“Only in the frame of a free society is it meaningful to distinguish between what is good and ought to be done and what is bad and ought to be avoided.”~~ Ludwig von Mises
“What is conservatism all about?” asks your friend who is new to politics.
Quick! Your friend’s attention span is 140 characters (thanks to Twitter). What do you say?
Chances are the phrases, Individual liberty and, Limited government, or some analogous expressions of the same, crop up.
I say “chances are” for a reason. Instinctively most conservatives would respond with these phrases because they are the foundation of what is broadly called the conservative movement. Other important principles such as Constitutionalism and federalism, free market enterprise, property and gun rights, low taxation, spending restraint, and school choice are derivatives of these philosophical lodestars.
Chances should also be great that you did not think, More federal legislation and bigger government. That wouldn’t be “conservative.”
As Grover Norquist at the American Conservative Union would say, the center-Right coalition shares an attitude that sums up these conservative principles: “Leave us alone.” It is the common thread among the respective political action groups that constitute conservative activism.
Enter CPAC, GoProud, and some social conservative groups at the center of so much hubbub of late.
The acronym, CPAC, stands for the Conservative Political Action Conference. It is the largest annual consortium of political activists and special interest groups, representing the broad base of a political coalition.
That said, in what kind of political action are social conservatives who are boycotting CPAC interested?
Their chief political interest is enacting social legislation DOMA, the defense of marriage act, to “protect traditional marriage.“
Such political action in the interest of legislating social values cuts directly against core conservative values. (Hold on, comment on social conservatism is reserved for the end.) What happens to the principle of “limited government” if we go to government, hat-in-hand, and ask for the privilege of legislating at the federal level traditional marriage on society? This would be an expansion of government reach at a drastic level, conferring to the federal government a power we’ve erroneously allowed state governments for generations.
And what about federalism, that long-neglected check on federal government overreach? DOMA is a further erosion of that principle at a time when many activists are seeking to revive the 10th Amendment and nullification in response to Obamacare.
Further, what would be the practical implications of DOMA? Once we’ve further expanded the unconstitutional powers and bureaucratic apparatus of the federal government, is there any guarantee that one day gay marriage advocates will not be in a position to utilize that same power of government? As history attests, with every increase in the size of government we further place ourselves and our liberties at the whimsical mercy of whatever group of politicians and bureaucrats hold power. That’s just a very bad idea for political action, and certainly not a conservative one. As Reagan said with eloquent simplicity, when government grown, liberty shrinks.
It is worth noting the only reason there is a desire to “protect” traditional marriage is that we’ve allowed state governments the ridiculously inappropriate power to validate marriages. What business does that state have interfering in a contract between private individuals? (Remember that whole Leave Us Alone thing?)
What is really in need of being protected, then, is not the institution of marriage itself but individuals from being forced by the government to legally recognize homosexual marriage. (Traditional marriages would not cease to transpire or exist, after all.) This is a concern but the threat here is not the vows two men I’ll never meet say to each other and their lifestyle I don’t condone, but the government itself that is so big and so intrusive that it can actually be manipulated to force a legal recognition homosexual marriage, just as DOMA would establish a national standard of traditional marriage.
This being the problem, why would people in the coalition of “leave us alone” want to simply turn the power of government onto others in society in the form of federal legislation? The “us” in “leave us alone” denotes everyone, not just a privileged class who is first in line to use the power of government for their own social preferences. That’s just not “conservative.”
The problem is too much government in too many places using coercive force on too many individuals. The solution is less government, not more in the interest of traditional marriage, gay marriage, no marriage, or what have you.
In his postscript to The Constitution of Liberty, F.A. Hayek lucidly described the Old World conservatives who opposed classical liberals who favored limiting the power of government and stressed the primacy of the individual. It is a lengthy passage but well worth considering in this context. Hayek says,
“Let me return…to the main point, which is the characteristic complacency of the conservative toward the action of established authority and his prime concern that this authority be not weakened rather than that its power be kept within bounds. This is difficult to reconcile with the preservation of liberty. In general, it can probably be said that the conservative does not object to coercion or arbitrary power so long as it is used for what he regards as the right purposes. He believes that if government is in the hands of decent men, it ought not be too much restricted by rigid rules. Since he is essentially opportunist and lacks principles, his main hope must be that the wise and the good will rule—not merely by example, as we all must wish, but by authority given to them and enforced by them. Like the socialist, he is less concerned with the problem of how the powers of government should be limited than with that of who wields them; and, like the socialist, he regards himself as entitled to force the values he holds on other people.” [Emphasis added.]
Hayek was not describing American conservatives. I sadly observe, however, that these lines seem tailor-made to describe some social conservative groups vying for DOMA and boycotting CPAC over GoProud’s presence.
On the other side of gay marriage we see activists leveraging the court system urging judicial activism for the sake of imposing a legal recognition of gay marriage on the rest of society. Would state referendums be better? Hardly. Either would force society through the coercion of government to recognize and validate homosexuality. If people do not wish to recognize gay marriage why should they be forced to?
Principled, conservative activism would be to oppose this wily judicial activism because it is judicial activism and referendum efforts not because it is being leveraged by gay activists, then work to undo the ridiculous state government requirements to get state approval to get married.
Getting government out of the middle alleviates the rest of society from legally recognizing gay marriage. If gays wish to get married, why should they not be free to do so? If they are free to do so I am free to—here’s a concept—leave them alone to do so. If they wish to do so and not care about legally binding me to condone it, why would I care? (Hold on, talk of social impact of mores coming soon.)
So what of GoProud? Where do they stand in all this? I called their office to inquire of their view of gay marriage and judicial activism. They would only say they oppose DOMA and a constitutional amendment on traditional marriage on the grounds of federalism and equal rights, and that marriage is a matter for the states. There was no comment on judicial activism and gay marriage at the state level.
At this point I see both an opportunity and a concern for them. If they stand by their principles and want to see policy derivative of the principles they profess, they should come out (absolutely no pun intended there) unambiguously against imposing gay marriage on society just as rigorously as they oppose DOMA. GoProud stands for limited government and liberty, so taking such a stand would be a principled, conservative stance to make and, combined with their stated legislative priorities and core principles, make them a valued activist member of the center-right coalition. Not doing so, unfortunately, makes them appear complacent in such an important matter.
Here would be a good place to inject that I am a social conservative. Among other things, I recognize the social benefits of traditional family values. I do not condone homosexuality. In fact, socially I see in it a philosophical and moral error. But not condoning homosexuality should not equate to supporting DOMA if one holds to basic political principles, and opposing legal recognition of gay marriage should not be one labeled a homophobe. I am simply trying to be intellectually consistent as both a partisan of liberty and the Constitution and a social conservative (one opposed to big government no matter who is in charge).
I also recognize that using government as a vehicle to apply social values—whoever’s social values—destroys the freedom that is a prerequisite to live the moral life that is good for society. If you are compelled toward holding to a value, how legitimate is that belief? If you come to that belief through the free exchange of ideas and after someone appealed to your reason and intellect, congratulations, you actually believe it. As Ludwig von Mise reminds us, “Only in the frame of a free society is it meaningful to distinguish between what is good and ought to be done and what is bad and ought to be avoided.”
If I truly desire freedom for myself and society—to be left alone—that freedom comes at a cost: people will use that freedom in manners that I do not approve of that, as Jefferson would say, neither break my leg nor pick my pocket. Put government in the middle of everything and how other people live their lives will indeed affect me; doing so puts more people in society at odds with other people and gives us incentives to neglect our principles and want the government to do more on our behalf at the cost of other’s freedom.
That’s just not conservative.
I don’t share GoProud’s social values but I certainly share their political convictions, especially if they publically oppose imposing gay marriage through the court system. I share most of the social values of social conservatives but don’t share the political goal of DOMA. (Whatever problem social conservatives have with “big government” too often seems to be that the wrong people are in charge, not with big government itself.)
Returning to Hayek:
“The typical conservative is indeed usually a man of very strong moral convictions. What I mean is that he has no political principles which enable him to work with people whose moral values differ from his own for a political order in which both can obey their convictions.”
I’m going to go out on a limb here and assert that conservatism is primarily a political movement about freedom and free society. Conservatism is also a social movement wherein we may persuade and influence others about social mores and what is good for society, but in order for any social impact to be meaningful such persuasion has to transpire freely, in society among ourselves, not at the coercive end of laws and regulations. Only in a free society can conservative political and social values coincide.
It will be interesting at CPAC this year. I hope to come away energized, but above all else I hope to first feel and then feed off a vibrant love of liberty. I need it. We all need it.
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