From deep Maine comes the story of the pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Sanford who is reportedly at the source of the Covid-19 infection of 120 people. He held religious services in Sanford and officiated a marriage ceremony in the Katahdin area (of Thoreau fame). He does not encourage wearing masks and many of his flocks didn’t. His sermons apparently have political tones, which are not those of the Scottish Enlightenment. He warns against any future coronavirus vaccines, claiming they will contain “aborted baby tissue.” He believes that only God can control epidemics. Source: “Sanford Preacher Linked to Outbreak Tells Followers to Put Faith in God, Not Government,” WGME, September 2, 2020.
Their website is currently down. Your blogger risked life and limb to drive to Sanford and take the feature image of this post.
It is tempting to think that with friends like this pastor, individual liberty does not need enemies. Yet, it is impossible for us—we who prefer to use our liberty in different ways—to claim the freedom to do what we like while not recognizing the same freedom of choice to the Sanford Baptist pastor and those who choose to follow him. They are adults. (Children present special problems, but note that the danger would be much worse if, as some French revolutionaries wanted, children were raised not by their parents but by politicians, bureaucrats, and “the will of the people.”)
The ideal of individual liberty is predicated on the reasoned belief that, within very wide limits (murder, the war of all against all, and such, although admittedly the limits are not always easy to draw), all individuals should be free to live their own lives as they please according to their own beliefs; and that voluntary cooperation will lead to more prosperity and more individual flourishing than any other system. Or, as Adam Smith put it,
Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism, but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice.
The partial realization of this ideal since the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution very strongly suggests that this system works as theorized, despite some inconvenience—including superstitious and unenlightened sects.
It is sad that some people have to die to demonstrate this, but then again they are adults. Politics is worse anyway as it forces people to flock manu militari to what they don’t want or believe in. Government actions during the pandemic crisis—from price caps to stiffening regulations and command-and-control allocation–provided numerous confirmations. And let’s remember John Stuart Mill’s argument: it is only by letting people defend strange opinions or pursue risky lifestyles that we can (provisionally) know what is true and what is false. In On Liberty (1859), he wrote:
There is the greatest difference between presuming an opinion to be true, because, with every opportunity for contesting it, it has not been refuted, and assuming its truth for the purpose of not permitting its refutation. Complete liberty of contradicting and disproving our opinion, is the very condition which justifies us in assuming its truth for purposes of action; and on no other terms can a being with human faculties have any rational assurance of being right.
As it is useful that while mankind are imperfect there should be different opinions, so is it that there should be different experiments of living; that free scope should be given to varieties of character, short of injury to others; and that the worth of different modes of life should be proved practically. when any one thinks fit to try them. It is desirable, in short, that in things which do not primarily concern others, individuality should assert itself.
READER COMMENTS
Phil H
Sep 6 2020 at 12:58pm
Nice to see the argument put so baldly, because it makes it easy to push back on:
“Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism, but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice.”
Name that state.
Pierre Lemieux
Sep 6 2020 at 1:30pm
@Phil H: Note the word “ideal” in my blog. Until classical Athens, the expression of opinions contrary to the rulers’ was unknown, and it was still not the 1st Amendment. Until the 14th or 15th centuries, free labor was unknown. Until the 18th century, liberty of religion was unknown (although perhaps glimpses of it could be found in the late Roman Empire or early Middle Ages). Until the 19th century, free international trade was generally unknown, although much still remained to be achieved during that century (and today). Until the 18th and 19th centuries, the right of commoners to own and carry guns privately was unknown (on this, you’ll be happy to note that most of the world has regressed). Until the 19th century, there was no state in the world that was not unashamedly dirigiste. And so forth. And history is not over.
Jon Murphy
Sep 6 2020 at 2:19pm
Phil-
What, exactly, is your objection?
Jairaj Devadiga
Sep 6 2020 at 4:40pm
Phil,
Switzerland seems to be a good example. It is very peaceful, has relatively low tax rates, and its justice system is tolerable. And it is opulent by both global and historical standards.
As Pierre says, it could be even better, but it is nonetheless evidence in favour of Smith’s argument.
Phil H
Sep 7 2020 at 2:08am
Thanks, guys.
Pierre – the fact that you can’t just name the states makes my argument for me.
Jon: I’ll answer that in two ways. My argument here for this post is simply that the Smith quote there makes a very clear prediction – and in the 200+ years since, that prediction has not been verified. That’s a striking fact.
My argument more generally is that markets are wonderful, wealth-creating, but fragile things, and they need governments to create, support, and manage them. I agree with the arguments on this blog that markets are amazing; I agree that governments should interfere little with people’s private lives; I disagree that government should be minimized. And as markets become larger and more complex, I think the machinery of government will have to become larger and more complex, too, to support them.
Jairaj – thank you, I see what you mean with that answer. I don’t know much about Switzerland, so I’m unable to address it with any level of expertise. I looked on the OECD website, and see that the Swiss state is smaller than many – about 1/3 of GDP, compared with 40%-50% for other European countries. And maybe that is better! But if the smallest that any developed nation has managed to make their state is 1/3 of the economy, that says something striking.
(Also worth noting that Switzerland is not exactly a libertarian paradise – those guns they have come as a result of *compulsory* military service, and their laws were pretty heavily affected by religion until quite recently.)
Jon Murphy
Sep 7 2020 at 7:29am
That’s just factually incorrect. Markets exist without, and often in direct opposition to, government all the time. Black markets, for example.
Mark Z
Sep 7 2020 at 7:46am
“Pierre – the fact that you can’t just name the states makes my argument for me.”
No, it doesn’t. “Every city has rats. Ergo, rats are necessary to the functioning of cities.” See, non sequitur.
Also, how about Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong? What ‘easy taxes’ (and concomitant size of the state) means is up to interpretation, but these are three successful, prosperous societies with states half or less the size of ours. We can debate whether it’s possible to have a functioning, prosperous society with a government that’s smaller than around 15% of GDP if we ever get to that point, but it’s clearly possible to have one at that level.
Jon Murphy
Sep 7 2020 at 8:59am
You just assert that without any evidence. Methinks you’re making the post hoc ergo propter hoc mistake, but I cannot be sure because you’ve provided no evidence. That’s why I asked you to clarify your point by clearly stating your objection. Your response to me indicates you think Smith is making an anarchist argument, which he explicitly is not.
I ask again: what, precisely, is your objection?
Phil H
Sep 8 2020 at 10:02pm
Thanks.
Jon – black markets. That’s a great example. They are fragile, full of violence, easily manipulated, and often don’t seem to drive development and wealth-creation in the same way as legitimate markets. Just to pick examples that I have seen: knock-off VCDs in China ultimately went nowhere; and after decades of reliance on pirate Microsoft software, the Chinese computer software industry is indifferent. Compare its extremely powerful mobile software industry, based on the legitimate use of Android.
Mark – Thanks, those are great examples. That’s literally the argument PL should have made. Taiwan, in particular, as a country rather than a city-state, is interesting. I will go and look into it.
Jon Murphy
Sep 8 2020 at 10:16pm
Phil-
Note that you’ve changed your argument. You originally claimed “they [markets] need governments to create, support, and manage them.” Black markets are evidence against this claim. You then changed it to say black markets are inferior to legal markets. That may or may not be true (it’s not necessarily; Lots of work indicates black markets in socialist countries are more efficient than their legal brethren in socialist countries). But it is a fundamentally different claim than the one you originally made.
Phil H
Sep 9 2020 at 11:08pm
Way to shoot yourself in the foot.
Firstly, Jon, you’re not engaging with the substance of the argument. My statement was not intended to be absolute, as in “no market has ever existed that was not created, sustained, and managed by a government.” My argument (from the beginning) was that markets are much more successful and generate much more wealth when… It would be much more useful to engage with the argument as made (in a casual forum, by a nonprofessional), rather than engaging in pedantry.
But given that you have chosen to engage in pedantry, let’s take a moment to reflect on just how bad your pedantry is.
Black markets are black precisely because they are against the law. That is to say, the existence of laws (and the governments that create them) is exactly a precondition for the existence of black markets. By your pedantic reading of my argument, black markets are in fact the *best piece of evidence for my position*. They *only* exist as a consequence of government action. They are *sustained* by the ongoing maintenance of the law that they break. And they are *managed* by governments which choose to contain them but not destroy them, as part of their law enforcement policy.
If you want to be pedantic, try getting it right. But what I really hope you’ll do (particularly as an educator) is attempt to engage with what your interlocutors mean, rather than engaging in point scoring.
Jon Murphy
Sep 10 2020 at 9:34am
Then why’d you use absolutist language, namely “need”?
You’re getting very hand-wavy here. That’s why I can’t engage with the substance of your argument: you won’t tell me what the substance is.
robc
Sep 10 2020 at 10:34am
Despite the handwaviness, Phil, you are still wrong. Black Markets exist DESPITE government, not because of government. Those markets would exist if the government was not regulating at all (in a different form). I would go absolute in the other direction, government never creates a market. They may regulate it, they may help it in many ways via courts and etc, they may destroy it, but they never create it. A market is only created by two (or more) individuals acting to exchange goods or services (or tokens representing them). The government can nurture or destroy that, but it can’t create it.
Jim Ancona
Sep 6 2020 at 8:37pm
I’ve now read this post three times and I still don’t understand your point. I also believe that adults should be free to make their own decisions. But during a pandemic those decisions can have serious consequences, not just for the free adults who made them, but for many others. Because a few people decided to ignore the relatively light restrictions that Maine has in place, so far 147 people have been infected and three have died. As far as I can tell from press reports, none of the people who died attended the wedding or the pastor’s church. The hundreds of children that will not start school on time or who will have virtual instead of in-person instruction did not attend the wedding or choose to take the risk. Neither did the nursing home residents or the prisoners in the county jail who have now been infected.
It’s interesting that you quote Mill without mentioning his Harm Principle (“That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”) To a naive person like me, that sounds like it might justify requiring masks or limiting the size of weddings during a pandemic. Perhaps for your next rumination on liberty, you can expound a bit on how it might or might not apply to a situation where irresponsible actions cause others to be injured or killed by a deadly disease.
Jon Murphy
Sep 7 2020 at 9:08am
We have to be very careful with the so-called “Harm Principle.” As stated, and taken literally, it is impossible to put into practice. Remember that “harm” necessarily means reciprocity. Any attempt to reduce the harm on A necessarily means imposing some harm on B. In the specific example, by preventing possible harm from the virus to somebody, there is real harm done to the pastor and his community by not allowing their services and community activities.
The proper question is not “do harm or no harm?” but rather “who should be harmed and who should not?”
Furthermore, there is a question of causality. If the political leaders of Samford or Maine overreact to this small outbreak, is that truly the fault of the pastor? That is a tricky question and will depend on your understanding of causality.
For example, let’s say I get into a small fender bender in the parking lot of my local super market. The governor of Maryland (where I currently reside), decides that he wants no harm done whatsoever to anyone in a vehicle. He orders any vehicle driven in Maryland to have a giant spike installed in the steering wheel and that anyone driving must position the spike so that even a fender bender will kill the driver.
Who is “at fault” here for the resulting fallout of this spike? Am I at fault for causing the accident that ultimately led to the legislation? Is the governor at fault for overreacting and imposing this order from On High? Who is really causing the harm here?
Again, this is a tricky question.
Jim Ancona
Sep 7 2020 at 4:56pm
Jon Murphy:
I’m no political philosopher, but I agree that the Harm Principle on its face might justify the death penalty for jaywalking and thus is a tricky question. I don’t believe that it justifies any and all pandemic restrictions. The question of what restrictions are justifiable is hard. Lots of people, including people I know, have been affected by COVID-related restrictions.
My objection to the original post is that it doesn’t engage with the question at all. It ignores the impact of irresponsible behavior that has killed three people and caused real harm to hundreds or thousands of others. If Pierre (or you) want to argue that political leaders have over-reacted and that justifies the pastor’s actions, by all means make that argument. Don’t just post a few chestnut quotes from Smith or Mill and call it a day.
I’m afraid I don’t understand this:
My understand of the relevant causality is that there would have been no opportunity for overreaction by political leaders but for the irresponsible behavior of the pastor and others associated with the wedding who chose not to follow the restrictions the state had in place. Again, if you think otherwise, make your case.
Jon Murphy
Sep 8 2020 at 8:33am
Pierre does engage in the argument. That’s why he posts the Smith and Mill quotes. Voluntarism allows for the experimentation needed to see which methods best fight the spread of the pandemic while minimizing harm.
Republican InBelfast
Sep 7 2020 at 7:42am
@JimA Thank you for such a clear response and Mill’s quote, which I plan to plagiarize every time I hear liberty used as an excuse for not wearing a mask. I would like to add that the Declaration of Independence puts the right to life before liberty. One would almost think a wrongful death suit could be waged against the Sanford pastor for as you point out, the 3 innocent people who died were robbed of their pursuit of happiness and had no freedom of choice. One person’s freedom can not impinge on that of another.
Pierre Lemieux
Sep 7 2020 at 12:37pm
@Republican InBelfast: You raise a serious question, but Jon has provided a good answer above. To elaborate: if the state prevents some individuals from transmitting a negative externality (such as ugly houses [photon pollution], rik of catching a disease, annoying opinions, etc.), it harms them in other to benefit others. Externalities are symmetric. Remember Anthony de Jasay:
There are ways around this powerful critique, but they are more in terms of public goods, social contract, or Hayekian-Humean coordination conventions—not externalities.
Jim Ancona
Sep 7 2020 at 5:01pm
So what’s your preferred way of dealing with this externality, @Pierre Lemiuex? Since we’re now talking economics, perhaps you could mention Coase and transaction costs in your answer?
robc
Sep 7 2020 at 7:14pm
Dont interact with people you dont trust to behave as you would want them to behave.
It is a form of coasean bargaining, since transaction costs are too high to negotiate with others, the option to avoid the externality is to literally avoid the externality.
Jim Ancona
Sep 7 2020 at 7:22pm
And if you’re a patient in a nursing home or a prisoner in jail? (There are major outbreaks in both places traced to the wedding.)
robc
Sep 8 2020 at 8:24am
Private nursing homes fit my original answer.
For jails, you have a good point. And that seems to be a government failure.
Pierre Lemieux
Sep 7 2020 at 11:49pm
@Jim Ancona: The idea that externalities are symmetric are Coase’s and Buchanan’s.
Jim Ancona
Sep 8 2020 at 9:02am
As I understand it, Coase’s point is that externalities are symmetric if you ignore transaction costs. But in the real world, different approaches always have different transaction costs, hence my question.
If you want to talk about libertarian theory, that’s fine. But you’re the one that brought up the very particular case of the Sanford pastor. Why discuss him at all unless you want to also want to talk about the real-world consequences of his actions in a pandemic?
robc
Sep 8 2020 at 9:10am
You are wrong about Coase, it is a common misconception. The case with no transaction costs was a small side point to his major point.
Jon Murphy
Sep 8 2020 at 9:25am
No. An externality is symmetric regardless (I have a forthcoming paper in the Journal of Private Enterprise that demonstrates this point effectively for students). The point about transaction costs is that they render Pigouvian taxes (a tax designed to correct the externality) moot if they do not exist. If they do exist, then a Pigouvian tax may be appropriate, but even then isn’t likely given the system of laws and responsibilities that already exist.
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