35-40% of Under-50 Respondents Endorse "Assassinating a Politician Who Is Harming the Country or Our Democracy"

This is according to a Southern Poverty Law Center poll, conducted by Tulchin Research (warning: FiveThirtyEight.com gives Tulchin mediocre marks, at least as to its campaign polls). The poll was "a nationwide survey of 1,500 adults ages 18+ which was conducted via online panel," so I expect there were likely only about 150 respondents in each of the demographic categories (such as "Younger Republican Men") which would mean a margin of error of about 8%, so I'd be hesitant to make much of (say) Younger Republican Women seeming to support assassination more than Younger Republican Men, Younger Republican Women more than Younger Democratic Women, or Younger Democratic Men more than Younger Republican Men.

But it does seem that among the under-50-year-olds, there is about 35-40% support, with no detectable aggregate difference between Democrats (averaging 38-54%) and Republicans (37%-56%).

I should say that, as a matter of abstract morality, assassinating political figures might be defensible. That's certainly so within despotic governments; but some argue that, even within democratic regimes, people's moral right to self-defense extends to lethal force  (whether in the form of violent revolution or more targeted assassination) used to defend against sufficiently serious threats to liberty.

But given the extraordinary damage that a culture of political assassination can do both to democracy and to liberty, I have to be pretty firmly in the "no" camp here. And, if the survey is accurate, the results strike me as extremely troubling, as to both sides of the aisle.

If I learn more about either the margins of error for each subcategory, or the specific language of the questionnaire, I'll post an update.

Comments

[John F. Carr]

From this post I infer that Eugene Volokh is over 50.

[DaivdBehar]

I am with Saddam. When you have a person, you have a problem. When you do not have a person, your problem is solved. So why take a chance? The leadership of an adversary should be the first to go. Do not break a $trillion in glass. Do not kill thousands of working people who only want to go home, and do not want to fight. It should become the war fighting doctrine of the US to decapitate the leadership in the first hour of any conflict.

Why is it not? The lawyer has immunized the people responsible for conflict. It is cheap to decapitate a leadership compared to a war of attrition. That way the oligarchs do not get to profit from massive government procurement. War is a toxic scam, and the lawyer is the enforcer of it.

[Eugene Volokh]

Grrr, kids these days, grrr.

[MatthewSlyfield]

Get off my lawn! [shakes cane]

[Longtobefree]

Stopped reading here:
Southern Poverty Law Center poll,

[Rossami]

I kept reading but that source certainly did drop my expectations for the result - and the details lived down to my expectations.

[rswallen]

Tbf, they just commissioned (ie paid for) the poll. They provide the questions and desired groups to poll, but the polling itself is carried out by someone else (like pretty much all reputable polling).

[rsteinmetz]

If I can write the questions I can guarantee the results.

[Life of Brian]

True story. The ordering of the questions can also matter, as well as the sequencing of the critical questions with other questions that may not be directly related but may still prime the respondent to answer the critical questions differently than they would otherwise. I put little stock in polls that won't publish their full methodology.

[MatthewSlyfield]

And the fact that people outright lie to pollsters.

[Brett Bellmore]

Perhaps, but I doubt they were hoping for a poll demonstrating that, for instance, a third of young Democrats believe the "Great Replacement" theory is true. There's plenty in this poll that runs strongly against the SPLC's ideology.

[MatthewSlyfield]

Assumes without evidence that there is such a thing as "reputable" polling.

[Social Justice is neither]

The strip club down the street may not be reputable but it does have consistently reputable poleing.

[damikesc]

Basically. SPLC is a source with no credibility.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Martin Sheen in "The Dead Zone"

[Sebastian Cremmington]

I think most Americans support assassinating foreign leaders like Saddam and Qaddafi. What I don’t understand is if we know that cleaning up the mess we create after assassinating a foreign leader costs more than a billion dollars…why wouldn’t we just give the foreign leader a billion dollars to leave the country? We could even give them a lot of cocaine and Quaaludes and say are free to use cocaine and Quaaludes and whatnot.

[Don Nico]

"support assassinating foreign leaders like Saddam and Qaddafi. "
Both were exceedingly bad ideas.

[rsteinmetz]

Saddam was tried and executed, not assassinated.

[Martinned]

What's the difference?

[Don Nico]

Thank you, Martinned.

[Soronel Haetir]

My problem was with the attempt at nation-building, not the nation-wrecking. Even more in Afghanistan than Iraq.

[Lee Moore]

why wouldn’t we just give the foreign leader a billion dollars to leave the country?

Because there's more to life than money ? Like toasting your opponents over a hot flame, collecting your harem - especially from your enemies' womenfolk, revelling in your power to make people quake simply by looking at them, basking in the cult of personaility you have created, hearing that you have, for the twentieth year running, been named the winner of iraq's Got Talent

And because once you have left the State you rule, you are neutered - you are at the mercy of assassins; and at the mercy of the US government policy du jour which might decide to take away your billion dollars and put you on trial. Or just cut your security detail a bit.

[Martinned]

why wouldn’t we just give the foreign leader a billion dollars to leave the country?

We have done that from time to time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idi_Amin#Deposition_and_exile

[not me]

Boaty McBoatface.

[Don Nico]

If so, it is pathetic. But time and time again we have seen assassination operate as a national policy.

[M L]

Instead of all the bloodshed, wailing and gnashing of teeth, just peacefully separate into our member states. They will all get along better then.

[Joe41 2]

California and New York peacefully seceding from the Union in order to escape so-called "minority rule" is vastly preferable to a bloody civil war that political assassinations will bring about.

[Krayt]

Worst. Idea. Ever.

Tyrants worldwide, especially the larger ones, want nothing more than a bunch of squabbling states in Neo-Europe, instead of something that can throw its weight around.

That asinine domestic politics would want separate states due to the desires of a handful of politicians whose fortunes depend on you feeling outrage to the other offends centuries of the long game of freedom.

How dare such shortsided political hacks think contemporary chimeral issues are weighty enough to make such major changes!

I would never recommend illegal behavior, but if broken noses resulted, I'd make a bowl of popcorn.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Tyrants worldwide, especially the larger ones, want nothing more than a bunch of squabbling states in Neo-Europe, instead of something that can throw its weight around."

Nah. Tyrants outside Europe might want that. Tyrants in Brussels want the exact opposite.

[Ben_]

Blame the news media.

[legalizeshrooms]

Once one accepts the premise that the end justifies the means, many unpleasant things become justifiable.

[Devin Watkins]

Where would Thomas Jefferson have fallen on this poll with his quote "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure."?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Study up on the context for that one. It's more complicated than a poll result. Once you understand it, you may be surprised by what it doesn't mean.

[Voize of Reazon]

Commenters here have insisted a purpose of the 2nd amendment is to resist tyranny, what purer form is there than assassinating a tyrant?

[M L]

Self-defense from invasion would be a purer form, to name one.

[Ed Grinberg]

Commenters here have insisted a purpose of the 2nd amendment is to resist tyranny, what purer form is there than assassinating a tyrant?

There's a long way from "a politician who [in my subjective opinion] is harming the country or our democracy" to a full-blown "tyranny" or "assassinating [someone who can be objectively, undeniably described as] a tyrant."

[Ed Grinberg]

I'll give you an example.
It's Russia, 1999. Putin is running for president. Knowing his (KGB) background, you're highly suspicious of him, you think he'll badly harm the country.
vs.
It's Russia, 2022. Putin has been in power for almost a quarter-century. He rigs elections; disqualifies, imprisons, or kills opponents. Protests are not allowed; unauthorized protests are harshly suppressed.

[Voize of Reazon]

Ed, how do you decide whether someone is objectively a tyrant before you kill them? It can't be that there is some process you need to follow to establish a consensus, so it is a community act instead of a private one. An individual right to arms makes sense only if it is to enable individual action.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'd suggest that there are multiple criteria. But, canceling elections in a democracy is one good basis for declaring somebody is objectively a tyrant, to give an example.

Basically, the moment somebody moves to get rid of the means for peacefully removing them from power, they've demonstrated that violently removing them from power is justified, without any further actions on their part.

[Voize of Reazon]

You didn't directly address the question, which was "how do you decide?", but you indirectly did by providing an example. And what your example teaches is that we each decide for ourselves, using our own sense of when we are justified in labeling our conclusions as objective.

Of course, there is nothing objectionable about deciding for ourselves. Having and expressing an opinion is the most fundamental right of all, because of the critical role it plays in defining all the others. The difference between democracy and an individual right to resist tyranny with arms is that one can act only by consensus, while the other legitimizes decisive action based on what may be a lone opinion. You can't logically support that without concluding that Nicholas Roske had a Constitutional right to decide that Brett Kavanaugh is a tyrant and to act with violence on that belief.

[Brett Bellmore]

Ah, but by my criteria the attempt was totally unjustified, because all Kavanaugh (presumptively) supports is leaving the decision up to the elected state governments. He's not taking the choice away from the people, he's returning it to them.

By the way, it's being downplayed, (I mean, to a greater extent than the assassination attempt, which is already getting amazingly little coverage.) that he was as much motivated by a desire for gun control, as he was by abortion. He was quite explicit about it: He wanted to shoot Kavanaugh because he expected Kavanaugh to vote in favor of gun rights!

[Voize of Reazon]

Your criteria is irrelevant unless you agree that Roske doesn't have an individual right to resist tyranny, and has to get Bellmore's concurrence before acting.

[Brett Bellmore]

The question was, "... how do you decide whether someone is objectively a tyrant before you kill them?" Perhaps you wanted an answer to a different question, and didn't clearly communicate that?

My answer was, somebody is objectively a tyrant if they move to abolish the peaceful means for removing them from power.

Since all Kavanaugh is accused of is returning a policy question to the democratic process, he is, approximately speaking, the diametrical opposite of a "tyrant". He was returning a choice to the people, not taking it away.

[Voize of Reazon]

I thought my ask was clear, but maybe it wasn't.

I was asking how do you determine the answer to a question. You gave me an answer instead of a method, an answer you characterized as an example of "multiple criteria". So how do we determine the other criteria? What is the legitimate process for deciding whether a purported tyrant merits assassination? Is it that your opinion should control everyone else? In your opinion, would that make you a tyrant?

And my underlying point, which I also seem to have not made clearly, is that asserting an individual right to resist tyranny with arms implies an individual right to decide when to act.
Self-defense already provides a justification for acting alone if the tyrant's threat is sufficiently immediate and severe, otherwise I believe that resisting tyranny with arms can only be a collective right, not an individual one.

[Brett Bellmore]

But you can't expect an actual tyrant to permit the open operation of collective decision making, which is exactly what my criteria goes to.

Inherently, in an actual tyranny, the decision whether to attempt assassination MUST be individual, or done by small, secretive groups. The very circumstances of tyranny do not allow for open debate of the topic!

[questioner7]

"a purpose of the 2nd amendment is to resist tyranny" -- by enabling a mass rebellion, triggered by a consensus of many people. Not by enabling any one person to dictate their personal will to the rest by assassinating leads they elected.

[Brett Bellmore]

But, how do you arrive at a consensus under a tyranny, which is largely going to be defined by suppression of free discussion, and picking off conspicuous dissenters?

Generally what happens is that somebody decides to act on their own, or in a small group, and this triggers the realization that there already IS a consensus in favor of the action. What's known as a preference cascade, where a large number of people who were all afraid to express their true opinions, because they thought they were an isolated minority on account of everybody else being similarly afraid, suddenly realize that they AREN'T the minority. And visible public opinion rapidly changes.

But that never can happen so long as nobody visibly contradicts the imposed pseudo-consensus, which is exactly why tyrants are so determined to pick off visible dissidents. If they fail to do so, everybody turns on them, and they don't have the resources to fight EVERYBODY.

[Brett Bellmore]

You saw that in the collapse of the USSR: There was probably never a time when the people living in the USSR actually wanted to be ruled over by a communist dictatorship. But the government they suffered under ruthlessly went after anybody who dared to express that opinion.

Gorbachev had too many scruples, permitted dissent. And the whole edifice rapidly fell apart. It would have fallen apart in the same way any time in the previous decades, if a previous dictator had simply stopped suppressing dissent.

[Ed Grinberg]

Q: Why are Democrats trying to hard to (1) take our guns and (2) suppress freedom of speech?

[Brett Bellmore]

Yup, exact same principle. They're trying to set up a system where they can rule against majority opinion because the people holding that opinion think they're a powerless minority due to systematic censorship.

[Bored Lawyer]

Ahh, the tide of progress.

[Ed Grinberg]

given the extraordinary damage that a culture of political assassination can do both to democracy and to liberty

Leftists ("liberals" and "progressives") don't give a fig about either. "The ends justify the means."

[Martinned]

While you are as innocent as fresh snow? Puhlease...

[Social Justice is neither]

I believe the correct phrase is "by any means necessary" which hardly sets assassination outside the bounds.

[raspberrydinners]

Excuse me? Just who is trying to downplay the attempted coup on January 6th?

Hint- it's not "liberals" and "progressives."

[Ben_]

Also whenever the special people "feel unsafe" it’s called "violence" in order to justify actual violence in response.

[Martinned]

So what's the point here, exactly? That a majority of young Americans oppose the 2nd Amendment? (And that, surprisingly, it turns out prof. Volokh does too?)

[Stephen Lathrop]

Seems like the source of empowerment, and the purpose of the would-be killer, got left out of the question. Might lead to some imprecision in the results.

[Brett Bellmore]

"But given the extraordinary damage that a culture of political assassination can do both to democracy and to liberty, I have to be pretty firmly in the "no" camp here. "

I'm pretty firmly in the "Yes, but circumstances need to be pretty dire first." camp.

You need to distinguish clearly between, "X can be justified under some circumstances", and "X can be justified under the present circumstances". Things are nowhere near bad enough in the US at present to justify political assassination. But it's foolish to declare they never could be that bad.

[tkamenick]

That's about where I am. An interesting way of looking at this question would be "Would it be justifiable right now for the U.S. to assassinate Putin" vs. "Would it be justifiable right now for the Ukraine to assassinate Putin"

[tkamenick]

And, I suppose, "Would it be justifiable right now for a Russian to assassinate Putin"

[David Bremer]

This. And for that reason anyone in dismay about these findings better never give the whole "we need weapons to protect us from the government" argument. Because what do you think those weapons would be use for if not shooting government agents and the politicians who sent them.

It's all about how bad the politician is. If we're talking democrats upset to Joe Manchin or Krysten Sinema type angry, then, no, I don't think it's okay. If its Russians upset with Putin and what he perpetrating, I wouldn't shed a tear. It's drawing the line that is tough.

I mean, imagine an American politician loses and an election, but successfully pulls off a coup to stay in power (purely hypothetical of course). Could you make a case that defending the constitution requires taking the position back by force? What if the courts rejected the efforts, but the politician refused to relinquish power, calling the courts a fraud? What if the courts bless it, but were packed with sympathetic judges? What if the outcome hinged on a close election in one or two states? Or what if the election was a landslide for the other side, but was called invalid due to some outside force reducing turnout, like a major pandemic or claimed national emergency.

Like Brett, I don't think assassinations could be remotely justified under the present circumstances, but there are too many variables to say they'd never be justified, even here in America.

[Brett Bellmore]

I would really like to see this particular poll rerun by somebody more respected, and with a lot larger sample size, so that the sub-group numbers would be more meaningful. As it is, it's barely more that suggestive.

[raspberrydinners]

Agreed. Sample size is way too small and the one group doesn't suggest much of anything. Well other than maybe our government should do its job a bit more often.

[snarling_dog]

This poll reminds me of a much better one from a few years ago: https://www.theonion.com/report-98-percent-of-u-s-commuters-favor-public-trans-1819565837

[jdgalt1]

It wouldn't surprise me if the result of a poll with this question would vary widely depending on how the current leader of the country in which it is taken is viewed.

If you have a country with a good degree of law and order (a stable republic), people will disfavor assassination, as it tends to destabilize the country and/or make its rule arbitrary or dictatorial (or as I label that situation, a banana republic).

But if on the other hand, those latter descriptions already fit, then some of us start to wish that Oswald were alive today... *sigh*

Of course, if your arbitrary ruler/dictator is old and decrepit and may go any time, then why take the risk? Leave him alone. But that assumes he's not about to get the country nuked because he's an idiot.