FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED AUG. 4, 1999
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
Is 'reducing taxes' enough?
Regular e-mail correspondent C.W.S. forwards a letter to the editor of the Vigo Examiner:
"I believe the U.S. Taxpayers Party is more in line with the principles of the founding fathers than the Libertarian party. There is a very vast difference between their platforms. I believe the Libertarian Party although better than the Republicrats has too much baggage with their open border philosophy. -- J.C."
C.W.S. then asks: "Interesting criticism. Valid?"
Although I hold no official portfolio to defend the Libertarian Party, and have even been known to respectfully differ with its officers on occasion, I replied:
# # #
I don't know that this (start ital)is(end ital) a "criticism," really.
The Founding Fathers obviously endorsed some forms of taxation. While most Libertarians would probably acknowledge that in the foreseeable future we are unlikely to succeed in getting rid of all taxation, Libertarians do hold all taxation is morally wrong, as an impermissible seizure of property from the unwilling.
Therefore, the apparent willingness of the "Taxpayers Party" to simply settle for "lower" taxes, or "simpler" taxes -- instead of calling for the elimination of (start ital)all(end ital) involuntary taxation in the long run -- probably is closer to the position held by the Founding Fathers.
Libertarians simply respond that while the Founding Fathers did awfully well compared to any other system of government realized in the 18th century, they didn't get it quite right. Once you allow that some taxation is moral and proper (as opposed to voluntary fees -- like bridge tolls), how do you set an arbitrary limit on how much taxation is OK?
The founders thought they had this covered with their ban on a "direct" tax -- and the federal courts have actually held this provision may not have been overturned by the supposed ratification of the "income tax" amendment in 1913. But regardless of that, the tax looters will never agree, "OK, 31 percent taxation is OK, but if we ever tax you at 34 percent, then it's OK for you to come shoot us and take it all back."
Obviously, no such inviolable limit will be set, other than "just a smidgen less than what leads to economic collapse, starvation and violent revolution" -- a limit that Washington City, like all previous nests of tyrants, now eagerly attempts to approach as closely as possible.
On this issue, the "pragmatism" of the founding fathers, depending on a "system of checks and balances" to cripple any attempt by the central government to impose huge levies, worked fairly well for either 75 or 125 years (depending on whether you date the beginning of the collapse from 1861 or 1912), but has since failed -- as they warned it could -- by a failure to cherish and jealously guard the reality (rather than the mere cosmetic appearance) of a pluralistic, decentralized form of government -- one of limited powers, sharply delineated.
But when it comes to other currently crucial issues, I suspect the original letter writer is just plain wrong.
I bear no ill will toward the "U.S. Taxpayers Party" -- if they want to fight for lower taxes, that's certainly better than fighting for higher taxes. But I haven't heard the "U.S. Taxpayers Party" call for an end to the war on drugs and guns -- for the complete re-legalization of the possession of machine guns and cocaine and opium, without any government regulation, "permitting," licensing, taxation, or other controls.
I believe I stand on solid ground when I say the Founders intended these to be individual rights protected by the Second, Ninth, and 10th Amendments. (The 19th century Supreme Court threw out attempt after attempt to impose a federal income tax or to federally limit the trade in alcohol, opium, or firearms, until a Constitutional Amendment was undertaken to solve the first "problem," and the loophole of being able to "regulate whatever it taxes" was discovered to enable a cynical and disingenuous end run around the second and third "problems.")
The Founders would be appalled at all the (start ital)other(end ital) liberties which have been trod underfoot in the pursuit of these absurd and tyrannical prohibitions on medical freedom and the right to keep and bear arms -- doors being broken down in the middle of the night; babies being incinerated and mothers shot dead in their kitchens; asset seizures without due process; "conspiracy" prosecutions of those who have harmed no one based merely on what they have said or read or written or possessed. Only the Libertarians, so far as I know, are willing to risk public opprobrium by pointing this out and demanding radical change.
The various other "less government" parties, being captive to varying degrees of factions of the religious right which see plenty of room for government power to help them stamp out various "immoral" behaviors (from abortion to sodomy to pornography to shooting dope to "taking God out of the classroom") fall pitifully silent when called upon to join in the call to eliminate the BATF, the DEA, the FDA, the FBI, and the federal Department of Education, along with virtually every law, code, ordinance, tax, and regulation they currently enforce.
"Well, we have no objection to a (start ital)sensible(end ital) level of subsidy and regulation," they will generally whimper and grovel.
If shifting the argument to "the encouragement of sodomy" doesn't work, many of these folks will next try to focus on the alleged risk of a truly free market allowing hordes of small brown "foreigners" to swarm America's resources.
But the objection to "excessive" immigration is generally that the newcomers might become leeches on the welfare state, while also cracking the Washington-enforced political protection rackets of various powerful unions and other professional guilds. But most Libertarians agree open immigration would come only after the complete and sudden elimination of the welfare state, eliminating objection No. 1.
Will the "Taxpayers Party" join us in calling for the total and instant elimination of the welfare state, including corporate welfare?
As for "protecting American jobs," not only does protectionism never work for long, it helped throw the whole world into depression when this nation adopted the Smoot-Hawley tariffs in 1931. And an earlier reliance on "protection from outside influences" resulted in Japan finding herself a technologically backward third world country, subject to the whims of greater powers, when Commodore Perry finally arrived there with his gunboats in the mid-19th century. (Her subsequent headlong race to regain major-power status showed amazing progress by 1905, but had its own, horrific end result by 1945.)
Are those the models we want to emulate -- or will the Taxpayers Party join with the patriotic Libertarians in asserting the American worker can succeed and triumph in any open, world-wide competition, even with the same kind of open borders between nations, which made us a free and wealthy nation when we adopted them between the 50 states?
I'm perfectly willing to make a temporary, "pragmatic" alliance with such folks when we find we share a goal on some specific issue. But we should not delude ourselves that most of these folks are "Libertarians and just don't know it." In fact, even if it is from ignorance, they tend to embrace most of the tyrannical excesses of our current government, only wishing these ongoing police-state excesses could be accomplished a) more cheaply and efficiently overall, or b) with funds extracted from someone other than them.
Personally, this is not a rallying cry to the banner of freedom that sends shivers down MY spine.
Vin Suprynowicz, assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, is author of the new book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998," available via web site http://www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html, or at 1-800-244-2224.
***
Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com
"The evils of tyranny are rarely seen but by him who resists it." -- John Hay, 1872
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken
* * *
------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you have subscribed to vinsends@ezlink.com and you wish to unsubscribe, send a message to vinsends-request@ezlink.com, from your OLD address, including the word "unsubscribe" (with no quotation marks) in the "Subject" line.To subscribe, send a message to vinsends-request@ezlink.com, from your NEW address, including the word "subscribe" (with no quotation marks) in the "Subject" line.
All I ask of electronic subscribers is that they not RE-forward my columns until on or after the embargo date which appears at the top of each, and that (should they then choose to do so) they copy the columns in their entirety, preserving the original attribution.
The Vinsends list is maintained by Alan Wendt in Colorado, who may be reached directly at alan@ezlink.com. The web sites for the Suprynowicz column are at http://www.infomagic.com/liberty/vinyard.htm, and http://www.nguworld.com/vindex. The Vinyard is maintained by Michael Voth in Flagstaff, who may be reached directly at mvoth@infomagic.com.