Posted by
PeterE on Thursday, April 10, 2008 4:53:54 PM
Prompted by a stimulating article from
Professor Walter Williams on the meaning of the vow that Presidents take to defend the Constitution, I challenged the assumptions underlying what I take to be Williams' libertarianism.
Williams and his supporters assume that reducing government to the functions strictly "enumerated" by the Constitution would fix pretty much everything. That means getting government out of pretty much everything that we debate politically - except defense spending. Wouldn't it be great if politics was just about about roads, airports and how many of the latest bomber to buy?
Why has government expanded? The failings of religion.
I countered:
"Isn't it the case that there is another reason - other than bureaucratic will to power - for the expansion of government, and that is that there were social needs that were not being met by civil society.
This comes under the historical heading of "The failings of Christianity".
For while Christianity did a fair job of maintaining the faith of the populace, being a placeholder while we wait for the return of the Messiah, the families of the poor especially were often ground under the wheels of industry. Or was Dickens making all that stuff up?
Marxism came in to fill the void of heart created by the lack of community in western society, that really came to head in the disruptions to traditional communities caused by the industrial revolution.
Is the argument now that such community can now be recreated in the post industrial world, the society of plenty? But isn't the contemporary world marked by the breakup of families and communities and the breakdown of traditional values - the atomization and group-ization of young people? Can that all be blamed on government?
We can go back to a literal federalism - but only with a rebirth of Christian spirit and true community - anybody have a plan?"
We need a spiritual revolution - not just new politics
Apparently that was not what they wanted to hear. So I had to defend my Christian patriotism:
"No, I love and respect Christianity, and I am in awe of the sacrifices of its legions of dedicated followers.
I'm trying to capture a vast swathe of human history in a couple of sentences. I believe there must have been weaknesses in doctrine and the hearts of ordinary Christians to allow those external ideological forces (marxism, radicalism, anarchism, socialism of various kinds) to undermine Christianity not only in Britain but throughout Europe. In America (and England - Methodism) it was largely sustained through revival movements that rekindled Christian spirit and social activism.
Today of course Christinaity is so weak in Europe that Islam is emerging as a serious competitor.
This is what I am asking: does it make sense to urge a return to strict federalism without a spiritual revival which brings the majority of society back into the Christian fold?"
An indictment of today's politicians?
One poster declared:
"If a recently arrived intelligent alien from outer space was asked to assess the Senate voting records and campaign promises of each of the three candidates, the alien would declare unequivocally that each of the candiates is an enemy of the Constitution and an unabashed traitor of the highest order. The alien would be wondering why we are not trying them for treason.
The alien would firmly declare that we do not elect people to Congress or the Presidency who take their oaths seriously. The alien would have to conclude that the voters do not understand or care about the Constitution."
Of course I could not resist:
"The alien and Professor Williams seem to have a lot in common. What a coincidence!
I would love to believe that you folk are on the right radically anti-big-government track, but I am as yet unconvinced.
Simply stating that the private sector was doing fine until government came along and ruined it...? What evidence do you have for that assertion?
While I respect your reverence for the Constitution, and the moral clarity that it offers, moral clarity does not mean that you are right.
The central point is: is the Constitution correct in attempting to keep government spending within very narrow bounds? What is the justification for the point of view that the people cannot decide democratically how to apportion a percentage of national wealth?
One counter argument would be: look, individual wealth comes from much more than individual exertion. It is only possible because of things like infrastructure of all kinds - transportation, education, communications. Indeed, this is not just a world of individuals, we are families, communities, groups, businesses, tribes, cultures, societies. Why the focus on the individual?"
The philosophical roots of the founding fathers
I think I ended up answering this myself - but perhaps you, the reader, have a better explanation:
"What seems to you to be as clear as day, is actually the fruit of certain historical developments. Others may know this history better than I do, but from Descartes philosophy took its starting point as the reflective individual, as he refused to the more "we" oriented ethics of Aristotle, or the metaphysical worldview of Christianity.
The British philosophers Locke and Hume tried to ground knowledge and ethics in what they thought was irrefutable self-grounded experience.
In fact this route led directly to scepticism, in Hume himself, and then into attempts to undercut Humean scepticism through such un-self-evident philosophies as Berkeley's idealism, Kant's dualism and Hegel's dialectics. And we also know where Hegel led to.
Hegel's philosophy was born out of a desire to solve the mysteries of Kant, specifically the unknowable thing in itself. But one fruit of Hegel's thinking is to move the subject of knowledge from the individual to the collective.
Now we know that the founding fathers were inspired both by Locke and by Christian fundamentals. But since the western tradition is all about criticism of assumptions, in the search for self-knowledge, I don't see why we can't ask whether the founding fathers' philosophical assumptions were correct or not.
Not because I have all the answers but because it is interesting that these debates on the Constitution come down to an assumed battle between the individual and the state.
Why, for example, do we not talk about a battle between the family and the state? Some would argue that the family is an institution created by God, and that I am not just "me" - individual worker in the garden of modern capitalism - but I am a husband, father of my children, child of my parents, working for the collective benefit of my family. Why not?"