Fallen Angels
Statists believe that government can work efficiently and effectively. They wish for government to work … for them. They are adherents of a religion with the most flawed of all deities. They embrace a theocracy, in which the halls of government become tabernacles, and through which they seek to impose Utopia, as a form of heaven on earth.
As messy as governing has become, recent experiences are effective in demonstrating the need for limited government. If government were properly limited and sufficiently impotent, we would not be concerned about political minions and technocrats illegitimately using the coercive powers of the state and the compulsory powers of government against us.
Oftentimes, those seeking to reap the benefits of government’s largess expect that the costs and related sacrifices, which are necessary to offset the benefits conferred, will be paid by or imposed upon some disfavored group of “others.” Government cannot be all things to all people. A benefit bestowed upon one likely comes at the price of tyranny to another. Therefore, government does best, which does least. Government should not be privileged or empowered to pick “winners” and “losers” among the people. The state should not be looked to as the arbiter of morality, and its agents are neither saints nor saviors.
Government is not a mechanism, which engenders cooperation, collaboration, compromise, or consensus. At its most basic, government is an instrument of brute force whereby an electoral majority (or controlling voting bloc) seeks to impose its self-serving will upon a reluctant minority (or other disfavored groups and individuals). Seldom, if ever, is there anything more noble or moral in the machinations of the state.
Political minions and government technocrats crave vicarious power, and they covet the position, prestige, and profit to be derived therefrom. As power trends toward absolute, so does the certainty for corruption, and with corruption come abuse, oppression, and tyranny. It was in recognition of this immutable reality, that the framers of the Constitution implemented a republic with limited and enumerated powers, which deferred to individual liberty and personal freedom. The founders sought to affirmatively limit the powers of the fledgling government, to which they gave birth, recognizing the capacity of the Leviathan to do great harm.
In ignorance, successive generations have endeavored to unleash the beast from its bindings so that it may do their bidding. They seek to harness its vast powers. They naively believe that they are capable of controlling the untamable beast. In arrogance, they sow the seeds of their own destruction.
Many would argue that democracy requires no such limitations. It is not happenstance, however, that the Constitution does not contain a single utterance of the word “democracy,” or any derivation thereof. The founding fathers were certainly wary of monarchy, but they were equally wary of an unfettered democracy, which is tantamount to mob rule.
Should one find himself the target of tyranny, he is likely to take little comfort that his harms and losses come at the behest of a self-serving electoral majority as opposed to the hands of a single deranged despot. The resulting tyranny is no less damnable. One cannot enjoy the absolution, which might be offered by even a host of accomplices or hordes of coconspirators.
A democracy is perhaps the most dangerous of all forms of government in that proponents act with a perverse moral certitude, which they mistakenly believe can be derived solely from their number. However, there is nothing in the makeup of a numerical majority, which implies, much less assures, that its proposed course of action is in the long-term best interest of that majority or of the collective as a whole, and that desired course is almost certainly disadvantageous to a disfavored minority.
A majority, which is necessarily comprised of exceedingly flawed individuals, does not suddenly achieve omniscience, perfect wisdom, and unflinching altruism when it acts in concert or unison. In fact, such collective action often involves groupthink and tends to exacerbate and amplify the baser traits of our bestial species.
From Federalist №51:
If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.
