Reclaiming our radicalism

Christians search scripture routinely for wisdom on moral and ethical issues. We freedom-lovers should likewise spend more time searching the writings of our heroic predecessors for insight on challenges that now plague us.

While the so-called Libertarian Party descends further into cowardice and “big tent” Neolibertarians raise their hawkish heads, Lew Rockwell’s unearthed and reprinted a timely and indispensable essay by Murray Rothbard titled “Do You Hate the State?” First published three decades ago, Rothbard’s piece identifies the “crucial dividing line” that split libertarianism in 1977 and still does so today. That division, Murray wrote, isn’t anarcho-capitalism vs. limited government, abolitionism vs. gradualism, natural rights vs. utilitarianism, or war vs. peace. The “nub of the issue,” as he called it, is radical vs. conservative. And there’s no question which side of that line Murray fell on.

The conservative libertarian, Murray explained, is convinced intellectually that among the entire spectrum of political alternatives, free markets and smaller government are superior. But he lacks “any passionate hatred of the State” or “any sense that the State is a plundering and bestial enemy.”

On the other hand, the radical libertarian, whether anarchist or limited-government classical liberal, “hates the existing American State or the State per se, hates it deep in his belly as a predatory gang of robbers, enslavers, and murderers.” He is radical “in the sense of being in total, root-and-branch opposition to the existing political system and to the State itself. Radical in the sense of having integrated intellectual opposition to the State with a gut hatred of its pervasive and organized system of crime and injustice. Radical in the sense of a deep commitment to the spirit of liberty and anti-statism that integrates reason and emotion, heart and soul.”

Added Murray:

“...the radical libertarian ... refuses to think in such terms as a Four Year Plan for some sort of stately and measured procedure for reducing the State. The radical — whether he be anarchist or laissez-faire — cannot think in such terms as, e.g.: Well, the first year, we’ll cut the income tax by 2%, abolish the ICC, and cut the minimum wage; the second year we’ll abolish the minimum wage, cut the income tax by another 2%, and reduce welfare payments by 3%, etc. The radical cannot think in such terms, because the radical regards the State as our mortal enemy, which must be hacked away at wherever and whenever we can. To the radical libertarian, we must take any and every opportunity to chop away at the State, whether it’s to reduce or abolish a tax, a budget appropriation, or a regulatory power. And the radical libertarian is insatiable in this appetite until the State has been abolished, or — for minarchists — dwindled down to a tiny, laissez-faire role.”

So here’s where I see the line drawn in today’s libertarian movement:

Conservatives — the Libertarian Party, the recent Neolibertarian splinter (it hasn’t yet distinguished itself as a movement), Reason and Liberty magazines, Laissez-Faire Books (to a large degree), and “libertarian” Bush sympathizers like talk radio’s Neal Boortz and CNBC’s Dennis Miller.

Radicals — The Mises Institute, LewRockwell.com, "Rob" and Strike-The-Root.com, the Antiwar.com coalition, the Movement of the Libertarian Left, and a growing number of writers and bloggers like B.K. Marcus, Claire Wolfe, Wendy McElroy, Tom Knapp, Karen De Coster, Anthony Gregory, and Roderick T. Long.

As Murray said, “Lord, give us radicals, be they anarchists or no.”