Apply your moral premises consistently.
By Christopher Cook, The Freedom Scale
This post is addressed to anyone, of course. However, libertarians—especially of the anarchist flavor—are already pretty well sold on what I am about to say. Conservatives are a more interesting target for this question.
Conservatives want to limit government far more than statists/leftists do. However, they are still haunted by the specter of the eighteenth century: they still believe that “some” government is necessary to escape the “insecurity” of the “state of nature.” And they tend to be in favor of law and order generally.
Thus, while I am happy to hear from anyone, I am hoping especially to hear from conservatives on the title question:
How do cops—and politicians, bureaucrats, soldiers, and all other government officials—acquire rights to do things that are immoral and criminal when done by any of us?
- They can take money at the point of a gun. You may not.
- They can kidnap people and throw them in cages. You may not.
- They can force people to work for the benefit of themselves and others. You may not.
We can do this exercise all day. They have special ‘rights’ that you do not. Where did they get them?
I prefer to call this the special rights problem, but it is more generally known as the moral parity thesis. It states that
The moral rules that apply to ordinary individuals ought to apply equally to people acting as agents of the state; holding political office does not, by itself, change the moral status of an action.
The quick and easy response—the response I suspect will be given by most people—is that we vote to create government institutions and delegate these ‘rights’ to the people who run those institutions. But this runs into a principle that most of us understand intuitively, and that is expressed in law as Nemo plus iuris ad alium transferre potest quam ipse habet. Roughly,
“No one can transfer to another more right than he himself possesses.”
I can sell you my house, because I have rights to it. I cannot sell you my neighbor’s house. I can name you as the manager of an investment account that I own. I cannot do so for anyone else’s investments.
We all get this. It’s obvious. It emerged as a legal principle because it’s obvious.
And yet most people immediately make an exception for government. This is the delegation problem. An individual cannot delegate a moral authority that he does not possess. If voters individually lack the right to perform some coercive act, an account is therefore needed of how voting can confer that right upon their representatives. And no such account is given, because it does not exist.
In response to this, some switch up the argument, offering one of the following:
- Institutions are an emergent phenomenon, and special rights can emerge with them.
- Some institutions are necessary for the common good, and individuals are obliged to obey such institutions.
- Reciprocity requires that those who benefit from a social institution must bear its burdens.
- Institutions can generate new powers; they do not require delegation from individuals.
I am not nearly as vexed by the ghost of Hume as some of my friends and colleagues, but this is a place where the Is-Ought problem applies:
What is the moral premise that justifies these special rights?
Rights are a moral concept. Thus, a moral premise is needed.
One might say that special rights are an emergent phenomenon, but emergence on its own does not confer moral legitimacy. The “common good” sounds like a moral notion, but it still does not explain specifically why (morally) a government official can tax you, but you may not tax your neighbor. Reciprocity and fairness cannot grant you the right to stick a gun in your neighbor’s ribs and say, “Pay for my cousin’s hernia operation or I will lock you in my basement.”
Every response sidesteps the original moral question with some new secondary moral claim. I will restate and repeat the original moral question in all caps, for those in the back row:
HOW DO THINGS THAT ARE IMMORAL BECOME MORAL WHEN DONE BY A GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL?
If you say “we must keep law and order, so this is just how it has to be,” you have conceded that you do not have an answer to this moral problem. You are agreeing that there is no moral justification for these special ‘rights.’ In essence, you are saying, “This is the best we can do.”
I know that conservatives pride themselves on accepting trade-offs and human nature as it is. And there is some value in that. But are you sure that this is the best we can do?
Conservatives also pride themselves on having good morals—perhaps more so than any other political cohort. So I ask you to look at your own moral beliefs.
Most people—of any political stripe—accept these propositions as almost totally unassailable:
- People may not assault peaceful strangers.
- People may not take another’s property merely because they want it.
- Consent obtained through a threat isn’t valid consent.
- Being stronger than someone doesn’t establish rightful authority over that person.
- Ten people agreeing that they may assault an eleventh doesn’t make the assault permissible.
- Merely declaring oneself the ruler of others doesn’t make it so.
When it comes to normal life, almost all of us hold these not only as moral truths, but as representative of moral axioms.
Don’t you want to apply those axioms consistently?
Doesn’t it weird you out that you make an exception to these fundamental moral axioms for government officials?
Don’t you want a real moral premise that explains not only how these special rights come to exist, but why they are morally acceptable? Doesn’t it bother you that you don’t have such a premise?
Or maybe you do. If so, I definitely want to hear it!
But if all you have is, “That is the only way to keep order,” what have you really done but sacrifice your most foundational moral principles and replace them with a much weaker moral rationalization?
Is that really the best we can do?
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