ANARCHY, SOCIETY, GOVERNMENT AND TYRANNY
by Kirk Brothers
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INTRODUCTION In this article I hope to show that, from the Libertarian viewpoint, (a) the concepts of ANARCHY, SOCIETY, GOVERNMENT and TYRANNY comprise, in toto, the four possible states of human political existence; (b) that society and government are the "heads" and "tails" of one coin usually called THE SOCIAL CONTRACT; and (c) that anarchy and tyranny are polar opposites showing a major breakdown in that unwritten agreement. THE FOUR STATES OF POLITICAL EXISTENCE I first submit that anarchy,society, government and tyranny are "mileposts" on a continuum of individual freedom/restriction. Anarchy in essence is unbridled freedom--no restrictions, except those imposed by an individual's sense of right and wrong. Tyranny is the polar opposite of anarchy. It is unbridled restriction, imposed by unrestricted government. It occurs when government degenerates into a mere tool in the hands of a self- serving bureaucracy. Between these equally undesirable extremes lies the coin of the social contract, the two faces of which--while interrelated to some degree--are mutually exclusive in their purpose and method. It seems valid to view society as the "carrot" in the contract, while government is the "stick". Society, in essence, seeks to MODERATELY restrict freedom by offering REWARDS for complying with the social contract. Government is essentially PUNITIVE--it is the police power of any state which seeks to uphold the social contract by force--to benefit the government first and the people second. It will be shown that America's politicians have corrupted our government into barely-concealed tyranny and we must rethink our options as to what we may do about it. ANARCHY Anarchy is often decried as "the law of the jungle", using that trite expression as a pejorative. I first submit that a wiser analogy is to refer to anarchy as "natural law". It is an impersonal law, surely--governing most commonly through the predator/prey relationship. Under natural law an individual has no unique or favored status--natural law is inexorable and blind to all so-called individual rights and virtues. Hobbes' classic description of a state of natural law bears repetition here: No arts, no letters, no society; and what is worst of all, continued fear and danger of violent death... Hobbes went on to describe the life of man under natural law as: ...solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. Hobbes' keen insight so eloquently stated might be illustrated by a simple hypothetical example. Let us say that a rabbit leaves its warren one morning to look for breakfast. It comes to a stone wall, where it must turn either left or right. It chooses to turn right. It meets a fox--also out looking for breakfast--and that is the end of the rabbit. Had the rabbit turned left it would not have met that fox at that time, and its life might have ended later or differently. But natural law cares nothing for individuals--it is simply a matter of eat or be eaten. The great agnostic, Robert G. Ingersoll, made the classic observation that in nature there are no rewards and no punish- ments--there are only consequences. It is man alone who tries to control the behavior of other men by offering rewards for the "right" behavior, or punishments for failure to comply. This system works only if all men have accepted the social contract. For example, if man lives in a state of nature--with no human law to consider--there are no environmental protection laws to prevent his destroying his natural surroundings. But natural law will dictate that the destroyer of his surroundings must bear the consequences--usually disastrous, or fatal, to the thought- less human. It is obvious to everyone except an anarchist that anarchy has one grievous, built-in flaw which invalidates the entire theory of a stateless human existence. That flaw is the failure of anarchists to recognize that, while exceptional anarchists might be considerate of other humans and the natural world, most people, by nature, are selfish, stupid, and deceptive much of the time--and some are selfish, stupid and deceptive all of the time. If such individuals see a chance to get "something for nothing", most of them will seize the opportunity and damn the long-term consequences of a moment's selfishness. They believe they can "get away with it" and, unfortunately, they often do so. THE NEXT MILEPOST But these are obvious generalities. Let me be specific by asking a crucial question upon the answer to which thoughtful men must, I believe, agree. Here is the question: Where does natural law end, and society begin? Think about it. You might have a different answer than mine, but consider this, please. I submit that society begins with the concept of private property. Here are my reasons. In nature, man is a hunter, fisherman, trapper, or gatherer of wild vegetables and fruits. He must be nomadic because when the bounty of nature has been exhausted in one of his crude camp grounds, he most move on to another location which has not been depleted by other men. There was a thought-provoking and beautifully-filmed program on Public Television a few years back, on a recently-discovered primitive tribe living in the Amazon rain forest. A camera crew spent some time living with them, videotaping their natural life- style--perhaps some readers will remember seeing it. The tribe consisted of an old man (in his sixties, with the body of a man in his thirties), his wives and children, who lived in a crude dwelling, entirely in the nude (the state of man in nature before either commercial technology sells him clothing, or prudish religion demands it). The patriarch hunted monkeys for their meat, using a blowgun propelling darts the old man had dipped in curare which he was seen preparing over a camp fire. The wives and children performed chores for the good of the family, especially gathering food (one son helped his father on the hunt for monkey meat). When the old man came home with a monkey he had killed with his poisoned dart, there was rejoicing and sharing of the food, and mutual grooming of each other's hair. Finally the patriarch decided he had to walk too far on the hunt for monkeys, so the crude dwelling was burned down and the tribe moved on to a new home site deep in the jungle. Please note that everyone in the social group shared equally in all benefits. There was no "private" property, and no sense of privacy from others. Yet the group might be seen as having some structure, based purely upon the natural relationships of old/young, or parent/child. But if one tries to apply such a social structure to those outside a family group, the structure cannot survive the stress and strain of competition--for available food, as an example. NATURAL RIGHTS IN SOCIETY When man left the precarious existence of the jungle to form communities with permanent homes--to become animal husbandmen and farmers rather than hunters and gatherers of wild produce, the first and perhaps greatest achievement was the establishment of private property as the basis for some sense of security and prosperity. Once a social group took possession of a tract of land by squatters' rights, and agreed among themselves to share it fairly--each member of the group being assigned a specific plot of land as "his domain"--real society had been unwittingly created by their unwritten contract. Let's pause a moment to emphasize a couple of points that might otherwise go unnoticed. First, in a state of nature, man had two fundamental rights: the right of self-determination, and the right to be left alone. These natural rights were embodied by long tradition in the Common Las of England, and were part of every American's Common Law heritage. The right of self-determination means simply that a man makes his own decisions and assumes full responsibility for all consequences of his errors. The right to be left alone means simply that his right of self-determination is pre-eminent unless by his actions or negligence he causes injury to some other man. These are fundamental Libertarian concepts, which have been thrown out with the garbage by the creeping socialism of sixty years of dry rot in our government. By what Madison called the "gradual and silent encroachments of those in power" our Federal (and State) political bureaucrats have undermined the ancient rights that we Libertarians claim--most vehemently--must be restored to the people. Individuals, by their consent, determine the rights of the social group--not the other way around, in which the social group DICTATES to individuals, despite their innate and unalienable rights. In short, society is a complex pattern of private property, voluntary associations and consensual contracts--the central and binding concept being the right of each person to "own" property exclusively. Private property is a formal recognition of man's territorial instinct. Anarchy in its purest sense would not recognize private ownership of any part of nature--although pseudo-anarchists and socialists do so, to some extent. We have already reviewed the distinction between society and government--that government is essentially punitive, as a means of maintaining law and order--without which society would lapse into anarchy. It has been frequently seen that, in time of war when normal law and order collapse, looting and pillaging will invariably begin. It happened in Atlanta before the collapse of the Old South in the Civil War, as it happened in Paris (the Reign of Terror following the French Revolution). A MICROCOSM THAT DEFINES THE MACROCOSM It has been suggested to me that I should include some kind of glossary defining unfamiliar terms so that a casual reader is not compelled to either find a dictionary, or give up on my text. So let me offer a brief definition here. "Micro" means small and "cosm" is a contraction of "cosmos" or universe. "Macro" means immense. So what I'd like to offer now is an illustative example of a "small universe" that defines socio-political concepts as they apply to an immense universe-- where issues grow more complex by virtue of a large population of diverse and competitive individuals. The microcosm I'd like to examine is found, not in the real world, but in the fictional one. ROBINSON CRUSOE In 1719 Daniel Defoe wrote his classic adventure story of Robinson Crusoe--an English seaman who was cast ashore from the wreck of a wood-masted sailing ship, of which he was the only survivor. Defoe, through the eyes of Robinson Crusoe, sees a lush but uninhabited tropical island. Crusoe's first hope--to find some civilization from whence he might secure return passage to England--is dashed to the ground as he realizes that he must somehow eke out an existence with only the few crude tools he has managed to salvage from the hull of the ship--and the knowledge he had acquired during his life in England. So the beginning of the novel is a story on the theme of man versus nature. There is no antagonist, so there is no society--there is no government. There are no laws except nature's laws, and thus no rewards or punishments--only consequences. Crusoe indeed enjoys the natural right of self- determination (and consequences of his mistakes) and his right to be left alone (because there are no busybody vigilantes to interfere with his natural freedom). Crusoe begins his saga of survival by studying the resouces on "his" island--its fruits and vegetables, its bird and animal life which might provide meat, and the fish in the surrounding ocean. He also learns the hazards of poisonous reptiles and insects, and the mental stress of complete isolation and lack of any human contact. His close ties to nature awaken his natural "religious" instinct--but what might (without his English upbringing) have become pantheistic beliefs, seeing nature populated with pagan god-figures, is rejected in favor of his Biblical tradition. Crusoe describes his daily routines, his making of crude clothing to protect his body from the ravages of storms, and his simple pleasures in exploring "his" vast estate, where he is the only human being. And then one day he finds the print of a naked human foot in the sand, flees in terror to his retreat, and is on guard against this new threat. The novel now develops the theme of man versus man--the plot element of an antagonist has appeared. The climax of the new situation, as readers will recall, is when Crusoe discovers a tribe of cannibals setting up a fire on the beach with which to cook their bound victim, who obviously knows what his fate is to be. Crusoe, having salvaged his ancient rifle--which he had used for hunting--now fires the rifle, with its blast of gunpowder, to drive off the cannibals in terror--leaving their bound victim behind. Crusoe releases the man, who falls to his knees in both gratitude and supplication. Crusoe helps the man to his feet, pantomimes that there is nothing to fear, and his new companion becomes his devoted servant. Because the incident took place on a Friday, Crusoe at once refers to his fellow human as "my man Friday". We need not concern ourselves with subsequent developments of the plot, which take Crusoe and Friday back to England, where their social relationship becomes infinitely more complicated than in their primitive island existence. What I should like to show now is how the relationship of Crusoe and Friday illustrate the concepts of society and government, from the smallest to the largest in the world today. CRUSOE AND FRIDAY - SOCIETY Society began with the second man in the story--one man can never be a society. A society of two is a microcosm, but let us look at the events in the story to see what social principles are at work. First, society always has leaders and followers. Leaders are essentially those with power--the nucleus of what will in due time become government. How does a leader win his status? Very simple--by natural, or informal, authority. He is followed because in some way he is perceived by his follower(s) as being superior. In ROBINSON CRUSOE, it is obvious that Crusoe was perceived by Friday and the cannibals as some type of angry god--his white skin was unlike any they had seen before, he had hair on his face, shouted at them in an unintelligible language, and his blunderbuss, with its exploding gunpowder and flash of flame with puff of smoke must have been a terrifying exhibition of some supernatural power. But let's look at real life again. The opposite of natural authority is formal authority--that which might be called "trickle-down" authority--the power is at the top through some political process, rather than by being earned by superior ability. If a man is recognized as a natural leader, he may be said to be a natural aristocrat--a person whose natural superiority exudes like an aura around him. If aristocracy is formalized by a political process it quickly degenerates into royalty, with all the trappings of tyranny by government which is beyond control of citizens, who are rightly called subjects. In THE RIGHTS OF MAN, Thomas Paine recounts with some relish an incident of which he had personal knowledge. After the War of Independence, a European "nobleman" (mercifully unidentified by Paine) wrote a letter to the Continental Congress, to the effect that, now that America had thrown off the Elector of Hanover (aka King George of England), the people would naturally need a new king--and he offered his nobility for that job. He explained how superior his blood line was to King George's, and added that, if the Congress did not choose him as America's new King, it would be proper for the Congress to send him a few thousand gold coins in gratitude for his noble offer. Paine chuckled that the letter went unanswered--and the gold tribute was never paid. Yet some people still cling to "royalty" to this day! But natural aristocracy is another story. Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to John Adams, wrote: I agree with you that there is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents. Let us dispel the fantasy that all men are equal. We are all unique and different individuals--not clones in a beehive-- and if everyone is unique and different, equality is out of the question. Whenever any informal social group is formed for any purpose of interest to its members, a natural leader appears who is chosen, perhaps unanimously, by the members of that group. The chosen leader may be a parent, a teacher, a clergyman, or any other person with special talents, who is instinctively trusted by other members of the group to guide their joint efforts for mutual benefits--the fundamental purpose of society. Natural leadership is the natural aristocracy of Adams and Jefferson--not a leadership imposed as the result of academic degrees, financial status, or by political (POLICE) power. The leader is simply that--one chosen because of superior abilities, or expertise, in the activity of interest to the group, whether leading a labor union, a Scout troop, a church choir or a sewing circle. It should be noted that such leaders are often volunteers, and assume leadership as a trust, whether the position offers a salary or not. Another point about natural leadership, beside the matter of unpaid services, is that the process often involves DELEGATED AUTHORITY. First, the people who, by natural talent, are followers, delegate by their consent some of their rights (or power of self-determination) to their leader. In turn a wise leader will delegate some of his authority to chosen followers who display some leadership ability of their own which is lying dormant and awaiting the opportunity to be developed. LEADERSHIP IN WORK RELATIONSHIPS We have seen that in informal social situations, the leader is more often than not a volunteer, and his followers are also unpaid. Volunteerism is a characteristic of informal social groups, which is of maximum benefit to all concerned, and is often seen after a natural disaster, such as a hurricane or flood when there is a spontaneous outpouring of volunteers to help in relief efforts. But in more formal social situations, a leader might be given a token payment as a kind of honorarium: a choir director or organist, for example, may receive a small stipend from church funds. The most formal social situation, that of employer/employee relationships on the job, crosses the line between informal and formal authority. For example, all employees are paid a salary or wages for services rendered--the amount determined by free negotiaions, which determines a sum the employer is willing to pay and the employee is willing to accept. A loyal employee may be recognized for services rendered by promotion to higher rank with greater compensation--and more FORMAL authority. Formal authority is what goes with a job title. A man who is in a supervisory capacity must oversee the job performance of numerous lesser employees, and evaluate their performance just as his own performance is being evaluated by his superiors. Again, however, the compensation for services performed is determined by negotiation. It is trite but true that some individuals attain a certain rank and status by the so-called "Peter Principle" which means promotion to the level of one's incompetence, from which no further promotion is possible. Unfortunately for those beneath the incompetent in power, he cannot be displaced easily, or reduced to a lesser rank which he can handle with competence and even superior skills. There is a tendency in some situations for incompetence to gravitate to the top. But we have been talking about private business in the free enterprise world of making a profit, and exchanging real goods or real services for wages or salary. In the real world of business there are rewards for efficiency and economy, and punishments (possible "sacking") for inefficiency or going over one's budget. EFFICIENCY IN GOVERNMENT--AN OXYMORON But if we leave the business world and enter the political arena, we find ourselves in an Alice in Wonderland world of exalted power, exalted salaries, non-existent production of real goods, and often non-existent services. There are numerous political jobs--virtually sinecures called "plums"--which pay incredible (by most working peoples' standards) salaries, and have pretentious titles like the Third Assistant Mugwump to the Chief Mugwump. These jobs are sheer patronage, handed out as "plums", or REWARDS, for political favors done in the past. The concepts of efficiency and economy are paid only the most hypocritical lip service--day to day practice on the job in a government office is a revelation in how much taxpayers' money can be wasted how quickly. Let me give you two examples from my own knowledge. A young woman I will identify only as Margaret G. (she has since taken a religious name) lived in Washington, DC, where her father, a career military officer, "wangled" a summer job for her during school vacation. Margaret was a bright young lady of high integrity. On her first day her supervisor gave her the assignment of assigning parking spaces in the new parking lot for use by the 50 or 60 employees. It was a rather complicated job because the employees arrived and left at different times, had different priorities in terms of leaving and returning during the work day when on agency business, and some were handicapped with special consideration given in terms of the distance to walk from their cars to the building. Margaret spent the entire morning on the job, but could not finish it before lunch. So about an hour after lunch she took the completed lists to her supervisor, and asked for her next assignment. Her supervisor (a woman) was aghast. "Do you mean to say you finished it already?" Margaret said yes, but it had been a little complicated, and what was her next job? "But that was your job for the summer!" said the supervisor. Margaret said, "I quit." In short, the agency was prepared to pay her for three full months to do a job she did in a little over three hours. So much for efficiency and economy. A similar story of profligacy with public money was told me by a professional newsman in Washington, who had many friends in many places. He was told by a friend, who was a minor executive in one agency, that by operating efficiently--like a businessman must operate--he had ended the fiscal year with a surplus. When he told HIS supervisor that he was returning several thousand dollars because it wasn't needed, the big boss said, "Spend that money somehow, or our budget will be cut next year!" In short, by always spending every cent of their allotted budget, bureaucrats have reason to ask for more. My friend's acquaintance then ordered new desks for every cubbyhole in the office. The old desks had been new two years before and showed no real wear--but they went out to the used furniture market, and his office had new desks for everyone. And they got a bigger budget allotment the next year. The boss had proved he needed more money, because they had had to buy new office furniture that year. Do you begin to get a picture of the scope of government waste and inefficiency? Remember that next time you wait three months for a reply to your letter to the IRS. But back to our Mugwumps and their inflated compensation for doing nothing. How can these fancy titles and salaries be justified? By any standard of natural authority or leadership, they can't--but they are part of the corruption that goes with the tax system. Let's consider just how much money can be involved. THE TAX RACKET There are, at the last census with which I am familiar, some 280 million Americans at the present time. That's the secret that keeps the racket running. If every American were to give me just ONE CENT a year, not a single person would really miss that penny. But I would be a wealthy man, with income of two million, eight hundred thousand dollars a year. Even after taxes, that's a sweet deal! But government isn't satisfied with a penny from every American that nobody would miss. Taxes are the biggest single expense for every American--and many taxes are hidden in the cost of items that appear to be non-taxable. I remember hearing Eleanor Roosevelt at a convocation at my University in 1953, in which she spoke of the United Nations in glowing terms, and said she didn't complain about the "ten cents a year" it cost a taxpayer to keep the fiasco going. Mrs. Roosevelt was guilty of a propaganda trick. Because the average cost of supporting the United Nations worked out at about ten cents a year per taxpayer, she ignored two realities: (1) that many taxpayers paid a helluva lot more than ten cents a year: and, (2) that the United Nations was, and is, an international debating and espionage society of diplomats, who are merely shysters with a portfolio. What does government actually PRODUCE to justify its existence? No goods whatsoever (that's up to factories and real laborers). It DOES produce a few services of value: national defense, law and order (civil and criminal courts), and disaster services. These are all of genuine benefit to virtually every American. But the bulk of governmental activity is NOT concerned with these real services, but with the alleged services involved in so-called taxing and spending "programs" aimed at redistributing wealth. And that is the key to understanding the source of all graft, waste, and self-serving pontificating of our so-called leaders in Washington (and state capitals as well). The fact that this charade of governmental services is continued--and will do so until bankruptcy and civil disorder cause a collapse of the entire nation--is because the bureaucracy has become a self-sustaining monster, like Frankenstein's creation that cannot be killed--at least not in any of the numerous film adaptations and sequels to Mary Shelley's novel. THE PORK BARREL GAME To show the enormity of the tax racket, let's set up a game on your table. I am indebted to my fellow Libertarian Jim Lewis for this game, which I have modified a little from his version. You'll need a hundred poker chips--or any coins you have handy--or sugar lumps will do nicely, too. You'll also need a big bowl in front of you, which you may label with any such make-believe term as graft, pork barrel, slush fund, or simply Big Brother. Count out ten piles of poker chips of ten chips each, and place them in a row opposite you. These ten piles of chips represent money earned by ten taxpayers. You have the best deal in this game, even if you start dead broke without a single chip of your own--because you are playing the government. We'll assume that our government is so efficient and so concerned for our citizens that our tax rate is only 10% (I said this was make believe!). First, you collect taxes from the taxpayers by stealing one poker chip from each. If they resist your theft, arrest them. Then you become benevolent. Having taxed, you now spend, by some social program which gives benefits of five chips to one of the taxpayers. Well, that taxpayer is very happy with Big Brother's game of tax and spend. He started with 10 chips, and now has 14. The other taxpayers see the benefit--that's like a magician's patter to misdirect attention. You collect another round of taxes--one chip each, and give another player five chips. The game continues for ten rounds, so that each of the ten taxpayers has received "benefits" once. Now count everybody's chips. Each taxpayer has exactly half of what he started the game with--five, to be precise. Big Brother has fifty--as many as all the rest put together. Those fifty chips are the graft, pork barrel, or slush fund that oils the lousy stinking governmental bureaucracy. And just remember we're not talking about a trivial 10% tax--our taxes are among the highest in the world. Chief Justice John Marshall, in McCULLOCH V MARYLAND (1819) wrote that "the power to tax involves the power to destroy." What is destroyed is free enterprise, a vital motivator in the right of self-determination which socialists would annihilate if they could. Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., had a more sanguine attitude toward taxes, writing in COMPANIA DE TOBACOS V COLLECTOR (1924) that "taxes are what we pay for civilized society." This opinion I regard as pure propaganda and a shining star of gratuitous assumptions. First, "civilized society" is about the most perfect example one can conceive of the glittering generality--vague and imprecise, meaning anything to anybody, and therefore nothing. It SOUNDS GOOD, which is part of all propaganda. Second, society is not government, and government is not society. The Supreme Court recognized this crucial difference in U.S. v BUTLER (the basis of Chapters 1 and 2 of THE REVOLUTIONARY RIGHT), when it ruled, "a tax is an exaction for the support of the government". Not for civilized society--but to keep the bureaucracy running. Third, government is out of control, because of its bloated size and lack of truly authoritative oversight of operations. It is virtually a private money-making club, run by and for the shysters who are elected as public servants(!) and, of course, are in fact in the driver's seat rather than the back of the bus where most of them belong. Let us pause again for a moment to emphasize one crucial point which no Libertarian should ever forget. It is a very old idea, but always new to some. POWER CORRUPTS. Not just occasionally. Not just frequently. ALWAYS. And the greater the power the greater the corrup- tion. No matter how "spiritual" a man might profess to be, if he is catapulted to a position of political authority, he quickly becomes as corrupt as any other politician. Here's an example from recent world history. The late Shah of Iran was a dictator who deported a religious fanatic and trouble-maker, the Ayatollah Homeini, to France. Had the Shah been wiser he might have had the Ayatollah assassinated. The Ayatollah's exile made him a hero to Islamic fundamentalists, and from France the Ayatollah masterminded a revolution against the Shah. The Ayatollah returned and quickly established a religious tyranny in Iran--one act of which was to impose a sentence of death upon author Salman Rushdie, who had written a book held by Islamic fundamentalists to be blasphemous of their prophet Mohammed. Ayatollah Homeini died a few years ago, but his successors, of the same intolerant religion, have refused to lift the sentence of death against Rushdie, and carry on their prede- cessor's fanaticism. In all the world there is no tyranny like the mental tyranny of religious fundamentalism (Chistian, Jewish or Islamic), and once a religious fanatic attains exalted political power, the corruption of liberty in that nation is a foregone conclusion. HOW TO ERADICATE TYRANNY IN AMERICA First, we must educate the people to the truth as shown by history, logic, and the Libertarian concepts of this primer. Second, we must try to bring about peaceful and orderly changes by Constitutional revision. Third, we must realize that our politicians and Courts (same thing) will block each and every attempt of the people to do so. Fourth, we must prepare for civil war. Fifth, if it must come to civil war, we must be prepared to fight to the death. Sixth, if there must be war and liberty triumphs over tyranny, we must have a new Constitution to submit to the people who survive the carnage that must occur in such a conflict. Therefore, for that purpose, my next and final offering to Internet readers will be an outline--a draft--for a Libertarian Constitution, to forever prevent any maneuvers by any politicians or Courts to abuse their discretionary (DELEGATED) powers, by establishing mandatory review of abuses by government at any level. We must adopt the slogan of Jews in reference to Masada-- NEVER AGAIN!