By Daniel Leven
Spring 2008
As I am writing this article, I ask myself: Do I really know what a libertarian is? Does anyone really? The only people I know who are willing to clearly state what makes someone a libertarian, are people who only would want to do so to distance themselves from the movement. The libertarians I know, including myself, tend to get squeamish if someone asks them what makes them a libertarian. The one thing they will say: a firm belief in freedom.
Henry Ward Beecher once opined: “Liberty is the soul’s right to breathe, and when it cannot take a long breath, laws are girdled too tight.” The libertarian believes firmly that freedom is at the heart of human rights. Liberty is the seminal prerogative of man; without it no other rights can exist. Out of respect for liberty—man’s most basic birthright—the libertarian places freedom at the root of his or her name, at the base of his or her ideas.
From this basic love of freedom, stems a firm belief in the virtues of individualism. Typically, a libertarian has a deep respect for an individual’s rights and beliefs. The general sentiment is, to borrow from Voltaire, “I do not agree with a word you say, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it.” The libertarian sees a deep value in anything an individual rationally decides to do with his/her time. From this respect for individualism, also comes an inherent distrust in collectivism.
Within this anti-collectivism lies the problem; not just for defining the rest of a libertarian system of thought, but also with having a libertarian club or party. The act of joining, of submitting an individual’s name and goals to an organization, is inherently suspect to the libertarian. Thus, to comment further on what a libertarian is would require me to claim some authority, however small, on what other libertarians believe. So, I cannot, in good conscience, go on to definitively state what the rest of my club believes. But, I will try to generalize (that is, please read the following as if “generally” was tacked on at the beginning of every sentence).
In terms of government, “limited” is the new stand-by word. While the movement might have had its start in anarchism, the general feeling of the American libertarianism is that a strict constitutional government is the best kind of government. As a brief reminder, the government called for in the Constitution is one where the federal government lacks the power to tax income, let alone the power to censor what everyone watches (I am talking to you, Federal Communications Commission).
Economically, the libertarian is generally a capitalist. Due to the love of freedom, most libertarians believe in a free market, where both businesses and consumers have the liberty to buy or sell whatever they would like.
The social beliefs of a libertarian literally run the gamut. The most liberal stance is one where the only laws on the book are laws which prevent physical hurt. The most conservative stance would be indistinguishable from the rightest of the Christian Right.
However, I would like to emphasize once and for all that the typical views of a libertarian are moderate, just like the typical American. To summarize our politics, using basic American labels: the average liberal believes in social freedom and economic control, whereas the average conservative believes in economic freedom and social control. The average libertarian believes in both social freedom and economic freedom. I hope this clarifies why the articles within are so diverse. As an editor, I should demand for you to read the articles contained in this paper, but I wouldn’t want to take that freedom away from you.
Daniel Leven is the Vice-President of the Rutgers Libertarians. He is a School of Arts and Sciences Junior, majoring in Mathematics.
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I don't know who said it, but I recall reading this definition of a libertarian. Paraphrasing, it goes like this: A libertarian is more liberal than a liberal on matters of personal liberty and more conservative than a conservative on matters of economic liberty.
ReplyDeleteI think that matches what you wrote if you equate the word "social," the word you used in your post, with "personal."
I also think it's worth noting that a "liberal" and a "leftist" are not the same thing. Today's leftists are "statists" and fascists, not liberals in the classical sense of the word.