For a New Liberty CTIR Literature Series 1Part 2Chapter 3

The State

The State as the Aggressor

•The supreme and best organized aggressor against the persons and property of the mass of the public.

Taxation

•Every person or group receives its income by voluntary payment.

•Exception for government.▫ONLY government obtains its income by

coercion and violence. Direct threat of confiscation or

imprisonment. ▫ONLY government can use its funds to

commit violence against others.

Who Protects Us From the State? • The Constitution?

▫ Must be interpreted by men.

▫ Those men are employed by the State.

Are We Not the Government?

•If “we” are the government, then anything a government does is voluntary. ▫If so, then the Jews murdered by the Nazi

government were NOT murdered. They were the government.

•Even if 90% of the people still decided to murder the other 10%, it’s still murder.

State Will Become an Oligarchy

•Rule by a coercive elite which has managed to gain control of the State.

•Why?▫Inequality and division of labor inherent in

the nature of man; and▫The nature of the State.

Who Makes Up this Elite? • The full-time apparatus.

▫ i.e. kings, politicians, and bureaucrats who man and operate the State.

• The groups who have maneuvered to gain privileges and benefits from the State.

The State and the Intellectuals

•The mechanism for how the compliance and acquiescence of the mass is secured. ▫The masses follow passively the ideas of

the intellectuals. •But why?

▫Quid pro quo. The intellectual are granted, by the State,

power, status, and material security. Needed to plan the economy and society.

The State and the Intellectuals (cont.)•But how?

▫Tradition and habit. Provides legitimacy of the rule under which

people live. ▫Deprecate the individual.

Exalt the society instead. Any new idea must begin as a minority

opinion. ▫Make its rule seem inevitable.

There is nothing anyone can do about it.

The State and the Intellectuals (cont.)•But how?

▫Fear. Man’s natural love of homeland.

Identification of that land is a means of making natural patriotism work. ▫Us VS Them.

▫Guilt. Any increase in private well being = greed. Mutually beneficial exchanges = selfish.

The Use of Scientific Jargon

•Permits intellectuals to create excuses for the State. ▫Example – the multiplier effect.

A thief would NOT be allowed to justify his theft by saying he was helping his victims by his spending.

BUT the government is allowed.

The Libertarian Creed

•The absolute right of every man to the ownership of his own body;

•The absolute right to own and control the material resources man has found and transformed; and

•The absolute right to exchange or give away the ownership to such titles.

Themes

•State as the biggest aggressor.•Constitution defined by the State. •Intellectuals used to further the State.

Thank you!

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