Libertarianism IS Ineffective

Or, at least it can be. Here's one argument I've heard several times in opposition to a libertarian philosophy. If the libertarian suggests that government must respect the same individual rights that the common citizen must respect by not taxing, not enslaving, not takning property by force without contract or some voluntary surrender of right, the recipient of this suggestion will often reply something like the following:

"That's a very nice dream, but it's horribly naive. You need to have national defense, local security, courts, education...the list goes on, and you'll never accomplish these things without taxes. We live in a fallen world, and an effective, successful government simply has to use some level of coercion to do good things."

This argument can be right, and it can be wrong. This depends, of course, on two things. First, it assumes that there are things that can only be done through coercion, or can be done best through coercion. This flies in the face of what we see demonstrated every day; almost all of the great successes you see in the business world were accomplished without the use of coercion. However, let's assume for a moment that this first assumption is true; that you can't, for instance, have good medical care without coercive government involvement.

The next assumption that this argument makes is that we should use a material standard to determine what constitutes effective, successful government. This is currently a very popular assumption, so I don't blame anyone for holding it. Should we, though? Which is your top priority; material comfort, or the protection of individual rights?

Jeremy Bentham advocated a material standard of evaluation in Principles of Morals and Legislation. According to Bentham, an action is "right"

when the tendency it has to augment the happiness of the community (utility) is greater than any it has to diminish it.

As a result, according to Bentham, government should follow whatever course of action maximizes utility.

Jefferson, on the other hand, used the word "right" differently in the Declaration of Independence. He said that a right is inalienable and endowed by God. He held that, instead of finding right in the greatest material good, governments exist to secure these pre-existing rights.

Bentham would consider a government successful if it made decisions that resulted in the greatest happiness, even if it that meant trespassing upon what Jefferson would have considered an individual's God-given rights. Since Jefferson said a government exists to secure rights, I assume he would consider a government successful if it did just that.

Let's assume, for the sake of discussion, that taxation violates the right to property. Let's also keep assuming that there are some situations where the greater happiness (utility) is served by taxation.

In this case, application of a "Benthamite" standard would mean that a taxing government was successful; it had resulted in more happiness. Application of a "Jeffersonian" standard would mean that the same government was unsuccessful; it had violated individual rights.

So if you're looking for a government that provides all sorts of material benefits, like education, health care, etc. even at the expense of individual rights, or if you don't believe individual rights exist at all, then sure, libertarianism is impractical.

If, however, you believe in the existence of rights endowed by a creator, and that those rights should subsequently be held sacred by even a government, then it's one of the most practical systems in existence.

I'm pretty sure this is what Franklin was talking about when he said "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."