The Reason Why I am Not an Anarchist
Montechristo writes:
Do you want to see someone who came to the exact opposite political view as yours seems to be while following the same spiritual/philosophical path? Read Joeseph Sobran’s essay: The Reluctant Anarchist
My comment:
I find the article of only limited interest, not because it is not well written, nor because the gentleman does not seem thoughtful, but only because in my youth I encountered these thoughts and arguments before, and found answers that seem to me not only clear, but obvious.
When Murray Rothbard, for example, says he sees no difference between an elected government hemmed in by Constitutional limits founded on natural law principles, and a Mafia Gang (except perhaps that the Mafia gang provides a service the local population wants) Mr. Rothbard is merely pretending to be an idiot to start an interesting discussion. If the discussion were serious, the discussion would turn on the difference between "authority" which is the legitimate use of power, and power, with is merely power.
The definition of a state as being "a monopoly on the use of force in a region" is an inadequate and misleading definition. As in geometry, so in philosophy, if you define your terms wrong, you come to a wrong conclusion.
A state is the legitimate authority in a region, whether it has the power to back its claim or not. Aragorn is King of Arnor and Gondor because he is the legitimate heir to the crown which,by the laws and traditions of Arnor and Gondor (not to mention the will of the Valar) the sovereignty passes by primogeniture. Even if he were thrown into the dungeons of Dol Guldur by The Necromancer, he would posses the authority to give commands, and a person lawfully his subject would be morally wrong and in violation of oath, fealty and honor, to disobey. On the other hand, when a Captain Hook holds a blunderbuss to your head, and orders (in song) you join his crew, there is no moral authority behind his command, and you may actually be under a positive duty to resist at the cost of your life.
Despite what the famous pirate said to Alexander the Great, there is a difference between legitimate authority and mere power. In some ways, they are exact opposite.
The argument given by the Founding Fathers was that legitimacy can be lost when a lawful sovereign becomes a tyrant, and tramples the laws he is supposed to protect. At that point, the tree of liberty must be watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Mr. Sobran’s meandering walk down the slippery slope from thinking only the Constitution grants legitimacy, to thinking that all governments must grow corrupt and tyrannical in time, to thinking that any establishment of any government ergo is tantamount to establishing a tyranny is a simple logical error. His definition of what a government is is flawed, hence his non-analysis of what makes a government legitimate is wrong, hence his equation of establishing a government of any kind to be establishing a tyranny is wrong, and he seems to make no judgment that a flawed establishment of law and order is preferable to general anarchy.
He seems not to notice the difference between (1) bloodthirsty utopia totalitarianism, such as created all the bloody conflicts of the Twentieth Century, and (2) lawful Christian kings hemmed in by folkmoot, parliament, common law, canon law; nor between (3) governments with a mandate from the will of the citizens, and (4) governments who regard their subjects as cattle to be butchered by the millions on the altar of the idol of socialism, eugenics, or whatever the latest Culture of Death fashion happens to be. He cannot even tell the difference between a pirate and a policeman, and even my five year old can tell you that: policemen are the good guys.
It sounds to me as if he is merely unwilling to take the Founders at their word, and water the tree of liberty with blood, starting with his own. He thinks the United States federal system became illegitimate as of the Lincoln Administration–but Mr. Sobran does not seem to be willing to take the manly step of John Wilkes Boothe, who shouted out the slogan of Virginia after assassinating Mr. Lincoln and jumping to the stage at Fords Theater: sic semper tyrannis. Mr. Boothe, a vile assassin, was morally superior to Mr. Sobran, an anarchist, because Mr. Boothe apparently wished to restore to American of the Southern persuasion those natural liberties the Constitution was enacted to promote — he was not attempting to abolish all law, order, and justice, merely to curtail a federal government that imposed its will on what hitherto had been free states. (To forestall an argument, as a loyal Virginian, I am required by honor to denounce the War of Northern Picking on Us, which we down here call the Second American War of Independence ya’ll — but, honestly, talk of a "right to succession" is nonsense. A democracy cannot survive in any way if the minority can walk out whenever they lose the vote. If the losers are not willing to accede authority to the vote of the winners, then it is not a democracy.)
Take also this bit of reasoning at the end: "But what would you replace the state with?" The question reveals an inability to imagine human society without the state.
Total, if I may use a crude expression, bullshit.
I have imagination coming out by ears and dripping down my shoulders to make a mess on the keyboard. I have read accounts by AE van Vogt and Ursula Le Guin and Thomas Moore and Ayn Rand and so on about various different methods of living without a state. I could invent half a dozen in an hour.
The question is not due only to an "inability to imagine" society without a state, Mr. Ad Hominem. The question is rooted in a sober view of human nature.
Here is the question he is not answering: In the situation where there is no recourse when you are wronged save private violence, what disincentive is there for avoiding private violence?
This also includes situations where you only imagine yourself wronged, or when a legitimate dispute arises between you and your neighbors and competitors for scarce resources.
By recourse here we mean government in its broadest sense: a common power to keep them all in awe and establish justice.
In a void of such a power, for what reason will men not resort to violence to retaliate themselves on those who wrong them, and deter those who contemplating wronging them?
Being rational creatures, in the absence of such a power, what disincentive prevents men from both seeking to establish such a power, if it seem lacking in a territory, or submitting to such power as may be nascent in the area? Even a cursory glance at the history of the human race shows that this is the way all men of all lands and all ages have always acted, so much so that there is hardly a tribe no matter how savage that does not have some form of formality, a hetman or patriarch, at whose feet the peaceful settlement of disputes can be laid, so as to avoid the horror of anarchy.
Anarchy creates an incentive to government. If you propose we ought to live in anarchy, or that we have a moral duty so to do, whence arises this moral duty? Granting such a duty, on just a practical level, since anarchy creates an incentive to non-anarchy, what do you propose as a practical measure to create a contrary incentive? What institution or law will you establish to enforce the lawlessness and lack of force you seek?
Merely shaking your head at the casualties caused by the heresiarchs of socialism, Soviet Communism, German Nazism, Italian Fascism, Chinese Sadism, illegitimate governments one and all, and using that to condemn peaceful democracies is not logic — it is mere sentiment, and it leads to a conclusion of stupid gibberish.
I am afraid that I am not a modern, and do not accept the modern axioms of political reasoning, that political economics is hedonism by other means. I regard the parliaments, kings and emperors of old, those who did not abuse their offices beyond measure, to have been legitimate rulers, to whom obedience was rightfully owed. I regard the vote of free men, when the free men do not overstep their bounds, to be legitimate government, and to carry a moral mandate binding even on the dissenting minority.
States are not gangs of thugs. When and if they do act as gangs of thugs, at that point they are no longer states, and it is the right, it is the duty, of all Christian men to take up arms against them and destroy them like vermin, as one would kill a stoat or a fox, or some other beast that preys on man.
But if states were merely gangs of thugs, one nonetheless could not be an anarchist, for there is a fatal paradox in anarchist logic:
The anarchist argues that if the state is illegitimate, it is owed no loyalty, no respect, and it is no treason to oppose it. The anarchist then argues that all states by definition are illegitimate, which means, logically, that the concept of legitimacy does not exist. But if the concept of legitimacy does not exist, then a lack of legitimacy does not and cannot legitimate rebellion against the state. The anarchist by that logic has no more right to rebel than the state has for punishing his rebellion: he has defined politics as being outside the realm of right and wrong, which means, outside the realm of logic.
At that point the anarchist can say the state displeases him, as I prefer brunettes to blonds, for any reason or no reason, but he cannot from his mere sentimental displeasure come to a normative conclusion about the moral duty a subject has either to submit or to rebel.
So, no, I found the article to tread over ground I have seen trodden many a time before, I fear, and by footsteps less shallow.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
