The quote comes from Goldwater's mostly ghost-written book, The Conscience of a Conservative, but such a book usually represents accurately the official author's opinions. Goldwater presents the following as his political mandate:
"I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom. My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them ... I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is 'needed' before I have first determined that it is constitutionally permissible. And if I should later be attacked for neglecting my constituents' 'interests,' I shall reply that I was informed their main interest is liberty and that in that case I am doing the very best I can."
In daunting language, Goldwater's ghostwriter makes the case for limited government. Ignoring the preamble of the Constitution, which authorized Senator Goldwater to promote the general welfare, he denies that government has any business providing for anyone. Goldwater is made to say, in effect, that as long as you have liberty, all your other concerns will take care of themselves, and if they don't, that's none of the Senator's or the nation's business.
Writing in 2007, Rep. Flake holds this utterance up as a standard from which his fellow present-day Republicans have backslid. He complains that "self-described conservatives" have "used the government to increase their power" and to "govern like liberals." The Congressman believes that my giving money to a think tank will reverse this trend. The Goldwater Institute conducts ideologically motivated research to cultivate support for tuition tax credits and school vouchers, and litigates against alleged abuses of state eminent domain powers. Taking a longer view, the institute wants to "groom the next generation of principled conservative leaders" by having young people read Adam Smith, Barry Goldwater and other great thinkers. I am invited to help this along with a contribution of $50 or more, or "Other."
While I'm willing to agree with Rep. Flake's opinion that today's Republicans are unprincipled conservatives, I fail to see how the nation would benefit from the rule of principled conservatives in the Goldwater mode. An objective view of the situation should tell us that "the principles of limited government, free markets and individual liberty" are no longer adequate to our national needs, not to mention the needs of the planet or the human race. Our main interest is not liberty, but survival, and we should not be interested in liberty that's inconsistent with collective survival. We should not be interested in an idea of liberty that presumes a perpetual competition of all against all for mere individual survival. We shouldn't be interested in an idea of liberty that translates succinctly as "tough luck if you fail." We all have an interest in survival, and neglecting it in the name of "liberty," or making survival entirely a matter of "personal responsibility," means that you're not really interested in government. All you want is a police force to protect whatever you consider to be your rightly-gotten winnings from everyone else, and that should leave everyone else wondering exactly how they benefit from your stewardship.
Liberty is not something that exists in nature in some sort of instinctual opposition to government or politics itself. Liberty is a creation of people through politics to save themselves from the state of nature. Anyone who appeals to the state of nature in defense of purported liberty against a democratic republic is only looking out for himself. None of this means you don't limit government. None of it means individuals don't have rights against the state. What it means is that the real choice in the 21st century is between competition and civilization, competitive liberty and civilized liberty. It won't do to just shout Liberty anymore, and until Jeff Flake and his friends can figure this out, they'll have to do without my money.
3 comments:
"General welfare" in the preamble of the constitution meant something different than welfare we use today. Today it means government handouts and special privileges, then it meant the happiness of the people which was protected by the government’s ability to enforce contracts, property rights, defend the nation, prevent fraud, and generally stay out of people’s private lives. So technically the preamble is not ignored but understood. We can’t enter today’s definitions of yesterday’s understandings.
As far as the state of nature is concerned, you can ignore human self interest at your own peril but you will never succeed in creating the society you want. Or you can attempt to understand the substantive argument behind that and try to understand how free markets and limited government can harness human self interest toward innovative, productive, and cooperative means.
The fact of the matter is cooperation will ALWAYS be more beneficial than competition. Capitalism only offers competition - for markets, for resources, etc. Capitalism does NOT foster cooperation. Since the net goal of capitalism is profit - not creating a better world, or a more peaceful and progressive society.
And we've all seen what limited government accomplishes when you're talking populations in the millions. It does very little. People like you are self-centered and selfish and add only to the dog-eat-dog mentality that drags the human race ever lower. Let's see you put your philosophy to the test - go live in the woods by yourself and let's see how long you survive.
Anonymous: You seem to be making inferences based on your own ideology that aren't justified by my post. Nothing I wrote can be construed to "ignore human self interest." Instead, I appeal to a more civilized self interest against the competitive compulsion that distorts conservatives' sense of liberty, which in some cases seems to boil down to "I like my chances better on my own." I refer such cases to Crhymethinc's comment. In your case, it depends on what you mean by self interest, and I hope you'll come back to clarify that point.
As for Goldwater's quote, I can't help but take the words "promote welfare" as a disapproving comment on the preamble itself. I don't dispute your list of original meanings, but I suspect you cut the list a bit short. Furthermore, are you sure the word welfare (small w) had the same connotation in 1960 as it does now when we usually capitalize the word? Again, I look forward to clarifications.
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