What is the point of our system of laws? In theory, the government is supposed to keep us all from killing and robbing each other. Broadly, laws and the government’s authority to enforce the laws are consented to by the governed in exchange for the promise that the power will be used to protect their rights from domestic and foreign aggressors.
This is the essence of liberalism (or, in America, “libertarianism” or “classical liberalism”), that liberty can be preserved by a government that is powerful enough to protect its citizens’ rights, but not so powerful that it can abuse them at will. The liberal society allows people of different backgrounds and with different political and religious beliefs to interact freely and without fear of secret police or of the authorities turning a blind eye to violation of their rights.
While the United States was among the first countries to profess these ideals, it has often failed to achieve them. All governments have social policies and economic policies. America at its founding had very many social policy wrongs, many of which have disappeared over time. Unfortunately, while our nation has come to respect the social rights of all people to a greater and greater degree, there has been a gradual erosion of peoples’ economic freedoms. Luckily, the gains America has experienced in social freedoms have more than offset the decline in economic freedom. We should not rest with our current situation, though; we can have a free economy and a high degree of personal freedoms at the same time.
When America was founded, its ideals were light years ahead of its practices. The racism, sexism and the all-too-common temptation to legislate the morality of early Americans betrayed the liberal ideals found in much of the Constitution. Slavery was allowed until the 1860s, racist “Jim Crow” laws lasted until the 1960s and affirmative action has been in place since then. Ethnic Japanese were forced to live in internment camps during World War II. Women were not allowed to vote until 1920 and were excluded from other public institutions by law. Gays are still banned from our military if they admit their preferences and are not allowed to enter the legal contract of marriage. Some people call for speech codes, hate crime laws and other rules that are designed to punish certain unpopular political viewpoints.
Last but not least (and this is certainly not an exhaustive list), there are still plenty of victimless crimes such as prostitution, gambling, euthanasia, suicide and consuming and distributing certain recreational drugs. These crimes are selectively prosecuted and are usually not given a second thought (probably due to their unpleasant nature), even though they do infringe on fundamental rights. Generally, as time has gone on our government has become more and more liberal in terms of social policy, though it still has plenty of room for improvement.
As America has shed its less-admirable social policies, it has adopted many policies that greatly interfere with people’s economic freedoms. Beginning with antitrust legislation in the late 19th century (a response at least in part to the real and perceived corruption of certain officials and unscrupulous businessmen), Americans have shown less and less reluctance to call on the government to take care of their problems and to subdue those they feel are benefiting unfairly from the relatively free society we have. Antitrust regulations seek to prevent businesses from “unfairly” leveraging their size and adopting other unpleasant business practices. The federal income tax (allowed by the 16th Amendment, questionably adopted in 1913) penalizes workers for their productivity and is often used by class-warrior politicians to pit their constituencies against others.
With the advent of the Great Depression and FDR’s court-packing scheme, our Supreme Court stopped blocking unconstitutional economic regulations, laying the groundwork for the immense regulatory bureaucracy we have today.
Gradually, people began to count on the government to hold their hand through every stage of life. The welfare state sprung up in the middle of last century, became bloated in the 1960s and ’70s, and was scrutinized in the ’80s and ’90s. What will the next decade bring?
Liberalism is only ideology that promises both the continuation and expansion of our social liberties on the one hand and the economic growth necessary to maintain win-win games and long-term stability (peace) on the other. If economic growth stops, our democracy becomes a zero-sum game with winners and losers, each faction seeking to subdue other factions. Social freedoms likely would not survive for long in such a setting.
Nick Passe ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in economics.
