Liberty is Hard

It is extremely difficult to be your own person; your own family; your own community. Extremely difficult. This is why we have a lot of arguments around what small government is, what constitutional conservatism is, and what balance to strike between liberty and safety.

Liberty is a huge Responsibility. If we were to live under completely totalitarian rule, we would have everything determined and provided that we could have. We would have no choices and no responsibilities; all would be provided and determined by those who did the choosing. this of course would not work because, different people are different, it would be impossible to find happiness (or even pursue it) under such a regime.

If we were to live under complete freedom there would be a lack of protection for society’s most vulnerable and marginalized: elderly, infirm, mentally incapacitated. Without some set of rules, one evil person could harm others freely and it would be up to those others to protect themselves individually. Clearly, we need some kind of medium between extremes.

Our founders understood liberty and the balance a people can strike with their government to maintain both liberty and safety. The government would be of for and by the people. The government would be balanced between duly elected parts. The government would be given powers only that the people said it would be given and no other powers. the government would exist to secure the people’s rights as provided by Nature and Nature’s God. The government did not give rights to the people; it simply secured them. Simple.

This method of governance requires a great deal of personal responsibility and comes along with a great deal of liberty. In effect, we can do as we please as long as another is unharmed in so doing. If another is harmed in our doing, the people’s government redresses the situation. Simple.

Of course, there are people who would rather not take responsibility: People who are strong, healthy, and of sound mind who do not take responsibility for themselves, their own families, and their own communities. The universal basic income, ultra-high minimum wage, anti-capitalist bunch. rather than relentlessly dedicating themselves to personal betterment, they would (at the expense of their own liberties) have the government control everything, take from those who have, and redistribute to those who have not. This is what “tax the wealthy” means: the government ought to steal from workers and give it to the lazy. This, of course, only works absent a certain amount of liberty. Our property rights must be tossed aside to provide for those who would rather not earn things.

Absent liberty, responsibility disappears. It is hard to maintain a culture of liberation; destitution is always but one generation away.