What are the Priorities of a Federal Government

Minarchist wrote:

It's also a gross inefficiency. There is an account I can give to at my church in which 100% of the money goes directly to people in need. The government doesn't publish figures (that I am aware of), but what do you think their efficiency is...50%? 25%? Pretty damn low, I'd guess.

Well one, you're forgetting about the cost of running the church in the first place. Two, the figure I've seen on Social Security is between 1% and 2% in overhead as far as efficiency.

As to your second point, I can't speak for everyone but I have had the opportunity both to go on unemployment and medicaid in my life, and I have declined both. There are those of us out there who really do live it. And if I only had to pay, say, 25% of the taxes on my paycheck that I do now, I'd have a lot more money to be able to save up for a rainy day.

Really though, that's an argument against insurance, not just government insurance. If you can so easily save up enough money using your premiums for that rainy day, then why would you buy *any* insurance in the first place?

Not to mention the additional wealth that would be created by investments of all those tax dollars not going to taxes anymore.

Well, tax dollars are going somewhere in the economy--even if the government is paying people to sit around all day doing useless paperwork, you can't do paperwork without buying *paper* so your investment in Dunder Mifflin is going to pay off more.

Obviously the issue of investment vs. consumption is a complex one, but it's not like every one of those tax dollars would be going to research Rearden Steel if the greedy looters would just stop taking them to build government death rays or grizzly bear paternity suits something.

Social insurance programs exist precisely because there was a time when they were desperately needed but were not there. Specifically, some people were either too poor to put something away against a rainy day (living paycheck to paycheck, or even behind), and other people didn't think they had to worry, then suddenly discovered that their investments weren't worth spit any more. The reason for the government to institute a practice of mandatory unemployment insurance, insured pension, medical insurance for pensioners, deposit insurance, and so on... is that when these things break down, society as a whole starts to go into the sh*tter. When everyone is hurting, there's simply not enough money available for people (other than the disgustingly rich) to give to charity to deal with the problem. More: Even if there were enough money (or the disgustingly rich were willing to give *large* chunks of their fortunes in a big chunk), the normal charity mechanisms aren't equipped to handle the extra load--you reach a point of "we just don't have enough suppliers/kitchen space/file clerks/what-have-you... try giving your money to someone else."

The solution? Build a social safety net to provide these things that people need to feel secure. A guarantee of pension money that's not subject to the bankruptcy of your employer or the value of stock certificates. A guarantee of medical care for the elderly even if their guaranteed pension is only able to cover their basic needs. A guarantee of temporary money to keep people from having to fight losing their homes at the same time they're desperately looking for work (after mass layoffs, for example.) A guarantee that no matter what happens to your bank, at least *some* of your savings you've invested with them will be secure (so you don't have to hoard cash at home, or make a run on the bank when you hear the sh*t is hitting the fan.)

By providing these things, the fabric of society is more stable, even in the face of major economic crises. You think this economic meltdown is bad? Imagine how bad it would be if we *did not* have these programs. Imagine that we had chosen to go the "all in" route against the banks--let them eat their losses. I can't totally say how that would have worked out compared to what we did do, but if it had happened *before* all of these social safety-nets were in place, I can guarantee is would have been very very bad.

On the subject of medicaid and unemployment: Would you have turned them down if it was the difference between your children eating and being malnourished? If you depended on charity giving, would your choice have been different if you knew that half of your local community was already making use of charity, and the charity was buckling under the strain? If you depended on your savings, what would you have done if your savings had disappeared at the same time? Or if the problems had gone on so long (or you thought they might) that your savings were depleted?

For myself: I grew up eating government cheese. My parents weren't members of a church. It's possible that without social programs there would have been more obvious charities to turn to... and yet. Everything seemed to work pretty damned well from my point of view--evening out the bad times so that we could get back on our feet, and we kids could go to college like our parents did.

Hypatian wrote:

My parents weren't members of a church.

I don't know of any churches that have a membership requirement for determining who receives charity or not. Requiring such would go against one of their core tenets.

MacBrave wrote:
Hypatian wrote:

My parents weren't members of a church.

I don't know of any churches that have a membership requirement for determining who receives charity or not. Requiring such would go against one of their core tenets.

Let me put it this way, then: For my parents to go a a church for support would have been drastically out of character. I'm not saying they wouldn't have done it if there weren't social welfare programs, but it would have chafed mightily. (I have a vivid image in my mind of how my dad would have reacted to the idea.)

Church membership came to mind primarily because my sister has a friend who depends heavily on the support of her church to get by. (I'm not talking little things, either.) That's the kind of support that can be provided by a community for members of the community (as long as everybody's doing pretty well over-all), and is the equivalent to more major social programs like the much lambasted HUD. Not the kind of charity you give to a random guy who comes in off the street.

You lack a crucial distinction here. When individuals do it, it isn't. It's charity.

No, you lack a critical distinction. The difference between charity and providing for the general welfare is similar to the difference between workshopping and factories. Charity is a great personal attribute, but it's a terrible way to run a social safety network intended to cover every citizen. Just as we've advanced in manufacturing from hand-crafted items to mass production and beyond, we've moved from dependence on the whims of individuals and disparities of generosity among the population to an even-handed system which applies to all.

And what applies to all should be funded by all. As I've noted before, the refusal to contribute while partaking of the benefits (which go well beyond unemployment and welfare) is itself theft. The idea that taxes are theft puts you completely outside the American system of government, anyway, since it's always been based on taxation.

Look, we disagree on this, but that does not make either of us completely wrong or completely right. The one thing that is a huge sticking point is the conflating of the social contract (of government) with actual theft, rather than as a responsibility of the citizen commensurate with the benefits received. If you want to hold that opinion, fine, but realize it's completely out of scope for anything like the system we have today. If you don't feel you can leave to live your ideals, I have to ask, what sort of compromise do you make to actually live in a system which you believe steals from you injustly?

It seems to me that you should argue from that compromise, or not claim that personal virtue puts you above the rest of us. I've never been on unemployment or medicaid/medicare either, but that doesn't change my view of them both as useful tools in society.

I think it was Richard Feynman that said that once you increase the scale of a problem by ten times it is, fundamentally, no longer the same problem.

I think of this when folks try to tell me that the problems of collective services and social safety nets in the 21st century can be solved with tools that didn't work particularly well even in the 18th. Debtor's prisons, roving bands of the unemployed, orphanages filled with hungry waifs, and the constant threat of revolution were commonplace up through the middle part of the 20th century precisely because we had insufficient tools for dealing with the sort of social misery endemic in industrialized societies with insufficient social policies. If you have any doubt of that, take a good, hard look at China.

Robear wrote:
You lack a crucial distinction here. When individuals do it, it isn't. It's charity.

No, you lack a critical distinction. The difference between charity and providing for the general welfare is similar to the difference between workshopping and factories. Charity is a great personal attribute, but it's a terrible way to run a social safety network intended to cover every citizen. Just as we've advanced in manufacturing from hand-crafted items to mass production and beyond, we've moved from dependence on the whims of individuals and disparities of generosity among the population to an even-handed system which applies to all.

The crucial distinction is personal choice. Scale has nothing to do with it. Do you choose to help, or are you forced to do so? This is just a red herring. Or do you really not believe that it matters whether someone chooses to do something?

And what applies to all should be funded by all. As I've noted before, the refusal to contribute while partaking of the benefits (which go well beyond unemployment and welfare) is itself theft. The idea that taxes are theft puts you completely outside the American system of government, anyway, since it's always been based on taxation.

America, for the majority of its existence, has been based on consumptive taxation. The income tax didn't come into play until 1913. So you could, up to that point, choose not to pay taxes by growing your own food, making your own clothes, etc. (something that a great many people did in that period of time). I have a right to my property, and the government is forcibly taking it away from me. How is that not theft? A social contract would be something that both parties agreed to. You can't force a private contract on someone; why would that be different in the government's case?

Look, we disagree on this, but that does not make either of us completely wrong or completely right. The one thing that is a huge sticking point is the conflating of the social contract (of government) with actual theft, rather than as a responsibility of the citizen commensurate with the benefits received. If you want to hold that opinion, fine, but realize it's completely out of scope for anything like the system we have today. If you don't feel you can leave to live your ideals, I have to ask, what sort of compromise do you make to actually live in a system which you believe steals from you injustly?

I would agree, that is the sticking point. It is out of scope, perhaps, but it wasn't a mere 80 years ago. If your A student suddenly started bringing home D report cards for a significant period of time, would you think that As are no longer in-scope? You know at one point they were capable of it.

As to your question...it's difficult. I'm not sure I can adequately answer that one. I don't think the welfare state can just be peeled back in one fell swoop, if that's what you're asking. It would have to be done piecemeal, over a period of years (probably decades). Otherwise, support libertarian and like-minded candidates as much as possible, vote for term limits, and try to smash up the two-party system wherever it's possible.

It seems to me that you should argue from that compromise, or not claim that personal virtue puts you above the rest of us. I've never been on unemployment or medicaid/medicare either, but that doesn't change my view of them both as useful tools in society.

That may have come across wrongly, and I apologize. I didn't say that to try and put on some holier-than-thou attitude or make my argument more valid. I read that you were painting in broad-brush strokes that any of us who hold that the large social welfare programs are unjust are still greedy enough to happily go on the dole if we have the opportunity. That's not the case.

Minarchist and Robear,

We can have both low taxes and a good safety net. These two things are mutually exclusive. As long as we spend on things that makes us productive. Right now with the unemployment rate so high in USA we are not deficit spending enough.

Minarchist is right when he says that taxes take away from the individual. This is not needed now when so many households are drowning in debt.

Robear is right when he says that the safety net is maintained by the Federal government is a good thing. That it helps society get through problems better.

So if you combine the two you would figure out that deficit spending is what is needed. It will pay for itself by getting the unemployment rate down.

AMY GOODMAN: Joe Stiglitz, the deficit, the battle cry of the Tea Party movement, of the Republicans, as well. Robert Rubin has weighed in, says any new stimulus plan is highly likely to be counterproductive. What do you think has to happen? Does the deficit matter? And how do you think it should be dealt with?

JOSEPH STIGLITZ: My view is we cannot afford not to stimulate the economy. So, you know, anybody that says we should go back to austerity or we should not have a second-round stimulus just doesn’t understand economics. And let me be very clear about this. If we don’t stimulate the economy, the economy is going to get weaker. When the economy gets weaker, tax revenues go down and expenditures go up. Already, more than 40 million Americans are on food stamps. Number of people on Medicaid is reaching record levels. So, revenues go down, expenditures go up, deficits get worse. If you stimulate the economy, then people get jobs, they spend money, tax revenues go up. Now, if we spend the money on investments—investments in education, technology, infrastructure—you grow the economy in the short run from the stimulus, you grow the economy in the long term because of the returns that you get on these investments.

I agree that talking about the need to deal with the deficit in the short term while the country is in recession is a bit like saying you need to spend less on fire extinguishers in the middle of a fire.

Minarchist wrote:

America, for the majority of its existence, has been based on consumptive taxation. The income tax didn't come into play until 1913. So you could, up to that point, choose not to pay taxes by growing your own food, making your own clothes, etc. (something that a great many people did in that period of time). I have a right to my property, and the government is forcibly taking it away from me. How is that not theft? A social contract would be something that both parties agreed to. You can't force a private contract on someone; why would that be different in the government's case?

It's a bit dishonest to present early America as some sort of tax-free Garden of Eden. The first income tax came into play in 1861, not 1913, to help pay for the Civil War. You also have to understand that consumption taxes weren't enough to fund the government, even back then. Tariffs on imported goods were the true source of funding for the early American government. As tariffs were phased out in the interest of freer trade taxes on incomes were gradually expanded.

A social contract isn't an contract between an individual and the government, its a contract between a people and their government. The people--the society--agree to give up their individual sovereignty to a government in exchange for a bit of stability, order, and the rule of law. The social contract you and I live under was signed and notarized generations ago. That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract. You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it (especially after you benefited from said contract for a decade or two until you got old enough to think that the government was stealing from you).

What you do get is the ability to occasionally fiddle with the terms because the social contract is based on the consent of the governed. In the case of America, you get to vote and choose your government representative. If you want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a of the social contract we all live under, then you vote for the people who you think want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a in the same way.

Minarchist wrote:

Otherwise, support libertarian and like-minded candidates as much as possible, vote for term limits, and try to smash up the two-party system wherever it's possible.

Yup. Vote for the people who want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a. Keep in mind, though, that if not enough voters want to change the social contract like you, you still have to live under the existing terms. And that means paying taxes.

If you don't want to, then feel free to find a country that has a social contract more to your liking. Again, I hear Somalia follows a limited government and consumptive tax approach that libertarians seem to favor.

The crucial distinction is personal choice. Scale has nothing to do with it. Do you choose to help, or are you forced to do so? This is just a red herring. Or do you really not believe that it matters whether someone chooses to do something?

Scale has *everything* to do with it, as does indeed the idea of personal choice, although you won't enjoy the context. First, I agree with OG above. You have the freedom to make the choice to leave if the contract is intolerable to you. If it's not, then your *choice* is to stay and accept the terms. You can try to change them, but you'll run up against the Constitution eventually, and that does not in any way support the idea that taxes are theft. That's a real problem for libertarians who work from that premise but want to stay within the US Constitutional framework. And if you want to work outside of it, or change it to that degree, you really have a much, much harder task than just changing the tax rates or spending.

Second, as I noted, scale is very important. Even in the new Republic, it was recognized that personal charity was insufficient for societal health, and that relying on the Church was a problem which had plagued Europe. The Founders were unwilling to let the Church have that much power. So naturally, it falls to government, state/local or Federal as you choose (although I've cited good reasons for Federal baselines.)

I would also argue that because I *choose* to participate, and you have *chosen* to participate as well, that the issue of forced personal choice in this matter remains hazy and distant for both of us. We literally can't avoid benefiting from the government - even the freedom to talk about these issues without harassment comes from the very same document that authorizes taxation. Are our freedoms illegitimate as well, simply because we were born into citizenship and happen to accept the social contract?

It's hard for me not to view the whole deal as a trade-off - I give some, I get some. Arguing that I shouldn't have to give but then should still have the advantages of (for example) the Bill of Rights seems to me to be arguing for an unbalanced contract. I benefit, but I don't want to help others benefit, in that case, and that just does not seem right.

America, for the majority of its existence, has been based on consumptive taxation. The income tax didn't come into play until 1913. So you could, up to that point, choose not to pay taxes by growing your own food, making your own clothes, etc. (something that a great many people did in that period of time). I have a right to my property, and the government is forcibly taking it away from me. How is that not theft? A social contract would be something that both parties agreed to. You can't force a private contract on someone; why would that be different in the government's case?

I agree with OG above, so I'll focus on a different aspect.

It's different because the government has the responsibility for maintaining the contract between the citizens and their leadership. I view that as something that both parties agree to, because citizens have the right to leave the country and renounce the contract. But it applies to all citizens from birth because they all get the benefits of it, from birth. We can't avoid being born, right? And I don't think you can argue that infants or children or even teens have experienced enough to be presented with the choice. So how is it meaningful that we are born into it? It's not like children get no benefits from government, so it's hardly unfair. They are not even paying for it for well over a decade.

Quote:

Look, we disagree on this, but that does not make either of us completely wrong or completely right. The one thing that is a huge sticking point is the conflating of the social contract (of government) with actual theft, rather than as a responsibility of the citizen commensurate with the benefits received. If you want to hold that opinion, fine, but realize it's completely out of scope for anything like the system we have today. If you don't feel you can leave to live your ideals, I have to ask, what sort of compromise do you make to actually live in a system which you believe steals from you injustly?

I would agree, that is the sticking point. It is out of scope, perhaps, but it wasn't a mere 80 years ago. If your A student suddenly started bringing home D report cards for a significant period of time, would you think that As are no longer in-scope? You know at one point they were capable of it.

1930? To what are you referring? The social contract was established in the 1780's in it's initial form, not the 1930's. What events did you have in mind that so changed things in 1930?

I would argue that we are much better off than we were in the Thirties. Civil rights, government reform, the social safety net and many other changes have improved life, not destroyed it.

As to your question...it's difficult. I'm not sure I can adequately answer that one. I don't think the welfare state can just be peeled back in one fell swoop, if that's what you're asking. It would have to be done piecemeal, over a period of years (probably decades). Otherwise, support libertarian and like-minded candidates as much as possible, vote for term limits, and try to smash up the two-party system wherever it's possible.

I agree that it's a hard question; I'd offer you an answer if there were an easy one. I'm puzzled as to how we're a "welfare state"; surely the welfare state existed for 30 years, but was dismantled in the '90's as a failed experiment. Is that not progress? As for term limits and the two party system, those are not solely libertarian issues. There are very good reasons not to go with the first (that's something that was tried in some states early on and failed spectacularly, as I recall), but I think there are very good reasons to change the latter. Still, that will bring us no closer to a libertarian ideal by itself.

I think that there's a big difference between trying to insert personal responsibility back into the system and arguing for the dissolution of the system. The latter can be viewed as extraordinary change, and I think it requires an extraordinary system to replace it. Democracies existed before the US, and have sprung up since. But has there ever been a functioning libertarian state? I worry that that alone is an argument against it's viability, but I recognize that's a weak argument.

That may have come across wrongly, and I apologize. I didn't say that to try and put on some holier-than-thou attitude or make my argument more valid. I read that you were painting in broad-brush strokes that any of us who hold that the large social welfare programs are unjust are still greedy enough to happily go on the dole if we have the opportunity. That's not the case.

I appreciate that, and I admit to the broad brush strokes in response to previous discussions. I should not have directed that at you; I believed you were not being selfish in that, but I did want to show that that personal virtue is not unique to people who disagree with the system. I did that clumsily, and I should have just steered clear of it.

To me, your thoughtfulness in considering the hard issues is reassuring. The system we have now is not perfect (of course), and libertarianism has some good ideas, but it's so often argued as virtuous and a complete fix for everything that it's hard to resist throwing out the good with the bad. And it's been tied to fringe economic and racial issues so often that it's hard to disentangle it from the edges of political philosophy and figure out how it can be brought into the mainstream. Certainly the mainstay of Friedmanian economics has been devastated in the last few years; economically, it's hard to find a mainstream theory that would allow it to differentiate itself policy-wise.

It's a hard stance to defend, I think, and I applaud your work in thinking seriously about it. Civil discussion is the best way to learn.

OG_slinger wrote:

A social contract isn't an contract between an individual and the government, its a contract between a people and their government. The people--the society--agree to give up their individual sovereignty to a government in exchange for a bit of stability, order, and the rule of law. The social contract you and I live under was signed and notarized generations ago. That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract.

That's not a contract, that's serfdom.

You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it (especially after you benefited from said contract for a decade or two until you got old enough to think that the government was stealing from you).

Well if we're bringing in contract law here, I'm pretty sure this Social Contract you're talking about would be considered a contract of adhesion. I mean, if it's possibly unconscionable to enforce a contract for furniture purchases against a single mother, you're telling me that enforcing a contract for food against an infant is a-ok?

Robear wrote:
The crucial distinction is personal choice. Scale has nothing to do with it. Do you choose to help, or are you forced to do so? This is just a red herring. Or do you really not believe that it matters whether someone chooses to do something?

Scale has *everything* to do with it, as does indeed the idea of personal choice, although you won't enjoy the context. First, I agree with OG above. You have the freedom to make the choice to leave if the contract is intolerable to you. If it's not, then your *choice* is to stay and accept the terms.

How? How on earth can you possibly decline such a "contract" on even terms? You've lived for decades within a confine (I like CP's "serfdom" term) from which you have no escape. You don't get refunded if you do decide to leave — in fact, the government still taxes you even after you leave the country! On money that you're earning overseas and spending overseas! The USA is the only industrialized nation to do this. You've been paying into a shoddy system your entire life up to that point: in concrete dollars if you've held a job, and in other notable but less tangible ways, like being shackled to a shoddy school system. If I chose to leave, would America reimburse me the opportunity costs that they squandered before I had the ability to decline our "contract"?

You can try to change them, but you'll run up against the Constitution eventually, and that does not in any way support the idea that taxes are theft. That's a real problem for libertarians who work from that premise but want to stay within the US Constitutional framework.

The Constitution does not support the idea that taxes taken for uses specifically enumerated within the articles of the Constitution itself are theft. Anything else, especially the idea of redistribution of wealth, the founders were vehemently against and stated on many occasions had no place in the U.S. government. It's really not a problem for us at all.

Second, as I noted, scale is very important. Even in the new Republic, it was recognized that personal charity was insufficient for societal health, and that relying on the Church was a problem which had plagued Europe. The Founders were unwilling to let the Church have that much power. So naturally, it falls to government, state/local or Federal as you choose (although I've cited good reasons for Federal baselines.)

The founders were unwilling to let the Church be officially part of the state, which was the noted problem in England (and most of Europe for most of the preceding millenium). So, essentially, they were unwilling to rely on the state for charity. So naturally, it falls to anyone else — corporations, individuals, community groups, private churches — to pick up the slack. Possibly state or local governments, if those voters so chose. Definitely not at a Federal level, though, which is what we have now to the tune of Trillions of dollars each year.

We literally can't avoid benefiting from the government - even the freedom to talk about these issues without harassment comes from the very same document that authorizes taxation. Are our freedoms illegitimate as well, simply because we were born into citizenship and happen to accept the social contract?

Our freedoms are our own. They do not come from the government. How could they be illegitimate? Are you suggesting that were it not for Our Benevolent Overlords in the government, I would not in fact have the right to my property? To my speech? To my life?

It's hard for me not to view the whole deal as a trade-off - I give some, I get some. Arguing that I shouldn't have to give but then should still have the advantages of (for example) the Bill of Rights seems to me to be arguing for an unbalanced contract. I benefit, but I don't want to help others benefit, in that case, and that just does not seem right.

What do you get? I know what we're supposed to get: a platform upon which everyone can have a free exchange of goods, ideas, and protection from physical harm. Considering the myriad shackles the government has placed on businesses, free speech, and the like, I'd say they're doing the exact opposite. Therefore, I earn, they take, and give to someone else. Some trade-off.

It's different because the government has the responsibility for maintaining the contract between the citizens and their leadership. I view that as something that both parties agree to, because citizens have the right to leave the country and renounce the contract. But it applies to all citizens from birth because they all get the benefits of it, from birth. We can't avoid being born, right? And I don't think you can argue that infants or children or even teens have experienced enough to be presented with the choice. So how is it meaningful that we are born into it? It's not like children get no benefits from government, so it's hardly unfair. They are not even paying for it for well over a decade.

I covered some of that above, so I guess I'll just ask: what benefits? An abysmal school system? A Child Protective Services agency that far too often removes kids from happy homes to give them back to their addict mothers? An adoption system that makes it so unattainably expensive for parents who desperately want to help American children that may people go overseas, or try artificial fertility treatments because it's actually cheaper?

1930? To what are you referring? The social contract was established in the 1780's in it's initial form, not the 1930's. What events did you have in mind that so changed things in 1930?

The contract in the 1780s resembles nothing of what we have today. The '30s was when we started to get charity as a national spending spree, with FICA and farm subsidies and continuing on with Medicare, Welfare and the whole host of programs we have today. In other words, someone re-wrote the contract.

I would argue that we are much better off than we were in the Thirties. Civil rights, government reform, the social safety net and many other changes have improved life, not destroyed it.

I would agree that we're better off, but I think you're making the mistake of correlation being causation there. (Well, not in the sense of civil rights, but in other senses.) It does bring us to the brick wall that almost every economic/political policy discussion runs into, though: you can't have a control group for history. We don't know what would have happened had the New Deal or the Great Society not occurred; we can only conjecture.

I'm puzzled as to how we're a "welfare state"; surely the welfare state existed for 30 years, but was dismantled in the '90's as a failed experiment. Is that not progress?

Over 50% of our government's budget goes to programs that directly (or slightly indirectly in the case of Medicare) facilitate taking money from one person and giving them to another and you still question that? I don't know what I can do to convince you, then.

I think that there's a big difference between trying to insert personal responsibility back into the system and arguing for the dissolution of the system. The latter can be viewed as extraordinary change, and I think it requires an extraordinary system to replace it. Democracies existed before the US, and have sprung up since. But has there ever been a functioning libertarian state? I worry that that alone is an argument against it's viability, but I recognize that's a weak argument.

True, there is a big difference. My response would be that I hope the former would gradually decrease the gap between it and the latter until the two no longer seem that separate. Let's say, for instance, that we got rid of all farm subsidies for farmers or corporations making over $250 million a year. An easy thing to do, politically, and an astonishing amount of the farm bill budget. Then the next year, it dropped to $100 million, and so on, and so forth. I think change is relatively easy if it can be swallowed in small doses.

As to a functioning libertarian state, there are some closer than us today, but America was pretty close to one back in the day. Although in certain areas we have made great advancements since then. It would be ideal to keep the expansion of liberties towards the Irish, African-Americans, woman, and (more recently) homosexuals and go back to the freedom of business and personal ideology that we had then. However, that's probably a topic for another post.

That may have come across wrongly, and I apologize. I didn't say that to try and put on some holier-than-thou attitude or make my argument more valid. I read that you were painting in broad-brush strokes that any of us who hold that the large social welfare programs are unjust are still greedy enough to happily go on the dole if we have the opportunity. That's not the case.
To me, your thoughtfulness in considering the hard issues is reassuring. The system we have now is not perfect (of course), and libertarianism has some good ideas, but it's so often argued as virtuous and a complete fix for everything that it's hard to resist throwing out the good with the bad. And it's been tied to fringe economic and racial issues so often that it's hard to disentangle it from the edges of political philosophy and figure out how it can be brought into the mainstream. Certainly the mainstay of Friedmanian economics has been devastated in the last few years; economically, it's hard to find a mainstream theory that would allow it to differentiate itself policy-wise.

It's a hard stance to defend, I think, and I applaud your work in thinking seriously about it. Civil discussion is the best way to learn. :-)

Respeck knuckles!

That paragraph is unfortunately very true; I wish libertarianism could stick to its principles, but understand that actual implementation requires great moderation. Too many people equate libertarianism with quacks that start by "less government!" and immediately run to "and disband the DoE! And legalize all drugs! And pull out of every war!" While I may agree with many of their desired goals...they push a bit too fast. And come off a little crazy because of it. Oh, well.

I'm hungry.

CheezePavilion wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

A social contract isn't an contract between an individual and the government, its a contract between a people and their government. The people--the society--agree to give up their individual sovereignty to a government in exchange for a bit of stability, order, and the rule of law. The social contract you and I live under was signed and notarized generations ago. That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract.

That's not a contract, that's serfdom.

Serfs don't get to vote, we do. That's why a key part of the social contract is that it's all based on the consent of the governed.

CheezePavilion wrote:
You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it (especially after you benefited from said contract for a decade or two until you got old enough to think that the government was stealing from you).

Well if we're bringing in contract law here, I'm pretty sure this Social Contract you're talking about would be considered a contract of adhesion. I mean, if it's possibly unconscionable to enforce a contract for furniture purchases against a single mother, you're telling me that enforcing a contract for food against an infant is a-ok?

Let me see if I have things straight. You want to apply 20th century contract law, which was based on French Civil Law of the early 19th century, to the political philosophy introduced by Hobbes and Locke in the 17th century?

I'll set aside the irony of you citing laws to argue against the ideas that led to the rule of law instead of the whim of a king. See, Hobbes and Locke were actually arguing *against* serfdom. They were trying to construct a way to justify how people could govern themselves that wasn't based on some watery tart throwing a sword at someone who could then claimed to be a king. In a world of hereditary rule and the divine right of kings, the idea that people could actually choose who and how they would be governed was some seriously radical sh*t.

The idea of a social contract Hobbes and Locke help formulate led to the modern nation state as we know it, which, in turn, led to the code of laws that help keep things running smoothly. Take away the social contract and you don't have a government, which means you don't have anyone to enforce the laws (or your rights, which are also part of that contract), which means your back to being ruled by the whim of whoever the moistened bint lobs a scimitar at.

I mean the American Revolution would have never happened in the first place without the Locke's Two Treatises of Government, which questioned the divine right of kings and said that people were allowed to revolt if the government starts to arbitrarily wield its power (i.e., abandon the rule of law), and Rousseau's Of The Social Contract, Or Principles of Political Right, which, you guessed it, said the only way you can have a legitimate political authority is if people band together and collectively agree to give up some of their freedoms and accept the same duties.

Understanding the ideological underpinnings of the American Revolution makes the libertarian "taxes are government theft" an absolute joke. We were the first modern nation on the planet that put the political ideas of a social contract fleshed out by Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, and others into practice. We threw off the yoke of the British monarchy and collectively agreed upon a new system of government that we've been living with ever since.

OG_slinger wrote:

Let me see if I have things straight. You want to apply 20th century contract law, which was based on French Civil Law of the early 19th century, to the political philosophy introduced by Hobbes and Locke in the 17th century?

20th century contract law is based on French civil law? Where are you getting this from?

OG_slinger wrote:
CheezePavilion wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

A social contract isn't an contract between an individual and the government, its a contract between a people and their government. The people--the society--agree to give up their individual sovereignty to a government in exchange for a bit of stability, order, and the rule of law. The social contract you and I live under was signed and notarized generations ago. That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract.

That's not a contract, that's serfdom.

Serfs don't get to vote, we do. That's why a key part of the social contract is that it's all based on the consent of the governed.

First you have to establish why a vote is a sufficient substitute for consent. You can't just skip from "you had the right to vote" to "you consented" without an argument why one is as good as the other in this case.

You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it (especially after you benefited from said contract for a decade or two until you got old enough to think that the government was stealing from you).

Well if we're bringing in contract law here, I'm pretty sure this Social Contract you're talking about would be considered a contract of adhesion. I mean, if it's possibly unconscionable to enforce a contract for furniture purchases against a single mother, you're telling me that enforcing a contract for food against an infant is a-ok?

Let me see if I have things straight. You want to apply 20th century contract law, which was based on French Civil Law of the early 19th century, to the political philosophy introduced by Hobbes and Locke in the 17th century?

Well first off, aren't you the one arguing things like:

In the case of America, you get to vote and choose your government representative. If you want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a of the social contract we all live under, then you vote for the people who you think want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a in the same way.

In the case of America, we modified our social contract's rules of contract to include the doctrines of Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander: along the lines of what you told Minarchist, feel free to find a country that has a social contract more to your liking. I hear Somalia follows a theory of contract law that does not include those doctrines.

CheezePavilion wrote:

First you have to establish why a vote is a sufficient substitute for consent. You can't just skip from "you had the right to vote" to "you consented" without an argument why one is as good as the other in this case.

Given that you are advocating for the change, I think the burden of proof is on you. In what way is regularly choosing the executives to run the government, directly petitioning the government, the freedom to run for any elected government office (provided you meet residence/age requirements), similar freedom to run for city/county/state positions, and freedom to found your own political parties and PACs an insufficient say in your government? What system would suggest to govern a nation of hundreds of millions in any coherent fashion? How would you deal with changing the current system if people do not consent to the change?

CheezePavilion wrote:

In the case of America, we modified our social contract's rules of contract to include the doctrines of Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander: along the lines of what you told Minarchist, feel free to find a country that has a social contract more to your liking. I hear Somalia follows a theory of contract law that does not include those doctrines.

Personally, I have found a society that is somewhat to my liking: this one. It is you, amongst others, who is arguing to change it without my consent. You brought up Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably, but never showed how either of those applied to citizenship or taxation. If you want to treat government like a business and apply this law to it, you are faced with a scenario of voluntary membership in a dues-charging society. If you think of the government as an organization superior to businesses, what with the ability to imprison you, impose laws, conscript you into the military and such, then you must acknowledge that the restrictions on government activities are different from those on businesses.

Funkenpants wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

Let me see if I have things straight. You want to apply 20th century contract law, which was based on French Civil Law of the early 19th century, to the political philosophy introduced by Hobbes and Locke in the 17th century?

20th century contract law is based on French civil law? Where are you getting this from?

The contract of adhesion came from French civil law. Our legal system incorporated it around the turn of the century.

CheezePavilion wrote:

First you have to establish why a vote is a sufficient substitute for consent. You can't just skip from "you had the right to vote" to "you consented" without an argument why one is as good as the other in this case.

Why wouldn't a vote be a sufficient substitute for consent? If I vote for something, I'm saying I approve of or assent to it, which is what consent means after all.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Well first off, aren't you the one arguing things like:

In the case of America, you get to vote and choose your government representative. If you want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a of the social contract we all live under, then you vote for the people who you think want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a in the same way.

In the case of America, we modified our social contract's rules of contract to include the doctrines of Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander: along the lines of what you told Minarchist, feel free to find a country that has a social contract more to your liking. I hear Somalia follows a theory of contract law that does not include those doctrines.

No. We modified contract law to include the Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionability .

There's a big difference between contract law and our social contract, which is essentially the ideas embodied in the Declaration of Independence and rights embodied in the Constitution and Bill of Rights. As long as the government protects the rights enumerated there and doesn't act too arbitrarily, it's holding up its end the deal and we agree to do things like pay taxes.

If you want our social contract modified to include the Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionability then you'd best get busy electing politicians who want to amend the Constitution to include a citizenship opt out clause.

But this won't happen because the vast majority of Americans are perfectly OK with the current terms of our social contract: with rights come responsibilities. It's only the libertarian fringe that thinks they can get all the benefits of a civil society without paying any of the costs.

What were you referring to in 1930 in the previous discussion?

How? How on earth can you possibly decline such a "contract" on even terms? You've lived for decades within a confine (I like CP's "serfdom" term) from which you have no escape. You don't get refunded if you do decide to leave — in fact, the government still taxes you even after you leave the country! On money that you're earning overseas and spending overseas! The USA is the only industrialized nation to do this. You've been paying into a shoddy system your entire life up to that point: in concrete dollars if you've held a job, and in other notable but less tangible ways, like being shackled to a shoddy school system. If I chose to leave, would America reimburse me the opportunity costs that they squandered before I had the ability to decline our "contract"?

Upon what principle do you claim you should be reimbursed for things you consumed? Do you expect that if you stop your credit card or cable account that they will reimburse you?

When you say "the government still taxes you even after you leave the country", are you still speaking in the context of renouncing citizenship? Or are you talking about just working overseas (in which case, you still benefit from being a citizen)? For example, the UK taxes expatriates working abroad, and the US stops taxing you when you renounce citizenship, so I'm unsure what you mean here.

Whether the system is shoddy or not is a different question from whether taxes are theft, or the Constitution is a personal contract.

The Constitution does not support the idea that taxes taken for uses specifically enumerated within the articles of the Constitution itself are theft. Anything else, especially the idea of redistribution of wealth, the founders were vehemently against and stated on many occasions had no place in the U.S. government. It's really not a problem for us at all.

Not all of the Founders or their influences. Jefferson argued strongly for a system of schools supported by the rich for the benefit of all - surely a "redistribution of wealth" under the silly definition currently en vogue (as compared to *actual* redistribution of wealth conducted at gunpoint by Communists, for example). Clearly the Constitution allows for the Federal government to "provide for the common welfare". As for the scope, you seem inclined to Madison's point of view, that the laying of taxes is essentially only for the self-support of government. However, it's Hamilton's pov that actually has taken hold from the start - that taxes can be laid for any purpose that encompasses "the general welfare of the union". So the idea that the Founders were "vehemently against" what you call "wealth redistribution" - the laying of taxes for the benefit of the citizens and the union - is simply incorrect, and has never been applied as the law of the land despite some of them taking Madison's side in the Federalist Papers.

The founders were unwilling to let the Church be officially part of the state, which was the noted problem in England (and most of Europe for most of the preceding millenium). So, essentially, they were unwilling to rely on the state for charity. So naturally, it falls to anyone else — corporations, individuals, community groups, private churches — to pick up the slack. Possibly state or local governments, if those voters so chose. Definitely not at a Federal level, though, which is what we have now to the tune of Trillions of dollars each year.

That's a real stretch, that they were unwilling to rely on the state for social programs because they didn't want to let the Church gain power. Again, the consistent legal and legislative reading is that social welfare is one of the proper uses for tax funds. That's not an opinion, it's the actual way things are.

Finally, in United States v. Butler,543 the Court gave its unqualified endorsement to Hamilton’s views on the taxing power. Wrote Justice Roberts for the Court: “Since the foundation of the Nation sharp differences of opinion have persisted as to the true interpretation of the phrase. Madison asserted it amounted to no more than a reference to the other powers enumerated in the subsequent clauses of the same section; that, as the United States is a government of limited and enumerated powers, the grant of[p.155]power to tax and spend for the general national welfare must be confined to the numerated legislative fields committed to the Congress. In this view the phrase is mere tautology, for taxation and appropriation are or may be necessary incidents of the exercise of any of the enumerated legislative powers. Hamilton, on the other hand, maintained the clause confers a power separate and distinct from those later enumerated, is not restricted in meaning by the grant of them, and Congress consequently has a substantive power to tax and to appropriate, limited only by the requirement that it shall be exercised to provide for the general welfare of the United States. Each contention has had the support of those whose views are entitled to weight. This court had noticed the question, but has never found it necessary to decide which is the true construction. Justice Story, in his Commentaries, espouses the Hamiltonian position. We shall not review the writings of public men and commentators or discuss the legislative practice. Study of all these leads us to conclude that the reading advocated by Justice Story is the correct one. While, therefore, the power to tax is not unlimited, its confines are set in the clause which confers it, and not in those of Sec. 8 which bestow and define the legislative powers of the Congress. It results that the power of Congress to authorize expenditure of public moneys for public purposes is not limited by the direct grants of legislative power found in the Constitution.”544

So let's lay that one to rest - the argument belongs to a history which does not exist. I understand that's distasteful, but it's the way things turned out, and it's not going to be reversed anytime soon, if ever.

I covered some of that above, so I guess I'll just ask: what benefits? An abysmal school system? A Child Protective Services agency that far too often removes kids from happy homes to give them back to their addict mothers? An adoption system that makes it so unattainably expensive for parents who desperately want to help American children that may people go overseas, or try artificial fertility treatments because it's actually cheaper?

Again, if it's that bad, leave. You won't be taxed after renouncing citizenship, so that's not an issue. But if you stay, work for change. Help elect people who will *fix* the system, rather than simply tear it down with the belief that people with a bit more money in their pockets will fix everything on their own.

The contract in the 1780s resembles nothing of what we have today. The '30s was when we started to get charity as a national spending spree, with FICA and farm subsidies and continuing on with Medicare, Welfare and the whole host of programs we have today. In other words, someone re-wrote the contract.

Nope. What happened then was good and forms the baseline of expectations held by everyone in the country today. (And the farm subsidies then actually benefited farmers and the nation by working to smooth out market fluctuations, as opposed to Nixon's that do the opposite.) Welfare is about 95% or more gone. Medicare is one of the most popular benefits out there, and is operated by *private companies*. FDA product regulation, the EPA, all sorts of beneficial services spring from this movement. I myself remember what things were like before the Clean Air Act - would you suggest repealing that in the interests of ideological purity? I hope not, as I have allergic asthma and it sucked back then. (Spectacular sunsets notwithstanding.)

So there are certainly benefits to social welfare network.

Over 50% of our government's budget goes to programs that directly (or slightly indirectly in the case of Medicare) facilitate taking money from one person and giving them to another and you still question that? I don't know what I can do to convince you, then.

Ask your grandparents whether they think Medicare is a waste. Maybe they do, but they are outliers. When LBJ signed it into law, 40% of people over 65 had no medical insurance. Now, they all can. This is a step backwards?

True, there is a big difference. My response would be that I hope the former would gradually decrease the gap between it and the latter until the two no longer seem that separate. Let's say, for instance, that we got rid of all farm subsidies for farmers or corporations making over $250 million a year. An easy thing to do, politically, and an astonishing amount of the farm bill budget. Then the next year, it dropped to $100 million, and so on, and so forth. I think change is relatively easy if it can be swallowed in small doses.

I'm all for that. The current subsidies are misguided and wasteful.

As to a functioning libertarian state, there are some closer than us today, but America was pretty close to one back in the day. Although in certain areas we have made great advancements since then. It would be ideal to keep the expansion of liberties towards the Irish, African-Americans, woman, and (more recently) homosexuals and go back to the freedom of business and personal ideology that we had then. However, that's probably a topic for another post.

I'm curious why you think it was libertarian, as opposed to republican. Can you cite specific differences? Certainly it was different, but how was it more supportive of libertarian principles? I'll leave you to make the argument despite an urge to dive in.

That paragraph is unfortunately very true; I wish libertarianism could stick to its principles, but understand that actual implementation requires great moderation. Too many people equate libertarianism with quacks that start by "less government!" and immediately run to "and disband the DoE! And legalize all drugs! And pull out of every war!" While I may agree with many of their desired goals...they push a bit too fast. And come off a little crazy because of it. Oh, well.

So there's still the crucial question - are you willing to work within the Constitution and accept the current system while changing policies? Or are you still standing on extra-Constitutional principles, in essence requiring major overhauls to the Constitution, or it's dissolution?

Kraint wrote:
CheezePavilion wrote:

First you have to establish why a vote is a sufficient substitute for consent. You can't just skip from "you had the right to vote" to "you consented" without an argument why one is as good as the other in this case.

Given that you are advocating for the change,

I'm not advocating for change, I'm trying to figure out if the current system is legitimate in the first place. I would actually say you are the one advocating for change--see below.

In what way is regularly choosing the executives to run the government, directly petitioning the government, the freedom to run for any elected government office (provided you meet residence/age requirements), similar freedom to run for city/county/state positions, and freedom to found your own political parties and PACs an insufficient say in your government

I think in the way the Supreme Court of the United States has held:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...

What system would suggest to govern a nation of hundreds of millions in any coherent fashion? How would you deal with changing the current system if people do not consent to the change?

Well that's the thing: both Libertarians and I like the idea of inalienable rights. They are a part of our American system. I don't think you realize that you are the one asking for change--or at least, the more fundamental change--in this case.

Personally, I have found a society that is somewhat to my liking: this one. It is you, amongst others, who is arguing to change it without my consent.

But you're not: you can't call government a 'club' where if you want to be a 'member' you need to follow the 'club rules' and then say you find this system is to your liking and other people are trying to change it without your consent, because the American 'charters' like the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence don't see government the way you do, and neither does the 'rules committee' of the Supreme Court, etc.

You brought up Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably, but never showed how either of those applied to citizenship or taxation.

That's because I was bringing them up specifically in the context of OG's talk of contract law and the Social Contract and why a 20th century concept would apply to the situation he was describing.

+++++

OG_slinger wrote:
CheezePavilion wrote:

First you have to establish why a vote is a sufficient substitute for consent. You can't just skip from "you had the right to vote" to "you consented" without an argument why one is as good as the other in this case.

Why wouldn't a vote be a sufficient substitute for consent? If I vote for something, I'm saying I approve of or assent to it, which is what consent means after all.

Heh--because a measure voted into law doesn't just apply to the people who voted "for something" it also can apply to those who voted against it.

Well first off, aren't you the one arguing things like:

In the case of America, you get to vote and choose your government representative. If you want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a of the social contract we all live under, then you vote for the people who you think want to modify Section 3, Sub-paragraph 7a in the same way.

In the case of America, we modified our social contract's rules of contract to include the doctrines of Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander: along the lines of what you told Minarchist, feel free to find a country that has a social contract more to your liking. I hear Somalia follows a theory of contract law that does not include those doctrines.

No. We modified contract law to include the Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionability .

There's a big difference between contract law and our social contract,

Right, but without further support, now you're picking and choosing according to what supports your argument at the time. You can't tell Minarchist in one post that "You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it" and then in another post tell me "there's a big difference between contract law and our social contract"

You can't treat the social contract as just another contract when it suits you, and then say there's a big difference when it doesn't.

which is essentially the ideas embodied in the Declaration of Independence and rights embodied in the Constitution and Bill of Rights. As long as the government protects the rights enumerated there and doesn't act too arbitrarily, it's holding up its end the deal and we agree to do things like pay taxes.

If you want our social contract modified to include the Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionability then you'd best get busy electing politicians who want to amend the Constitution to include a citizenship opt out clause.

There's no Incorporation clause either, so according to you standards for constitutional review the Bill of Rights should not apply against the states. Are you sure you want to make this argument?

But this won't happen because the vast majority of Americans are perfectly OK with the current terms of our social contract: with rights come responsibilities. It's only the libertarian fringe that thinks they can get all the benefits of a civil society without paying any of the costs.

It's also anyone who takes those words about inalienable rights in the Declaration of Independence seriously, too. Let's not strawman the argument about rights we get unconnected to responsibilities: it's not just some libertarian fringe that thinks that, plenty of straight-up liberals would agree with that too.

What you're really trying to do here without realizing it is pretend liberals like me do not exist, and it's just liberals like you vs. libertarians like Minarchist.

CheezePavilion wrote:

I'm not advocating for change, I'm trying to figure out if the current system is legitimate in the first place.

Are you seriously questioning the legitimacy of the American government? That after the drafting, debate, and compromise process of the Constitutional Convention *and* separate ratification votes by the individual states that the American government is somehow illegitimate?

CheezePavilion wrote:

Well that's the thing: both Libertarians and I like the idea of inalienable rights. They are a part of our American system. I don't think you realize that you are the one asking for change--or at least, the more fundamental change--in this case.

Our 'inalienable' rights are really just a construct of our political system. They aren't universal to all Mankind and they certainly don't exist without the American government agreeing to enforce and protect them.

As an example, if you took an American out of America and, say, dropped him in China, he would no longer have the 'inalienable' rights you like so much. Sure, the Constitution says he has the right to complain about the government all he wants, but he really only has that right if the government agrees to play along.

That misplaced American wouldn't have the same freedom of speech in China since the rights people enjoy are based on the unique social contracts they've formed with their governments.

CheezePavilion wrote:
You brought up Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably, but never showed how either of those applied to citizenship or taxation.

That's because I was bringing them up specifically in the context of OG's talk of contract law and the Social Contract and why a 20th century concept would apply to the situation he was describing.

No, Cheeze. You brought up contract law first. Why? I have no idea because contract law has absolutely nothing to do with the idea of a social contract except the word contract.

A social contract is a social and political construct, not a literal contract that every American signs and gets notarized.

CheezePavilion wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

Why wouldn't a vote be a sufficient substitute for consent? If I vote for something, I'm saying I approve of or assent to it, which is what consent means after all.

Heh--because a measure voted into law doesn't just apply to the people who voted "for something" it also can apply to those who voted against it.

So? Our system of government works by majority consent. If over half the people (or the people's representatives) assent to something, it's law for everyone.

We collectively agreed to this approach as a nation when the Constitution was ratified by each individual State (and even used the much higher 3/4ths consent).

Libertarians tend to think that they also get to vote on the ratification of the Constitution, but it doesn't work that way.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Right, but without further support, now you're picking and choosing according to what supports your argument at the time. You can't tell Minarchist in one post that "You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it" and then in another post tell me "there's a big difference between contract law and our social contract"

You can't treat the social contract as just another contract when it suits you, and then say there's a big difference when it doesn't.

I'm not picking and choosing anything, Cheeze. Minarchist and other libertarians don't get to claim that they're magically exempt from the social contract we're all working from because they don't like it. It applies to all citizens.

If it truly burns your britches that you have to pay taxes then you have the choice of abandoning your American citizenship and entering into a new social contract with another country or staying here and trying to alter what's in that social contract. However, if you stay, you're agreeing to the terms, which are you get rights in exchange for responsibilities, one of which is paying taxes.

You're the only one insisting that contract law is somehow related to the American social contract. It isn't. I don't know how to be more clear than saying contract law had abso-f*cking-lutely nothing to the formation of the our American social contract.

We were figuring out how to create a system of government from scratch that embodied certain shared principles about life, liberty, property, and more that didn't somehow derive it's power and legitimacy from a monarch. We were the first modern nation to throw off the chains of a king and say we were going to figure out how to govern ourselves all by ourselves and that we would have rights that were guaranteed by the very government they were creating.

That process had nothing to do with contract law and it certainly didn't incorporate a concept in French civil law that didn't even exist until 17 years later with the Napoleonic Code in 1804, that we Americans didn't even make part of our legal system until 1912, and that took until the 1960s to become case law.

Just show me which Constitutional Amendment covers either the Contract of Adhesion or Unconscionability and I'll cede the point to you. If you can't find them then stop claiming that Americans modified our social contract--the Constitution--to include these things.

CheezePavilion wrote:

There's no Incorporation clause either, so according to you standards for constitutional review the Bill of Rights should not apply against the states. Are you sure you want to make this argument?

When did I make that argument? Please don't put words in my mouth and then try to argue against them.

The thing about about the social contract we created through the Constitution is that it described the type of government we were going to create and how it would function. One branch of that new government was the Judiciary whose power extended to:

all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority; to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls; to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction; to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party; to Controversies between two or more States; between a State and Citizens of another State; between Citizens of different States; between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.

So I don't have any issue with incorporation because the courts--as directed by our social contract--have reviewed the issue and said the Bill of Rights applies to States. It's settled law in my books.

CheezePavilion wrote:

It's also anyone who takes those words about inalienable rights in the Declaration of Independence seriously, too. Let's not strawman the argument about rights we get unconnected to responsibilities: it's not just some libertarian fringe that thinks that, plenty of straight-up liberals would agree with that too.

What you're really trying to do here without realizing it is pretend liberals like me do not exist, and it's just liberals like you vs. libertarians like Minarchist.

Before you go off the deep end and lets back up about what this conversation has been about: the libertarian idea that taxes are theft. The entire discussion about social contracts and the formation of America has been to show that the government is holding up it's end of the contract by guaranteeing the rights enumerated in the Constitution. Since they're holding up their end, we have to hold up our end. In part, that means paying taxes.

I fail to see how I created a strawman argument by stating that most Americans are generally OK with how things are visa-vi taxes. Sure we bicker about how much we might pay, want to pay less, and argue over what the money is used for, but there's nothing like a groundswell of Americans saying they don't want to pay any taxes or a tiny fraction of what they do now.

See, at the end of the day we Americans like our social programs. That's why there's been great quotes from Tea Party followers like "the government better keep its hands off my Medicare." Because when push comes to shove and we actually have to choose what programs and benefits we want to keep and which we want to get rid of, we tend to say we want want them all...but we don't want to pay for them. That's why we have $13.6 trillion in national debt.

As far as you're concerned, I'm not pretending to do anything with you or whatever brand of politics you might subscribe to. You've come across as more libertarian than not in this thread and I've simply attempted to discuss the points you and others raised.

OG_slinger wrote:

See, at the end of the day we Americans like our social programs. That's why there's been great quotes from Tea Party followers like "the government better keep its hands off my Medicare." Because when push comes to shove and we actually have to choose what programs and benefits we want to keep and which we want to get rid of, we tend to say we want want them all...but we don't want to pay for them. That's why we have $13.6 trillion in national debt.

I don't think anyone here is saying this. I feel like Minarchist's original point was simply that it would be nice to have a society with the social values of today toward minorities and other historically disadvantaged groups, but without the belief that the government needs to be the one responsible for taking care of the financially disadvantaged other than protecting their constitutionally granted rights. If I'm wrong please correct me.

I also don't have a clear understanding about why deficit spending is necessary, at least to the degree we are currently engaged in it. Did Reagan's deficit spending lead to some sort of sustainable economic growth? Did Clinton's? Investment in infrastructure, education and all that are important to me, and I put them in my top 5 things the government should fund. I just don't see any evidence that deficit spending has had lasting positive effects on our economy, though I'm fully willing to admit my ignorance on the topic and would like to hear from those who know more about it.

An interesting piece of data I found here:

the 1970s had been a period of stagflation: slow growth along with high unemployment, high interest rates, and high inflation. The economic stimulus provided by President Reagan's tax cut in August, 1981—which scaled back marginal tax rates by 25 percent over three years—clearly set the economy on a growth trajectory.

But it also set the national debt on a growth trajectory. The debt rose from $930 million in 1980 to $2.6 trillion in 1988. Some observers point out that this doesn't matter because after the tax cut, government tax receipts doubled from about $500 billion to $1 trillion from 1980 to 1990, due to the higher income in a growing economy. But whatever the increase in tax receipts, it clearly did not come near to covering the increase in government spending—for which each party blames the other."

The last line is telling, but clearly the relationship between deficits, taxes and economic growth is not a simple one. Seems paradoxical, even.

I am now also curious why deficit spending rose so much under Reagan, but that's for another thread.

OG_slinger wrote:
CheezePavilion wrote:

I'm not advocating for change, I'm trying to figure out if the current system is legitimate in the first place.

Are you seriously questioning the legitimacy of the American government?

No, but I'm basing it's legitimacy on a different part of John Locke and 17th century political philosophy than you are.

Well that's the thing: both Libertarians and I like the idea of inalienable rights. They are a part of our American system. I don't think you realize that you are the one asking for change--or at least, the more fundamental change--in this case.

Our 'inalienable' rights are really just a construct of our political system. They aren't universal to all Mankind and they certainly don't exist without the American government agreeing to enforce and protect them.

As an example, if you took an American out of America and, say, dropped him in China, he would no longer have the 'inalienable' rights you like so much. Sure, the Constitution says he has the right to complain about the government all he wants, but he really only has that right if the government agrees to play along.

That misplaced American wouldn't have the same freedom of speech in China since the rights people enjoy are based on the unique social contracts they've formed with their governments.

Granting all that for the sake of argument, what does the fact that China will or will not recognize the U.S. Constitution have to do with a Libertarian in America claiming he doesn't have to pay U.S. taxes?

You brought up Contract of Adhesion and Unconscionably, but never showed how either of those applied to citizenship or taxation.

That's because I was bringing them up specifically in the context of OG's talk of contract law and the Social Contract and why a 20th century concept would apply to the situation he was describing.

No, Cheeze. You brought up contract law first. Why? I have no idea because contract law has absolutely nothing to do with the idea of a social contract except the word contract.

A social contract is a social and political construct, not a literal contract that every American signs and gets notarized.

You're the only one insisting that contract law is somehow related to the American social contract. It isn't. I don't know how to be more clear than saying contract law had abso-f*cking-lutely nothing to the formation of the our American social contract.

Umm...

A social contract isn't an contract between an individual and the government, its a contract between a people and their government. The people--the society--agree to give up their individual sovereignty to a government in exchange for a bit of stability, order, and the rule of law. The social contract you and I live under was signed and notarized generations ago. That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract. You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it (especially after you benefited from said contract for a decade or two until you got old enough to think that the government was stealing from you).

In other words, when you say to Minarchist "You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it" why can't he give your words of "a social contract is a social and political construct, not a literal contract" so OG, when you bring in this concept of breach (or I guess unilateral rescission, technically) "you're the only one insisting that contract law is somehow related to the American social contract" right back to you?

Why wouldn't a vote be a sufficient substitute for consent? If I vote for something, I'm saying I approve of or assent to it, which is what consent means after all.

Heh--because a measure voted into law doesn't just apply to the people who voted "for something" it also can apply to those who voted against it.

So? Our system of government works by majority consent.

Right, and you said "it's all based on the consent of the governed" not consent of the majority of the governed. Big difference.

Right, but without further support, now you're picking and choosing according to what supports your argument at the time. You can't tell Minarchist in one post that "You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it" and then in another post tell me "there's a big difference between contract law and our social contract"

You can't treat the social contract as just another contract when it suits you, and then say there's a big difference when it doesn't.

I'm not picking and choosing anything, Cheeze. Minarchist and other libertarians don't get to claim that they're magically exempt from the social contract we're all working from because they don't like it. It applies to all citizens.

Magic had nothing to do with it--they're claiming exemption because you're talking about one generation binding another. I mean, even the descendants of traitors can't have that held against them in the American system--our Constitution prohibits Corruption of the Blood. Your whole theory of a social contract that binds a person's descendants is completely repugnant to that Constitution.

If it truly burns your britches that you have to pay taxes then you have the choice of abandoning your American citizenship and entering into a new social contract with another country or staying here and trying to alter what's in that social contract. However, if you stay, you're agreeing to the terms, which are you get rights in exchange for responsibilities, one of which is paying taxes.

Well okay, but now you're moving the goalposts: you started off talking about "That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract." Now you're talking about something else.

What was truly burning my britches

IMAGE(http://i1036.photobucket.com/albums/a447/cheezepavilion/GWJ%20iCandi/Ignition.jpg)

because frankly, neither my feelings nor my pants are inflamed by this topic--is not the claim that I have to pay taxes, it's that you claimed it on the basis of some kind of Corruption of the Blood social contract theory and are speaking as if there's no Natural Law in the DNA of the American Constitutional tradition.

We were figuring out how to create a system of government from scratch that embodied certain shared principles about life, liberty, property, and more that didn't somehow derive it's power and legitimacy from a monarch. We were the first modern nation to throw off the chains of a king and say we were going to figure out how to govern ourselves all by ourselves and that we would have rights that were guaranteed by the very government they were creating.

That process had nothing to do with contract law and it certainly didn't incorporate a concept in French civil law that didn't even exist until 17 years later with the Napoleonic Code in 1804, that we Americans didn't even make part of our legal system until 1912, and that took until the 1960s to become case law.

Just show me which Constitutional Amendment covers either the Contract of Adhesion or Unconscionability and I'll cede the point to you. If you can't find them then stop claiming that Americans modified our social contract--the Constitution--to include these things.

The same one that covers "You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it." OG, you made an argument to Minarchist about contract law, and now that I've brought in more contract law, you're acting as if you never made that argument to Minarchist in the first place. Before responding to me, I ask you go back and carefully read what you wrote: I think it may have slipped your mind the things you were saying earlier.

There's no Incorporation clause either, so according to you standards for constitutional review the Bill of Rights should not apply against the states. Are you sure you want to make this argument?

When did I make that argument? Please don't put words in my mouth and then try to argue against them.

I did not put words in your mouth, nor did I say you made that argument--please read what I write more carefully. My point is that the logic you are using in this context, if we applied it in the context of Incorporation, that would mean the Bill of Rights would not apply against the states.

You are free to agree that there's no separation of Church and State at the sub-Federal level, but somehow I get the impression you do not want to, so you may want to abandon this line of reasoning.

It's also anyone who takes those words about inalienable rights in the Declaration of Independence seriously, too. Let's not strawman the argument about rights we get unconnected to responsibilities: it's not just some libertarian fringe that thinks that, plenty of straight-up liberals would agree with that too.

What you're really trying to do here without realizing it is pretend liberals like me do not exist, and it's just liberals like you vs. libertarians like Minarchist.

Before you go off the deep end and lets back up about what this conversation has been about: the libertarian idea that taxes are theft. The entire discussion about social contracts and the formation of America has been to show that the government is holding up it's end of the contract by guaranteeing the rights enumerated in the Constitution. Since they're holding up their end, we have to hold up our end. In part, that means paying taxes.

I fail to see how I created a strawman argument by stating that most Americans are generally OK with how things are visa-vi taxes.

You're misstating *why* they are OK with how things are regarding taxes.

As far as you're concerned, I'm not pretending to do anything with you or whatever brand of politics you might subscribe to. You've come across as more libertarian than not in this thread and I've simply attempted to discuss the points you and others raised.

Exactly--you can't see the difference between a libertarian and a liberal who looks back to Locke's ideas on natural law, because you're speaking as if the U.S. only drew on Locke's ideas on the social contract. You're making an argument based on history while retconning out the facts you don't like.

Chairman_Mao wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

See, at the end of the day we Americans like our social programs. That's why there's been great quotes from Tea Party followers like "the government better keep its hands off my Medicare." Because when push comes to shove and we actually have to choose what programs and benefits we want to keep and which we want to get rid of, we tend to say we want want them all...but we don't want to pay for them. That's why we have $13.6 trillion in national debt.

I don't think anyone here is saying this. I feel like Minarchist's original point was simply that it would be nice to have a society with the social values of today toward minorities and other historically disadvantaged groups, but without the belief that the government needs to be the one responsible for taking care of the financially disadvantaged other than protecting their constitutionally granted rights. If I'm wrong please correct me.

I also don't have a clear understanding about why deficit spending is necessary, at least to the degree we are currently engaged in it. Did Reagan's deficit spending lead to some sort of sustainable economic growth? Did Clinton's? Investment in infrastructure, education and all that are important to me, and I put them in my top 5 things the government should fund. I just don't see any evidence that deficit spending has had lasting positive effects on our economy, though I'm fully willing to admit my ignorance on the topic and would like to hear from those who know more about it.

An interesting piece of data I found here:

the 1970s had been a period of stagflation: slow growth along with high unemployment, high interest rates, and high inflation. The economic stimulus provided by President Reagan's tax cut in August, 1981—which scaled back marginal tax rates by 25 percent over three years—clearly set the economy on a growth trajectory.

But it also set the national debt on a growth trajectory. The debt rose from $930 million in 1980 to $2.6 trillion in 1988. Some observers point out that this doesn't matter because after the tax cut, government tax receipts doubled from about $500 billion to $1 trillion from 1980 to 1990, due to the higher income in a growing economy. But whatever the increase in tax receipts, it clearly did not come near to covering the increase in government spending—for which each party blames the other."

The last line is telling, but clearly the relationship between deficits, taxes and economic growth is not a simple one. Seems paradoxical, even.

I am now also curious why deficit spending rose so much under Reagan, but that's for another thread.

What you're referring to in the Infoplease article is pretty much the economic repudiation of the Laffer Curve nonsense. It is simple logic that gross tax receipts would go up after a tax cut, but actual revenue going up was always -- as George H. W. Bush put it -- "Voodoo Economics".

I think, however, that it is important to point out that there is no meaningful distinction between deficit spending and, well, spending. If the nation needs it and it benefits us all in the short or long term, spending is good irrespective of whether it is deficit or deficit neutral. If, for instance, we need to spend a billion dollars to find the cure for a highly contageous form of human zombieism, it really shouldn't matter if it is deficit spending or deficit neutral. We just need to spend it.

If, on the other hand, we end up spending tons of money leaving American body parts in sh1tholes like Iraq because some moron thought we could "drain the swamp" of Muslims, I think we can all agree that that sort of spending isn't getting us any closer to where we want to be as Americans irrespective of how the funds were raised.

Paleocon wrote:

What you're referring to in the Infoplease article is pretty much the economic repudiation of the Laffer Curve nonsense. It is simple logic that gross tax receipts would go up after a tax cut, but actual revenue going up was always -- as George H. W. Bush put it -- "Voodoo Economics".

I think, however, that it is important to point out that there is no meaningful distinction between deficit spending and, well, spending. If the nation needs it and it benefits us all in the short or long term, spending is good irrespective of whether it is deficit or deficit neutral. If, for instance, we need to spend a billion dollars to find the cure for a highly contageous form of human zombieism, it really shouldn't matter if it is deficit spending or deficit neutral. We just need to spend it.

If, on the other hand, we end up spending tons of money leaving American body parts in sh1tholes like Iraq because some moron thought we could "drain the swamp" of Muslims, I think we can all agree that that sort of spending isn't getting us any closer to where we want to be as Americans irrespective of how the funds were raised.

While I agree with the rest of your post, I'd caution on how you approach the bolded piece. If we don't actually have a plan in place to deal with the debt being accrued, we can very quickly dig ourselves a long-term hole to solve short-term problems. A $500B stimulus spending bill that works via infrastructure expansion/modernization, improving education, and other long-term investments is going to have much bigger returns than one that provides short-term jobs that don't actually strengthen the underpinnings of our economy.

Deficit spending, like taking a mortgage or car loan, should be done when the gain experienced is sufficient to counterbalance the long-term cost of paying it off. Taking a loan to buy a bunch of trivial things you don't actually need is not good fiscal policy on a personal or public level.

I'm just going to touch on the "unalienable rights" part of the debate to kill it off. I have no idea what libertarians see as their unalienable rights granted by the US Constitution, but it actually doesn't grant ANY.

The US Declaration of Independence does mention three (3) unalienable rights - Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. However, this is not a document of which law is drawn from.

CheezePavilion wrote:

In other words, when you say to Minarchist "You don't get to tear up the contract because you, personally, don't like it" why can't he give your words of "a social contract is a social and political construct, not a literal contract" so OG, when you bring in this concept of breach (or I guess unilateral rescission, technically) "you're the only one insisting that contract law is somehow related to the American social contract" right back to you?

Since we're down to parsing the word 'contract', let's do a little substitution and see if that clarifies anything. When I say social contract, think social covenant instead. A collective agreement.

Maybe that way you can see that my telling Minarchist that he doesn't get to tear up the social contract because he doesn't like it was rhetorical turn of phrase, not a reference to a literal social contract nor having anything whatsoever to do with contract law.

CheezePavilion wrote:

No, but I'm basing it's legitimacy on a different part of John Locke and 17th century political philosophy than you are.

++++

Granting all that for the sake of argument, what does the fact that China will or will not recognize the U.S. Constitution have to do with a Libertarian in America claiming he doesn't have to pay U.S. taxes?

Where in my example about an American dropped in China did I compare it to a libertarian not paying taxes?

It was to show that there are no such things as universal natural rights. The rights a citizen has depends on the unique social covenant they have with their fellow citizens and their government. So while a transplanted American might think he has an inalienable right to freedom of speech, he really only has that right because it has been specifically defined in the American social covenant. That right really only exists while he's in America because we've all agreed that its a right. Take that individual and drop him into another country and his supposedly inalienable right to freedom of speech may vanish. If he was dropped into China, he wouldn't have the freedom of speech because that's not a right recognized in the Chinese social covenant.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Right, and you said "it's all based on the consent of the governed" not consent of the majority of the governed. Big difference.

Explain how it's such a big difference.

In the case of finalizing the American social covenant with the ratification of the Constitution the framers established what consent meant: 3/4th of the States had to ratify it for it to go into effect. The ground rule everyone agreed to from the beginning was that if nine States said "yes" the Constitution would apply to all 13. From the beginning of our government consent of the governed has meant consent of the majority.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Magic had nothing to do with it--they're claiming exemption because you're talking about one generation binding another. I mean, even the descendants of traitors can't have that held against them in the American system--our Constitution prohibits Corruption of the Blood. Your whole theory of a social contract that binds a person's descendants is completely repugnant to that Constitution.

So you go around speeding and not wearing a seat belt because you personally didn't vote on those laws and, because of that, feel they don't apply to you?

The Constitution--and all the laws created from it--actually requires one generation to bind another. That's pretty much how societies and the rule of law works. Each generation builds off what the previous one did.

What they don't do is insist they need to go back and vote on everything that's happened from the beginning before they will accept anything. Instead, the current generation accepts the laws that older generations consented to and moves forward. If the current generation feels they need to make changes, they make them. Succeeding generations will follow those laws and adjust as they see fit. And so on. And so on.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Well okay, but now you're moving the goalposts: you started off talking about "That means as soon as you're born, you automatically fall under the terms of the existing contract." Now you're talking about something else.

It's really all the same, Cheeze. Every American citizen falls under our social covenant and the Constitution. If someone is upset about some portion of the law that flows from the Constitution their choices are simple: go or stay. If you go, you renounce your citizenship and find a social covenant and associated government better suited to your outlook. If you stay, you don't get to claim exemption. By staying you're actively consenting to established agreement--and all the laws that flow from it.

CheezePavilion wrote:

I did not put words in your mouth, nor did I say you made that argument--please read what I write more carefully. My point is that the logic you are using in this context, if we applied it in the context of Incorporation, that would mean the Bill of Rights would not apply against the states.

You are free to agree that there's no separation of Church and State at the sub-Federal level, but somehow I get the impression you do not want to, so you may want to abandon this line of reasoning.

Please read what you write more carefully because you certainly did try to put words in my mouth and then argue against them.

But since you keep trying to tell me what I think about incorporation, let me set you straight. The Bill of Rights applies to the State because the Supreme Court has ruled it so. It's really that simple.

The Constitution established the judiciary to sort out the issues that arise from the laws the legislation passes. I don't need to follow a particular standard for Constitutional review or use any special logic because I'm not the final arbiter on what laws mean. That's the job of the Supreme Court. Since they've established that the Bill of Rights applies to the States, it applies to the States.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Exactly--you can't see the difference between a libertarian and a liberal who looks back to Locke's ideas on natural law, because you're speaking as if the U.S. only drew on Locke's ideas on the social contract. You're making an argument based on history while retconning out the facts you don't like.

I'm not retconning anything. Much smarter people than you or I have written entire tomes about philosophical, political, social, economic, and religious influences on the Founding Fathers. There's Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Smith, the Enlightenment as a whole, the failures and limitations of the Articles of Confederation, concerns about events of the time like Shay's Rebellion, and much, much more.

Shoal07 wrote:

I'm just going to touch on the "unalienable rights" part of the debate to kill it off. I have no idea what libertarians see as their unalienable rights granted by the US Constitution, but it actually doesn't grant ANY.

The US Declaration of Independence does mention three (3) unalienable rights - Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. However, this is not a document of which law is drawn from.

Not exactly; it might not have the force of law, but as far as law being drawn from it:

But arbitrary selection can never be justified by calling it classification. The equal protection demanded by the fourteenth amendment forbids this. No language is more worthy of frequent and thoughtful consideration than these words of Mr. Justice Matthews, speaking for this court, in Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356, 369 , 6 S. Sup. Ct. 1064, 1071: 'When we consider the nature and the theory of our institutions of government, the principles upon which they are supposed to rest, and review the history of their development, we are constrained to conclude that they do not mean to leave room for the play and action of purely personal and arbitrary power.' The first official action of this nation declared the foundation of government in these words: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, [165 U.S. 150, 160] 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.' While such declaration of principles may not have the force of organic law, or be made the basis of judicial decision as to the limits of right and duty, and while in all cases reference must be had to the organic law of the nation for such limits, yet the latter is but the body and the letter of which the former is the thought and the spirit, and it is always safe to read the letter of the constitution in the spirit of the Declaration of Independence. No duty rests more imperatively upon the courts than the enforcement of those constitutional provisions intended to secure that equality of rights which is the foundation of free government.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bi...

for instance, that phrase "pursuit of happiness" finds its way into the interpretation of the 14th Amendment:

The problem for our determination is whether the statute, as construed and applied, unreasonably infringes the liberty guaranteed to the plaintiff in error by the Fourteenth Amendment. "No State shall . . . deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law."

While this Court has not attempted to define with exactness the liberty thus guaranteed, the term has received much consideration and some of the included things have been definitely stated. Without doubt, it denotes not merely freedom from bodily restraint, but also the right of the individual to contract, to engage in any of the common occupations of life, to acquire useful knowledge, to marry, establish a home and bring up children, to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, and generally to enjoy those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Meyer_...

CheezePavilion wrote:
Shoal07 wrote:

I'm just going to touch on the "unalienable rights" part of the debate to kill it off. I have no idea what libertarians see as their unalienable rights granted by the US Constitution, but it actually doesn't grant ANY.

The US Declaration of Independence does mention three (3) unalienable rights - Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. However, this is not a document of which law is drawn from.

Not exactly; it might not have the force of law, but as far as law being drawn from it:

But arbitrary selection can never be justified by calling it classification. The equal protection demanded by the fourteenth amendment forbids this. No language is more worthy of frequent and thoughtful consideration than these words of Mr. Justice Matthews, speaking for this court, in Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356, 369 , 6 S. Sup. Ct. 1064, 1071: 'When we consider the nature and the theory of our institutions of government, the principles upon which they are supposed to rest, and review the history of their development, we are constrained to conclude that they do not mean to leave room for the play and action of purely personal and arbitrary power.' The first official action of this nation declared the foundation of government in these words: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, [165 U.S. 150, 160] 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.' While such declaration of principles may not have the force of organic law, or be made the basis of judicial decision as to the limits of right and duty, and while in all cases reference must be had to the organic law of the nation for such limits, yet the latter is but the body and the letter of which the former is the thought and the spirit, and it is always safe to read the letter of the constitution in the spirit of the Declaration of Independence. No duty rests more imperatively upon the courts than the enforcement of those constitutional provisions intended to secure that equality of rights which is the foundation of free government.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bi...

for instance, that phrase "pursuit of happiness" finds its way into the interpretation of the 14th Amendment:

The problem for our determination is whether the statute, as construed and applied, unreasonably infringes the liberty guaranteed to the plaintiff in error by the Fourteenth Amendment. "No State shall . . . deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law."

While this Court has not attempted to define with exactness the liberty thus guaranteed, the term has received much consideration and some of the included things have been definitely stated. Without doubt, it denotes not merely freedom from bodily restraint, but also the right of the individual to contract, to engage in any of the common occupations of life, to acquire useful knowledge, to marry, establish a home and bring up children, to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, and generally to enjoy those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Meyer_...

No, it is exactly. You're essentially agreeing with me, and expanding in a way I considering mentioning but decided not to, for the sake of brevity. The Declaration of Independence is not a law. Has it been used as a framework document to make law? Sure. But so has the Magna Carta and the Code of Hammurabi, both of which are core foundations of the US Code of Law (along with the English system employing sheriffs and magistrates). The US Constitution is Law (primarily the Amendments, but distinctions are academic) and it does not grant you any unalienable rights.

These are not discussion areas, but well accepted fact by anyone educated in Criminal Justice or Law. Even if you want to discuss your three unalienable rights granted by the US Declaration of Independence (which, as I have shown, is a useless one), they are only the rights to ideals: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. None of which are specifically denied by the existing tax structure, social contract, or US (Federal) Code of Law. You may feel something in existence infringes on these unalienable rights, but nothing outright denies them, nor does anything actually grant you these rights in the first place (outside of the idea of these "truths"). The ideas of the Declaration have been followed and upheld in most US laws, it's how we framed everything, so it's pretty hard to say they're being denied.

Shoal07 wrote:

No, it is exactly. You're essentially agreeing with me, and expanding in a way I considering mentioning but decided not to, for the sake of brevity.

Well hey, if we essentially agree I'm not going to argue with you over semantics or something. I just thought brevity might be misleading here.

None of which are specifically denied by the existing tax structure, social contract, or US (Federal) Code of Law. You may feel something in existence infringes on these unalienable rights, but nothing outright denies them, nor does anything actually grant you these rights in the first place (outside of the idea of these "truths"). The ideas of the Declaration have been followed and upheld in most US laws, it's how we framed everything, so it's pretty hard to say they're being denied.

Oh, no, I'm not making that argument. OG stated "our social contract, which is essentially the ideas embodied in the Declaration of Independence and rights embodied in the Constitution and Bill of Rights" and I was arguing about how to understand the 'terms' of that 'contract.' I mistook his rhetorical turn of phrase for a reference to a literal social contract (or at least one literal enough that his mentioning of it wasn't just an appeal to emotion).