the rights God, and not the government, gave to us, so that we may thrive in liberty, rather than descending into tyranny and mediocrity.
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