This is no place

Lessons (and losses) in Liberty this Election

There are more important outcomes this election season than who won the presidency. Don't get me wrong, I certainly recognize the historical significance of the first black president. I also realize it is a criticism of government that it has taken so long for an African American to ascend to the "highest office in the land". The federal government is way behind private enterprise in this regard, just look and the diversity among the executive leadership of corporate America.

Perhaps more importantly than who won the horse race for Constitution-breaker-in-Chief is the ideology of the average American voter. For that, we need to look at the questions that weren't on the ballot. We're talking exit polls.

According to most analysis, despite the obvious partisan shift in this years indecision, there was no major ideological shift. According to Breitbart:

This year 22 percent called themselves liberal, compared with 21 percent in 2004; 44 percent moderate, compared with 45 percent; and 34 percent conservative, same as four years ago. Since at least 1992, liberals consistently have comprised 20 percent to 22 percent of the electorate, while the conservative and moderate numbers have been a little more volatile.

This comes as no surprise. More surprising, and more troubling to those in the liberty caucus, should be a subtle shift in the electorates opinion of the role of government. Again from Breitbart:

51 percent said government should do more to solve problems, the first time even a narrow majority said so since exit pollsters started asking the question in 1994. In a likely reaction to the global financial shock this fall, only 43 percent said government is doing too many things better left to businesses and individuals, down from 49 percent in 2004 and a high of 56 percent during the 1994 midterm elections.

This data appears to indicate that the mass of the American electorate believes the political position that government deregulation and laissez-faire have brought economic disaster to the country in the form of the recent financial "crisis". It seems that the Austrian message that Fed Manipulation, easy credit, and malinvestment are to blame is not getting through to the voting hordes. Is it any wonder? Nevermind the regulatory disaster that is the Sarbannes-Oxley act created a new sector of the accounting industry in response to the Enron and WorldCom fiascos. Americans quickly forget. Despite the failure of the Enron collapse to have much effect on the energy industry, Americans have been swayed by political posturing that the failure of even one large financial institution could cause "systemic risk" to the whole of the American economy. The people have bought in to the idea that only the government, in its infinite wisdom, can solve our economic woes. Despite some of the worst ever approval ratings of Congress and the White House, Americans think government should be more involved in the day to day affairs of the American people. This is truly cause for any limited government libertarian to concern.

Obviously, we have work to do.

But it gets worse.

Ariana Huffington writes on the Huffington Post that the second biggest winner this election is democracy. Ms. Huffington writes:

Based on initial numbers, it looks like over 133 million people turned out to vote on Tuesday -- 11 million more than voted in 2004 - producing the highest turnout rate in 44 years (62.5 percent). By way of comparison, the turnout rate in 1996 was just over 49 percent (that's right, less than half of those eligible to vote bothered to show up).

It turns out the perceived huge voter turnout didn't happen.

As a percentage of elligible voters, voting increases were up only a tenth of one percent over 2004.

Despite this, I tend to agree with Ariana Huffington that this election was a victory for democracy. Since the United States was founded as a Constitutional Republic rather than a democracy, I don't view this as a good thing. As is oft repeated, a democracy is little more than mob rule, ie: subjugation of the minority opinion to the will of a dominate majority. Majority rule is antipathy to liberty in all its forms.

Perhaps the most publicized democratic victory of a tyranical majority was the passage of Proposition 8, banning gay marriage in California. Black voters voted overwhelmingly, 70-30, in favor of banning gay marriage in the state. This type of ballot initiative is just the type of threat to liberty that enligtenment writers knew democracy democracy would bring on minority groups.

The first amendment of to the US Constitution states:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"

While I am in agreement with the "religious right" that marriage is a sacred (read religious) institution, I stand in stark disagreement to their notion that the sanctity of marriage needs to be protected by legislation or constitutional amendments.

As a religious sacrament, or institution, marriage cannot be legislated by Congress under the first amendment. The government has no more business taxing or providing tax incentives for married couples than it does supporting or opposing gay marriage. Many people say gay marriage should be left up to the states. I say it should be left up to the churches, mosques and synagogues. Whatever a particular religion decides is their definition of marriage is the definition of marriage for all people married under the authority of that religion. Those definitions should, no must, be respected as marriage. If a gay couple is a member of a church that is willing to bless their union with religious sacrament, that is an inherent right in their freedom of religion. Get politics out of religion, and marriage, altogether.

Others argue that government must be involved in marraige to a certain degree because of its role in enforcing contracts. The marital contract is enforced by courts in the event of the disolution of marriage, that is, divorce. I do not see this as at supporting the argument for state or federal governments to define marriage. On the contrary, if unmarried couples do not get the benefit of the court system do decide divestiture of assets post separation, why is court involvement necessary in the event that a married couple separates. If such government involvement is necessary, isn't there an argument to be made that two women or two men who separate after a long term relationship and cohabitation ought to be afforded the same benefit of legal arbitration?

One silver lining in the results of this election for proponents of individual liberty is the result of overwhelming support for ballot initiatives encouraging sensible drug policy. Michigan passed medical marijuana while Massachusetts effectively decriminalized possession of small amounts (less than an ounce) of pot. Several other states and localities passed measures expanding access to medical marijuana or protecting patients.

That the overwhelming success of these ballot measures (passage by more than 2 to 1) indicates a positive trend in mainstream thinking about drug policy cannot be denied. It seems Americans are waking up to the failures of the drug war: ridiculous amounts of money spent to prosecute and imprison drug offenders who only hurt themselves, violent action against erroneously identified innocents, no effective decrease in access to illegal drugs, etc. While this is a positive trend, the fact that these reforms had to be passed through ballot initiatives is disturbing. It is past time for politicians to recognize the failure, lack of necessity, and unconstitutionality of the drug war. Despite the apparent softening of stances against drugs around the country, there is little call for wholesale decriminalization of all illegal drugs, or abolition of the FDA. If the FDA approval process results in blanket immunity for pharmaceutical companies that produce dangerous drugs, maybe Americans will finally wake up to the dangers of federal control of the chemical substances individuals choose to put in their bodies.

While the reform of softening drug laws around the country is seen as a victory to some in the cause of liberty, I see little to celebrate. Perhaps the greatest lesson of this election cycle is that there is still a lot of educating to do. Libertarians need to reinforce to all willing to listen that government intervention in our lives is rarely beneficial, and frequently harmful. If we are to preserve the individual freedoms enshrined in the American Constitution and Bill of Rights, the percentage of Americans who think the government does too much must rise, and the numbers of those who think it does too little must reverse and shrink exponentially.