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Cutting Government and The Principles of Liberty

By Nicholas Snow
Published: 29 August 2010

“Too much government? Just what would you cut out?” This is an extremely interesting question and is the topic of the Clichés of Socialism number 5. Leonard E. Read counteracts this cliché in a very interesting way, namely by flipping the question upon those who ask it. Read claims the question is extremely tricky because it would take a lifetime to answer the question in detail. And he would not be wrong; the size of government has grown massively since the founding of our country. And has grown considerably even since Read wrote this short piece. There are far too many government programs and regulations which make the choice of just what to cut difficult. Thus, the way around this is to answer on principle rather than with the difficult (simply due to number of choices not in content) details.

Read lists twelve different principles in which government should not interfere with individual’s lives (he could probably have thought of many more). If the person who asked you what you would cut from government disagrees with any of the principles, Read says, let them present their case for why he is against freedom in this specific manner. If, on the other hand, he approves of these principles then he “implicitly approves of the free market, private property, limited government way of life.”

From a libertarian or liberal (classical, of course) position Read is right. The problem is that most individuals will claim to be for freedom but still want to deny some (even many, in some instances) of these principles. Or they accept these principles except in certain instance where it is ‘necessary’ to take them away. In other words, they either want to completely redefine the term or simply pay it lip service.

The current financial crisis has seen many justifications for taking away some of our freedoms. Many who claim to be supporters of liberty are finding government intervention into our lives more and more. Now more than ever people need to be reminded of the principles of liberty. Thus, the question should not necessarily be what would you cut out of government but what principles of liberty do you believe in? What do you think of Read’s strategy?

Download the Clichés of Socialism number 5 here.

2 Comments »

Read makes an interesting argument.

But with the impending bankruptcy of many of the western world’s economies, and the likelihood of a foundational change in government in the USA in November, perhaps the more practical question is, “What should the strategy be to downsize the government?”

The answer is made more difficult by the following:
1) The economy is likely to get much worse before it gets better.
2) Concerted efforts to draw down the government will be met by huge resistance that will put Progressives back in charge, at least for limited periods.
3) Laws can be reversed.

So what does a government committed to downsizing do, given a limited time to fill mandates, that are unlikely to be restructured by socialist based ideologies? After all, the mountain that is the federal government will not be unwound in even 5-10 years.

I suggest two things should remain a priority:
1) Repeal the 17th Amendment. The individual states must again be given a chance to control the central behemoth. In fact, I doubt it can be done just by electing the ‘right’ people in Washington. And monstrosities like Obamacare would never pass if Senators represented the states.

2) Education must go private. There are many reasons for this; drive down cost, re-introduce innovation to teaching, and offering a larger choice. But there is by now another reason. And that is that it is a captured arena for progressivism, paid for by the special interest that is bureaucracy and large government. Privatizing education would spell the end of socialism’s nest within 20 years. The practicality of markets would do the work.

These two efforts are difficult to reverse. And they form a foundation that will have a reinforcing ripple effect as the government continues to slide towards inviability.

//Jim
30 August 2010 at 5:20 am

The ONLY way to fix government is to start over with the issuance of currency by the states. The federal government’s ability to have an open ended “credit card” that they just use to “buy” or pay for whatever they want, allows too much control of too much money by a handful of people. They don’t want to be accountable for the money, so the answer is to take it away from them. Wouldn’t you do that if your kid went crazy with your credit card? The only thing government creates is debt. And that debt is passed on to us in the form of “bills”. They call us human resources. They calculate each person as if they are a dollar bill. We should not have this over our heads. They have sold their souls to the devil and given us up as collateral to the central bankers. In other words, we are slaves. It doesn’t make sense that we send our money to the federal level, to wait for them to issue it back to us. We need to keep it at the state level and secure ourselves in each of our states.

They are called “public servants” for a reason, although when they get to DC, they assume the role of being in power. The Federal Reserve has taken all the wealth of this nation over the last 97 years. Our Constitution does not allow the Congress to give away their power to issue and regulate the value of our money to a private corporation. THIS is what is bankrupting the country. WHY are we paying interest to a handful of greedy bankers to “issue” a debit or credit on a computer ledger screen? Until the states stand up and demand to issue our own currency as competition against the federal reserve debt backed currency, we will never be free. The federal reserve does not pay taxes nor do they contribute to our economy and they are getting over $500 billion per year. Something is wrong with this picture.

//Jan
5 September 2010 at 9:29 pm