Roy, you are right in your Locker Room post yesterday to equate some conservatives with liberals (both modern-day) on the subject of governmental theft. Of course, I could have plowed into the libertarian/conservative divide, but I resisted it for several reasons.
First, many, many more people who share the classical liberal position on this think of themselves as conservatives, not libertarians. That may be unfortunate, it may be wrongheaded, but it is nonetheless true. Thus when we employ the term “libertarian” as if it is the only current political group that does so, we are unnecessarily reducing the practical force of the argument by confining its adherents to a small, seemingly extreme group.
Second, I didn’t want to associate the classical liberal position I was defining with anything remotely resembling “anarcho-capitalism,” which I view as idiocy and an oxymoron. Unfortunately, again, some equate that with libertarianism, which is a sort of guilt by association that harms the latter term’s rhetorical usefulness.
Finally, you and I disagree about the scope of the stealing principle. As I noted, there was always disagreement about the classical liberals about the issue, too. Certainly most did not believe that government provision of services such as education finance, streets, or even a basic social-safety net (at the time we would be talking about asylums, orphanages, poorhouses, and some poor relief) were outside the scope of a properly limited government. John Locke and Adam Smith did not so believe, for example. Nor did most of the American Founders (though they properly did not favor such action by the federal government). They justified these activities on grounds other than wealth redistribution, as do I. These justifications included the maintenance of law and order and the sticky problem of orphans and abandoned or neglected children. John Locke wrote about this issue, for example, in around 1697 while serving on the London Board of Trade.
I’d like to reclaim the term liberal but fear it is a lost cause. I still try to employ the term libertarian, sometimes with unfortunate results given the current direction of the movement associated with it. I don’t much like the term conservative, either, since we advocate significant change in public policy and embrace innovation and dynamism.
Guess I’m stuck. I’ll just be a Lockean.
