New at Reason

Julian Sanchez | June 30, 2005

I explore what an ancient Greek philosophical puzzle can teach us about the Supreme Court's rulings in Raich and Kelo.

Reason needs your support. Please donate today!

Try Reason's award-winning print edition today! Your first issue is FREE if you are not completely satisfied.

← New at Reason | Main | Just Compensation →

See all 63 comments | Leave a comment

Editor's Note: We invite comments and request that they be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of Reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment or disable your ability to comment for any reason at any time.

|6.30.05 @ 5:21PM|#

Really nice article, Julian.

|6.30.05 @ 5:24PM|#

Is this like one of those TV commercials that asks, "What can a hemorrhoid teach us about investing?"

|6.30.05 @ 5:30PM|#

Julian,

I think Smacky's hitting on you, but it was good article. The sorites paradox can be applied to a lot of aspects of our society.

|6.30.05 @ 5:36PM|#

David,

^_^

WTF?

I'm not allowed to compliment Julian now? I really liked the article. OK?!? :p

(FYI, I have a background in classical languages and mathematics, so I always really enjoy things which tie mathematical principles into discussions/current events which can get tiringly political and bogged into tiny details.)

|6.30.05 @ 5:43PM|#

I was just kidding.

|6.30.05 @ 5:47PM|#

David,

Of course I know that. Hence, all of the little smiley faces leering at you in my above post.

|6.30.05 @ 5:49PM|#

I think Smacky's hitting on you

Does that mean this thread will disappear too?

|6.30.05 @ 5:55PM|#

Ouch!

|6.30.05 @ 5:56PM|#

The lesson: You are doomed to live under a heap of insane legislation so long as there is crisis to initiate bad law, stare decisis to justify increasingly worse law, and popular opinion to substitute for textual interpretation on the legitimacy front. Eventually, you wake up and have to ask yourself, "Why does the constitution contain any provision other than General Welfare, Interstate Commerce, and Public Use?" Under the current reading of those three clauses, there is absolutely zero constitutional limitation placed on the government. No amendment will ever be required again because the government can do anything it wants under those three clauses.

It starts with a crisis, it increments granularly, and it gets solidified with appeal to precedent. Nothing ever gets rolled back and we all lose.

|6.30.05 @ 5:58PM|#

Does that mean this thread will disappear too?

If it didn't before, it probably will now, since Julian's probably getting embarassed. I'm destined to go the way of the Gunnels on this web site, I tell ya....at least give me some advance notice if you do block me, so that I can curse a few of you out properly (a la Gary) before I get booted.

|6.30.05 @ 6:00PM|#

Hypothesis: No constitution can ever survive in meaningful form. Crisis, precedent, and popular opinion will drive all constitutional systems toward majoritarian tyrannies.

My opening argument in support of my hypothesis:

How many people in the US view the New Deal as illegitimate? People know for a fact that its source of textual legitimacy is bogus, but they don't care. If some court were to rule on Interstate Commerce or General Welfare in such a way as to invalidate any significant portion of the New Deal programs, we would be in a constitutional crisis. The crisis would not be, "We need to pass some amendments!" but "How can we get rid of these judges!?" There is no effective legitimacy but popular legitimacy. Justices know this. The job of the court is to rubber stamp federal authority over every aspect of our lives.

|6.30.05 @ 6:17PM|#

Great article, Julian.

|6.30.05 @ 6:21PM|#

Good article. Though I think you're being very charitable to the majority judges; I have a hunch that hiding behind the written opinion, they knew exactly what they were doing, rather than innocently adding one grain at a time. And you don't address the fact that some would not agree that the rulings and precedents are "one grain of sand at a time." Some would point to precedents like Wickard as a very clear case of a heap being reached, while the court pretends it wasn't and is too stubborn or chicken to say otherwise at this point. But, I think as a generalization, your analogy is quite spot on.

|6.30.05 @ 6:26PM|#

FYI: I pulled the thread in question because I was trying to avoid getting someone at DOJ yelled at by hyper-sensitive superiors over a frivolous post, not because of anything in the comments.

|6.30.05 @ 6:33PM|#

Phew! That's good to know. [begin snark] Now I can reschedule all that time I set aside to stalk Julian. [/end snark]

|6.30.05 @ 6:59PM|#

So what's the story on Gunnels?

|6.30.05 @ 7:05PM|#

That's not snark that's a cry for help ;)

|6.30.05 @ 7:11PM|#

smacky,

I wouldn't at all be worried about you getting blocked from this site like GG. As far as I can tell, you haven't engaged in any of the behavior that Tim found so annoying about Gary (long legal briefs and song lyrics copy/pasted in posts, multiple consecutive posts, etc.)

RandyAyn:

The full story is in this topic/thread.

|6.30.05 @ 7:12PM|#

All snarks are cries for help.

|6.30.05 @ 7:16PM|#

NoStar, I think you're thinking of Snorks. Or possibly Sporks; I can never keep any of it straight.

|6.30.05 @ 7:21PM|#

Many, many years ago there was a child-custody case wherein a four-year-old little girl, who had lived with adopted parents her whole life, was ordered removed from their home and given to her biological parents (whom she had never met). I can't imagine how traumatic that must have been for her. Anyway, some columnist whose name I forget wrote about that, and made the following very good point: all countries contain people who are evil, but a country itself cannot be considered evil unless the evil people are the ones with empowered by the law.

So, in line with the question "How many grains of sand do you need to make a heap?" I'm wondering, "How many more evil things does our country have to do before we are officially an evil country?" I'll ignore Abu Ghraib and Gitmo and foreign-policy debacles for now, since I don't want to start a flame war, but look at recent domestic rulings: dying people can't grow plants to relieve their pain? Poor people can be booted off their property if they're not paying enough ransom to the local government?

I think maybe we're already there. It's just not obvious enough to most people, who don't give a damn about injustice unless they, personally, are affected.

|6.30.05 @ 8:45PM|#

Jennifer,
The scales were tipped somewhere about the time that Conservatives dropped their principles against military adventurism and Liberals started equating Civil Rights with welfare entitlements.

|6.30.05 @ 8:51PM|#

NoStar-
I don't think the welfare entitlement is evil, just naive and counterproductive. I'd far, far rather see my tax dollars go to pay some dumb slut to keep pumping out babies she can't afford to support, than see that money spent to kick Wilhelmina Dery off of her property, or arrest some bone-cancer patient who smokes pot to quell her nausea.

|6.30.05 @ 8:52PM|#

By the way, it's really weird to post from the mountain time zone. It's not even seven o'clock where I am, yet my post came in at just before nine o'clock. Odd.

|6.30.05 @ 8:58PM|#

You will do things on OUR time system, Jennifer.
And you will like it.

That is all.

|6.30.05 @ 9:04PM|#

Jennifer,
The evil arose with the trope that entitlements are civil rights. Defense of freedom of expression took a back seat to defending hand outs.

Today, a multitude of entitlements are brandished as rights, but our true rights (those expressed in the Bill of Rights) are trampled and ignored.

|6.30.05 @ 9:05PM|#

Oh, I DO like it, ETZ Authority. I am very happy that tomorrow I fly back to the Eastern Time Zone, also known as The Time Zone of Righteousness and Virtue.

|6.30.05 @ 9:10PM|#

NoStar-
I see what you're saying, but I don't think of that as "evil;" I think of that as "improper definition of virtue." I'm not sure quite how to explain it, as I am pretty tired, but you know how some people equate healthy diet and exercise with virtue? I disagree, of course, since healthy habits are personally beneficial as opposed to virtuous, but I don't think that believing health=virtue is evil, just naive and incorrect.

As for the idea that entitlements are viewed as rights while real rights are ignored, well, correlation doesn't equal causation. There never was a time in our country where everybody had all the rights the Constitution (supposedly) guarantees, so the fact that we're losing rights nowadays isn't necessarily due to the increase of the welfare state.

Mark Bahner|6.30.05 @ 9:11PM|#

Hi,

Probably someone has already mentioned this, but I wanted to get this wonderful news out as quickly as possible.

http://www.freestarmedia.com/hotellostliberty2.html

Mark

|6.30.05 @ 9:21PM|#

While welfare and other wealth redistribution plans may not be foisted on the populace by a cackling madman wearing a black top hat, cape, and twirling his moustache it doesn't really much change the fact that the underlying philosophy is one rooted in theft, just with warm 'n' fuzzy window dressing.

|6.30.05 @ 9:28PM|#

Mediageek and NoStar-
Yes, I know, it's taking money from my pocket and giving it to somebody irresponsible. But the fact is, EVERY SINGLE GOVERNMENT IN HISTORY has had taxation, and every one of them has squandered tax money on stupid stuff, yet they weren't all evil. So I don't think our descent into evil is caused by the welfare state. And I'll say again: since I accept the fact that I'll be paying taxes for unnecessary crap, I'd rather see my tax money go for welfare payments than for fighting the war on drugs or the war on poor, politically unconnected property owners or the war on the whole damned world. I'm not saying the welfare state is a good thing--I'm just saying that the welfare state is not the main thing wrong with America these days.

|6.30.05 @ 9:49PM|#

"...the Supreme Court ruled in Kelo v. New London that a home owner has no rights that a city planner is bound to respect."

I don't like *Kelo* but this is not really true: for it to be true, the Court would also have to do way with the "just compensation" requirement, which it hasn't done. (Maybe I should add "yet"...)

Besides there ought to be some sort of equivalent of Godwin's Law for *Dred Scott* analogies.

|6.30.05 @ 10:04PM|#

Yep, good article.

David, I don't understand how I have any rights as a homeowner if I can be forced to sell my property for reasons as flimsy as those in Kelo, regardless of the "compensation" offered.

|6.30.05 @ 10:08PM|#

What is the "just" compensation for kicking an old woman out of the only home she's ever had? This is almost like saying it's okay to rape a prostitute, so long as you give her the money she would have charged anyway.

And in all seriousness, I'll wager that poor Mrs. Dery doesn't live six months after leaving her home. I think the grief and shock will literally kill her.

|6.30.05 @ 10:20PM|#

Kudos on the analogy, Jennifer.

|6.30.05 @ 10:31PM|#

Besides there ought to be some sort of equivalent of Godwin's Law for *Dred Scott* analogies.

"There oughta be a Godwinian law!", eh? It's a good thing Godwin's Law isn't an actual bit of legislation, because goshdarnit, I see there is a tendency to extend it far beyond its original intent -- just like the principle of eminent and the commerce clause!

I hereby formulate Stevo's Law: Anyone who attempts to ban an analogy on the grounds that it carries a powerful emotional charge that makes it harder to logically argue against, immediately loses the debate. :)

What is the "just" compensation for kicking an old woman out of the only home she's ever had? This is almost like saying it's okay to rape a prostitute, so long as you give her the money she would have charged anyway.

That is very aptly put!

Although, of course, all "rape" analogies should be banned, because they are too emotionally charged and therefore effectively shut down the debate.

Oops, I hereby invoke Stevo's Law upon myself.

|6.30.05 @ 10:50PM|#

As a corollary to Stevo's Law, may I suggest that anybody who takes an analogy too literally also loses the debate? I'm thinking specifically of those who are even now indignantly sputtering, "But raping prostitutes doesn't increase city tax revenues!!!"

|6.30.05 @ 11:01PM|#

Julian,

Not to sound like yet another sycophant, but this is really great. It has "required-first-year-law-reading" written all over it. Your tack reminds me (and, dude, I totally mean this as a compliment) of when Ted (from Bill & Ted's) uses the Kansas lyric ("All we are is dust in the wind, dude") to philosophize with Socrates (pronounced So-crates) Johnson.

I'm puzzled by one thing about this and other cases: though Thomas is opposed to stare decisis, in this case he sticks with his tendency to cite precedent -- rather than the Constitution solely -- in his none-too frequent dissents/concurrences. Shouldn't someone opposed to stare decisis cite only the Constitution? Can someone help me with this?

|6.30.05 @ 11:36PM|#

Actually there is nothing in the explicit language of the Fifth Amendment that prevents government taking land for public (or other) purposes beyond public use (which may be why the textualists Thomas and Scalia broke their preferences and resorted to stare decisis). Which demonstrates the worthiness of Julian's conclusion that stare decisis may be as vital as the main language. But that's very Brennan.

The Amendment states: ". . . nor [shall any person] be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

It doesn't say "nor shall private property be taken, EXCEPT FOR public use AND THEN with just compensation."

It merely requires due process to take property -- ie proper notice, hearing, appeal -- and it only says that WHEN private property is taken for public use that there must be just compensation.

I challenge anyone to read the text (of Amendment 5) and identify where the textual language of that Amendment restricts the government to exercising takings powers only for "public use." If the Constitution text does prohibit that, it is found elsewhere.

In fact, I offer $50 (email posted) to first person who convinces me that the *textual language* of the 5th Amendment takings clause does indeed restrict government taking to cases of public use (and I am convinceable).

PS -- I do think the implications of Kelo are horrible but it would be tough at minimum to make a textual case of unconstitutionality.

|6.30.05 @ 11:54PM|#

Well, Matthew, the Constitution outlines the dozen or so things that government can do. Anything not expressly permitted of the federal government in the Constitution is expressly prohibited, or left "to the states or, to the people" as the 9th & 10th Amendments -- the two most important in the document -- make clear. Otherwise, the government could reasonably force me to, say, wear a tutu while miming the cheerleader dance from "Hollaback Girl" and fellating Justice Kennedy. And you're not suggesting that government has that power (right?) -- even though it's not expressly prohibited in the Constitution. (Keep the $50. Or, better yet, donate it to IJ.)

|7.1.05 @ 12:00AM|#

Matt-
Well, you've got to allow some minimum of common-sense contextualization for any of it to make sense. Consider the veto override: A bill becomes law over the president's objections "if approved by two thirds of the House." Does that mean that if two thirds plus one member approve, it shall *not* become a law? Has it got to be *precisely* two-thirds? That's consistent with a hyper-literal reading, but that's a kind of cursed monkey's-paw literalism. The non-restrictive reading would be that just compensation must be paid for PUBLIC uses, but since PRIVATE uses aren't mentioned, you can take a house to hand over to your friend Jim without paying any compensation at all. That is, I hope, sufficiently ridiculous on face to make the only really plausible reading the one that takes as implicit that compensation must be paid for takings for public use, which are the only sorts of takings the government is supposed to carry out.

|7.1.05 @ 12:28AM|#

Julian --

Both you and Baylen had to resort to other parts of the Constitution to make your points, which goes along with what I meant as the problem.

Government CAN take property for private use, it does, and for other than the literalist sense of public use. It permanently seizes private property in private litigation, it takes property to pay for private debts between private parties and it seizes private property to pay individual taxes or debts to the government. It can and does take property as a punishment for a crime. It may have no "public use" for that property other than to generate owed revenue and to punish its owner. But it will take it and it will not pay just compensation; it has that power. So those other examples exist.

I do have to disagree on the technicality of the two thirds example. That indeed works literally and textually. If 2/3ds equals 370 members (arguendo, I havent done the math) and 400 actually approve the override, then that means ipso facto that 370 approved. 2/3ds did hyperliterally approve.

The question is where is the limiting language of takings? The fact is it isnt there in Amendment 5 , so courts rigged it in (thank God). Just like the warrant requirement in the 4th Amendment -- it really isnt there and textualist of 4th Scalia has even said for example that the only standard should be that searches merely be reasonable, the warrant and probable cause requirement is superfluous language he says, but courts have done otherwise.

It just seems odd for many to insist the courts be hyperliteral textually on what constitues "public use" but not similarly literal on the clause in which it occurs.

Where might be the limits on takings -- 9th and 10th Amendments, a high standard for just compensation, the reasonableness standard of 4th amendment seizures. Perhaps one can infer public use then only from the fifth by using substantive due process grounds but it not an obvious or necessary connection and certainly not a literal one.

By the same loose standard then, "public use" can also have a broad meaning, like local development seizure for a "public purpose", interpreted in light of local needs and the fact that, unfortunately, Adam Smith's principles have not been incorporated in the constitution.

|7.1.05 @ 12:44AM|#

Matthew,

Thanks for very generously stating that I had a point above. It's true I did resort to another amendment to support my interpretation of the 5th. But that's not unusual with the Constitution. The right to due process, for example, is powerful in its own right, but is also strengthened by jury-trial guarantees (i.e., Article III; Amendments 6 & 7) and search-and-seizure prohibitions (4th). So, in my view, one has to look at the rights guaranteed by an amendment (or, put better, perhaps, the constraints placed on government power) and then look to the rest of the document to see if those rights are in any way restricted or strengthened elsewhere in the document. And, for me, the 9th and 10th Amendments are the two that make most clear that any power not specifically granted to the government in the Constitution is a power it absolutely lacks. I agree that the 5th doesn't say, "The government cannot take from Peter and give to Paul." But because it doesn't say the government *can* do this, it therefore does not have that right. Hollaback!

|7.1.05 @ 12:58AM|#

Am I the only one who thinks that the government should never be able to take private property, even if it is for public use? Why not just say that the government isn't even allowed one single grain of sand, and not have to worry about when it becomes a heap? The drafters of the constitution really screwed this up. The right to property should be as clear and absolute as the right to speech, and should have been included in the Bill of Rights.

|7.1.05 @ 1:07AM|#

I agree with Cyrano, my subsidiary point being that the Framers have left this open, not merely the corporate predators, local government corruptees, or lefty redistributionists.

Baylen -- I think I've decided that the only way I will be convinced (and research and pay it myself of course) is if "taken" was a legal term of art at the time understood as referring to all non-judicial seizures of property. Probably the answer to this is found in the earliest cases on takings. I better start looking before someone sells me on the point and I have to pay him/her.

raymond|7.1.05 @ 3:35AM|#

The article's not bad. I wish I'd read it before commenting on it.

Matt|7.1.05 @ 4:00AM|#

While the principle is surely true, these two cases aren't particularly good ones for elucidating it. (A jurisprudence which accepts Wickard as valid precedent will see no expansion whatsoever in federal powers under Raich...only someone who is in fact stoned right now would think that marijuana is entitled to special Constitutional protections that aren't available for wheat. Likewise Kelo and Poletown...an America where Detroit can bulldoze a neighborhood to build a factory for GM is not an America where New London bulldozing a neighborhood to build an office complex for Pfizer will be considered even a minute expansion of government power.)

That all libertarians and many conservatives would dearly love to see these precedents overturned is of course a given. But in reality, all Kelo and Raich did was bring more publicity to the rapacious scope of government power under precedents that have been in place for decades...they didn't actually expand that power at all.

MP|7.1.05 @ 8:39AM|#

A jurisprudence which accepts Wickard as valid precedent will see no expansion whatsoever in federal powers under Raich

You're wrong. In Wickard, the farmer was actually selling their excess capacity. In Raich, there were no transactions whatsoever.

Likewise Kelo and Poletown...an America where Detroit can bulldoze a neighborhood to build a factory for GM is not an America where New London bulldozing a neighborhood to build an office complex for Pfizer will be considered even a minute expansion of government power.

Wrong again. Don't mix federal and state constitutional interpretations. Furthermore, you can't assume that just because the government hasn't done a particular type of taking before means they have the right to do it.

MP|7.1.05 @ 8:52AM|#

Sorry 'bout the bad HTML formatting...should've been italics.

|7.1.05 @ 10:55AM|#

Yes, I know, it's taking money from my pocket and giving it to somebody irresponsible. But the fact is, EVERY SINGLE GOVERNMENT IN HISTORY has had taxation, and every one of them has squandered tax money on stupid stuff, yet they weren't all evil.

Is it a sign of maturity that I'm resisting the temptation to quote Rand here?

And I'll say again: since I accept the fact that I'll be paying taxes for unnecessary crap, I'd rather see my tax money go for welfare payments than for fighting the war on drugs or the war on poor, politically unconnected property owners or the war on the whole damned world. I'm not saying the welfare state is a good thing--I'm just saying that the welfare state is not the main thing wrong with America these days.

The thing that royally sucks though, is that we seem to be living in a nation that is hopelessly addicted to both guns and butter. :-/

|7.1.05 @ 11:50AM|#

Matthew,

Here's an excerpt from the Federal Observer that more clearly enunciates my point:

--

In an article titled, "The Original Understanding of the Takings Clause [Editor's Note of Caution: Links to an article to kind of sucks], analyzing the relevant component of the Fifth Amendment, William Michael Treanor states that "the only time when government must compensate the property owner is when it physically seizes property. The text does not require compensation when regulations diminish the value of property. Indeed, the clause does not even mention regulations."

Indeed. Such fanciful and deceitful interpretations of Constitutional text ignores the interpretive belief of the Founders that whatever powers the Constitution is silent on can in no way be read into the powers of government at some future date for reasons of expediency, environmental protection, or anything else. Even that great monarchist-at-heart, Alexander Hamilton, emphasized this on several occasions in the Federalist Papers. Government cannot regulate how a person goes about using his property because it has no enumerated authority to do so.

--

There are some links off of this that might be worth exploring. From what I've just read, it looks like Madison alone was insistent that property rights be guaranteed, but the perspective he used to defend that right was changed by the rest of the framers from defending property to less robust language restricting the government's "takings" right.

|7.1.05 @ 12:15PM|#

Jennifer,
You had asked when will we become an evil nation. I was saying that it happened already, around the time that conservatives became neo-cons
(dropping their anti military adventurism principles) and liberals began equating entitlements as civil rights.

While causality may be implied, I would not be so bold as to defend that assertion. Instead of the specific programs being the cause of the evilness of the USA, it is that both conservatives and liberals have divested themselves of what morale principles they once stood for and replaced it with a pragmatic expediency of getting votes.

|7.1.05 @ 4:33PM|#

Baylen --

Thanks. The article confirmed what I expected .. and feared (not in regard to my pledge but my beliefs).

"Many colonial laws imposed affirmative obligations on residents to use their property for some specific purpose to advance the overall interests of the community. A Plymouth colony ordinance required those with rights in valuable minerals to exploit their rights or forfeit them. A Maryland law required owners of good mill sites to develop the sites or run the risk of losing their property to someone else who would develop the site. Similarly, when land was not developed or bridges fell into disuse, colonial governments took these properties from their owners and transferred them to someone else."

Sounds like Kelo, or its justificaitons.

The issue of enumerated powers is in the text found in the body of the Constitution not the Bill of Rights, these latter are LIMITATIONS of those powers. (".. shall make no law..no warrants shall issue") The fifth does not limit takings to pubic use, only requires compensation when it happens. It seems assumed that takings in general were considered within the Federal Gov't's power acting within enumerated powers; these takings might include takings for criminal punishment, payment of debt, even promotion of land use and development in areas subject to federal jursidcition.

The Amendment clearly means or was intended to mean in its original text that eminent domain takings for public use requires "just compensation"; I would therefore WANT an expansiv reading of public use to mean ALL EMINENT DOMAIN so as to give SOME protection to the victims of government to give some disincentive to government.

But there is nothing there about saying ONLY public use is ground for a taking, in fact, the previous clause and Amendment 4 indicates/implies that takings are likely to occur for many reasons.
Any reason valid under or prusuant to the enumerated powers in Articles I to V (making laws necessary and proper, blah blah blah), and also traditional understandings of English property law in areas of federal jursidiction.

Sadly, the Framers were not all interested in Lockean theory and the more strong sense of property that readers of this place, including me, would like. In fact, since the 19th century the narrow interpretaiton was simply read into it.

Good, I say. But the bottom line is that we libertarians are being profoundly expansive of COnstitutional history and language when we assert the limited view that takings are restricted only to public use cases, (and in local law too where enumerated powers restriction perhaps does not apply as strongly), 'cause it ain't there in the Constitution.

|7.1.05 @ 6:04PM|#

PS -- Article IV section 3: scarier than I thought:

"The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States...."

This appears to refer to federal territories, and dispose of, all needful rules and regulations is very broad. When one considers that the takings clause is aimed at the limited federal government and not the broader state governments, even with the incorporation doctrine the only protection explicit in the language remains the right to get just compensation not to limit takings to public use situations.

The COnstitution wasnt strong on this issue, it is a moral one and only by fuzzy good judicial interpretation made into an arguable legal one under American law.

|7.1.05 @ 7:37PM|#

NoStar-
Maybe you and I are viewing evil as two different things. I accept that I'll always have to pay some taxes, and that some of those taxes will go for stupid bullshit; this sucks, but I'm more outraged by other things.

Here's two choices: an America with its current welfare state, but no war on drugs and its attendant erosions of civil liberties and expansion of the prison-industrial complex, Kelo is overturned, no governmental discriminatuion against gays, (insert your ideal view of the law in regards to abortion here), and no evil foreign policies which degrade human rights and give people legitimate reason to hate us--or, an America with all of our current evils EXCEPT the welfare state?

I'd go with option one. I don't like the welfare state, but I think that's the least of the injustices America is currently committing against increasingly large numbers of her citizens and others throughout the world.

raymond|7.2.05 @ 4:18AM|#

Jennifer -

I don't think America is better or worse than it's ever been. What I _do_ think is happening is that parts of the world are becoming more... civilised. (By "civilised" I mean "respectful of fundamental human rights".)

You look like an awful country? Blame Canada.

(Here's an interesting poll, btw.)

There's the "power corrupts" problem, of course. On the world stage, the US now has absolute power. Or thinks she has. Acts as if she has.

Half or more in every non-American country surveyed said they wanted Europe to be more independent of the United States, and huge majorities - between 70% and 80% - said they thought the world would be better off if America faced a rival military power. (The Economist, June 23, 2005)

Though that result surprises me (Who needs more soldiers and means of destruction, after all?), it is perhaps, in part, a result of the audience's need to see the hubristic hero - however good and noble - put in his place. (History is Tragedy.©)

9/11 was a climactic moment. The US could have chosen to reaffirm her commitment to human rights. Within her borders, she could have abolished capital punishment and reformed the prison system, for example. On the world stage, she could have pressured her client states to accept the notion that governments are instituted to secure the rights of the people. She could have become... good and worthy of respect.

Instead, you chose security over rights. You chose the notion that "the end justifies the means". You played (and are playing) bin Laden's game. You let him win.

Does this make you worse than you were?

No.

|7.2.05 @ 9:23AM|#

Raymond-
Please stop saying "You" when you talk about the stupid and/or evil things the US has done. I oppose this administration and pretty much everything its done. (Except the no-call anti-telemarketing list; I must give credit where it's due.)

raymond|7.2.05 @ 11:11AM|#

lol.

I did it on purpose.

The thread started with "what makes a heap". It made me think: What makes a "country"? At what point does one cease to be just a member of a family, clan, or tribe and become a grain of sand in a "nation/heap"?

And when a nation acts, just how responsible is the individual grain?

Of course, I don't believe nations act. Individuals act. "Nation" is a way for the individual to avoid having to take responsibility for his own acts. A "nation", to function, requires a willing suspension of... what the heck. Disbelief. A willing suspension of disbelief. And of reason and morality and responsibility.

Are you (singular) responsible for what you (plural) are doing in the world? I don't know. Are you part of the heap?

|7.2.05 @ 8:35PM|#

Raymond-
Well, I am one of the 300 million or so grains of sand that make up this heaping pile of America here, but if you want to find the lion's share of the weight of responsibility for the vile things my country's been doing, you need to focus less on little grains of sand like me and more on the enormous heavy boulders in the pile. I voted against this administration, and I don't give it any active support beyond things (like pay taxes)which I'm required to do or else go to jail; I'm not a member of that small golden circle of people with direct access to lawmakers; I'm not some famous person whose every utterance is treated reverently by huge swaths of the population. I suppose I COULD abandon my career and my loved ones and become a full-time activist, willing to make the sacrifice of going to prison for my principles, and I further suppose that if large numbers of people did this, as opposed to just me, that would ultimately bring about some results; however, I'll admit that I'm not quite enraged enough to be the first to make such sacrifices.

Short of trying to become the Martin Luther King of the next great civil-liberties protest movement, or getting elected to government myself, what would you suggest the average powerless American like me do, to avoid being held directly responsible for those actions of our country which we despise but have no say over?

|7.3.05 @ 12:00AM|#

Jennifer,
I know I'm late to the party, but what do you consider "evil" in a country? Don't get me wrong, I'm not happy either, but it's got me thinking about a "one man's evil is another man's good" kind of concept. After all, 60% or more of America supported the war (at first).

Raymond,
Your ideas have me thinking, too. Who is responsible for the actions of a nation? Those in charge? Those who put them in charge (voters)? Those who "do what you're told" in spite of objecting to the orders?

These are (for me at least) pretty deep ideas, and I'm thankful for the posts about them.

WSDave

raymond|7.3.05 @ 6:56AM|#

I suppose I COULD abandon my career and my loved ones and become a full-time activist, willing to make the sacrifice of going to prison for my principles...

Doesn't it strike you as odd (and depressing) that a government set up to secure the rights of people should leave dissenters with only two options: Submit, or Leave.

(Submission takes two forms. One can lie back and enjoy the rape of his moral code, or one can be imprisoned. Blame Lincoln.)

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organising its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

That, along with "Don't do to others what you don't want them to do to you", is the most profound thing I've ever read.

Isn't it ironic (and depressing) to think that someone espousing those ideas today risks imprisonment and "vigourous" interrogation, no matter where he lives?

(This is not to say that all those who are being tortured today are proponents of non-violent change in the guards for their security. We can't really know. We can't even really know if they're all brown!)

Are you, Jennifer, an individual, responsible for the actions of your agents, the government? Yes you are. You pay their salaries. You bought the leash.

Are you as responsible as Lyndie England? It depends. Now that you know how the leashes you are paying for with your labour are being used, your responsibility for future violations of fundamental rights is certainly greater than it was. Sorry.

|7.3.05 @ 11:15AM|#

WSDave-
Well, there's evil and then there's Evil. I know that many on this board view taxation as the single greatest of all evils, but I don't. Yes, it irritates me, to compare the impressive size of my pretax income to the much, much smaller check I take home each two weeks. With my new job, for example, I have a MUCH higher pretax salary than my previous one--I am now paying almost as much in taxes as I previously earned in pretax income!

I'd like to keep those extra tens of thousands of dollars for myself. But if I can't, the thought of that money going to pay for food stamps or the Hubble Space telescope, or even fine champagne for an alcoholic legislator, doesn't bother me so much as the thought of it being used to imprison non-violent drug users, or hire SWAT teams to break down the doors of said users, or kick an old woman out of her home to make way for a new condo complex, or torture people in Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, or play buddy-buddy with some truly evil foreign dictators (whose oppressed citizens of today will likely give way to the anti-American terrorists of tomorrow).

Yeah, a lot of my fellow Americans initially supported the war in Iraq, but so what? Is evil to be decided by majority rule? Besides, they supported that war because they were sold a false bill of goods. Hell, a lot of Germans probably thought the invasion of Poland was a good thing--when they thought that the only option was to be invaded and overrun by the Poles.

But even this false war doesn't strike me as evil as what we've been doing since we're there. Tell me quick--how many Iraqi civilians have died? Whoops, you can't tell me because that information is Top Secret; our government doesn't want us to know. Our own military admits that many of the people we've tortured TO DEATH in our prisons were innocent. And the families shot to death at checkpoints, not because they were doing anything wrong but because the soldiers were frightened and trigger-happy.

My view is, if you have less spending money than you'd otherwise have, but besides that are left alone to live in peace, then you're in pretty good shape. But we're not, here in America; our money is used to oppress us AND a lot of powerless people elsewhere in the world.

You know, I actually WOULD sacrifice my freedom and go to jail--if I thought that would somehow make a damn bit of difference. But it won't. I'm not afraid of making sacrifices; it's POINTLESS sacrifices that scare me.

And now I have to go and take a shower; the irony of it is, I'm on my way to a fourth of July party to celebrate my theoretical freedoms. Harrumph.