conservatism

We don't pay much attention.  Whether we ever did, I really can't say, but there are many trends in the political arena today that works against the interests of the vast majority of Americans.  The alliance of economic conservatism and social conservatism strikes me as one such trend.  I can understand both, and there may even be some legitimacy to the arguments advanced on behalf of economic conservatism and social conservatism, but there seems to be a deep cynicism in the republican party, one whose true interests lie in economic conservatism, the fundamental principles of which benefit only the wealthiest of individuals, not in social conservatism, which has a broader appeal and serves as a cover for the former.  The intersections between the two are uneasy at best.  The cry against big government in the economic sphere is carried over into the social sphere, but only when it suits a particular argument -- the use of tax subsidies to fund elective abortions or contraception when all that is needed is an aspirin locked tightly between the knees.  Of course social conservatives want to ban abortion, and a certain segment want to ban contraception.  They want big government to regulate our sexual behavior, usually to the disadvantage of women, but not our economic behavior.  Of course, within a wholly free market, often thought of as a holy free market, big government must intrude on our boudoirs, else the market for child pornography, say, get out of hand.

We don't pay much attention, and we lack a sense of irony, probably because we are poorly educated in the humanities.  I wanted to write an essay entitled "A Modest Proposal," where the poverty across the globe, to include the poverty in our country could be solved through a free market solution -- just offer up the children of the poor to the sex trade.  The use of abortion and contraceptions would go down, the children would likely be quickly used up and their life expectancies short so they would not be a continuous burden, and the needs of those who could afford it would be satisfied.  I didn't write the essay because, frankly, too many would take me seriously and would miss the point.  Liberty and morality are fundamentally linked and just as fundamentally opposed.  We are moral creatures because we can choose between moral and immoral actions, but to choose morality, whether individually or socially, is to choose a restriction on our liberty.  Though it happens, the idea of selling children into the sex trade is so deeply repugnant to most that we feel, regardless of individual predilections, it should be banned.  Though I don't share their repugnance, I get the idea that homosexuality might be so repugnant to some that they feel, regardless of individual predilection, it should be banned.  Social conservatism has its place in the free market of ideas.  They can argue their position, and if their arguments are persuasive enough, one can imagine moral regulation that enforces their position, an infringement on liberty that insures we are not only moral individuals but a moral society as well.

I should point out that, to my way of thinking, there are differences between the market place of ideas and the free market per se.  The language of one crosses over into the language of the other, and we talk about things like "buy in" to an idea as if it were popular commodity, and then too rights to "intellectual property" can be protected and commodified facilitating their trade within the market place, but there remain a fundamental differences that are recognizable even if fraught with difficulties.  It is one thing for me to make a "Modest Proposal," quite another to realize the elements of that proposal within the market place, and we can allow for the much greater liberty in the market place of ideas than the market place per se, in part because great latitude in the former is a necessary (if not wholly sufficient) condition for the moral regulation of the latter.  I say this because "moral regulation" emerges within a social consensus and a social consensus emerges within the market place of ideas.  Even if one believes, fundamentally, that morality is tied to the revealed word of god, or his emissaries, it remains that there must be a genuine social consensus around the validity of the revelation.

I distract myself a bit, because I really wanted to talk about the nature of American conservatism, particularly the relation between economic conservatism and social conservatism, which in many respects hasn't changed much since Andrew Carnegie wrote "Wealth" for the North American Review.  In it, he wrote, "the problem of our age is the proper administration of wealth," and if we are not so much concerned that "the ties of brotherhood may still bind together the rich and poor in harmonious relationship," we perhaps should be.  Carnegie, of course, was quite willing to accept great disparities in wealth, and he justified that disparity on free market principles.  As he put it, "much better this great irregularity than universal squalor," in part because the great advances, the "highest and best in literature and the arts," as well as "all the refinements of civilization,"as he saw it, were contingent upon this great irregularity.  At the core of the justification was an argument around liberty, and "the law of competition."  There must be, again as he saw it, "great scope for the exercise of special ability in the merchant and in the manufacturer who has to conduct affairs upon a great scale," in part because "this talent for organization and management is rare among men," and the possession of those rare talents "invariable secures for its possessor enormous rewards."  Great scope, or great liberty must be allowed for "the law of competition" to have it salutary effect in the provision of "our wonderful material development, which brings improved conditions in its train."

This is essentially the argument that economic conservatism advances today.  We should reduce, even eliminate, anything that would limit the "great scope" or the great liberty of those captains of industry.  Although there are great disparities in the wealth, and those disparities are likely to continue, nevertheless through the law of competition and the refinements it brings, the condition of all has improved, and today "the poor enjoy what the rich could not before afford."   There is, of course, a certain truth to this argument, and the grand 20th century experiments with controlled markets proved to be wholly disastrous for all concerned.  Carnegie may have been prescient in suggesting that no substitutes for the law of competition have been found, and in lieu of effective substitutes for the law of competition, that same law is "best for the race, because it insures the survival of the fittest in every department."  It perhaps bears pointing out that his law of competition is social darwinism writ large, and self-justifying -- those who are at the top of the heap are inherently superior to those at the bottom of the heap, and their position at the top of the heap is sufficient proof of the same -- those who are in control of the resources are inherently those best capable of controlling the resources, and their being in a position to control the resources is sufficient proof of the same -- et cetera.  It perhaps bears pointing out as well that social darwinism is inherently anti-democratic.  One must be attentive to note that the law of competition prevails, not among the masses, but only among the fittest.  The masses have already been subjugated, and "we accept and welcome, as conditions to which we must accommodate ourselves, great inequality of environment, the concentration of business, industrial and commercial, in the hands of a few, and the law of competition between these, as being not only beneficial, but essential for the future progress of the race."

As most would recognize, Carnegie's argument, and the argument of economic conservatism generally, is one of utilitarian resignation, not a moral argument.  I don't need to point out that great wealth can be accumulated by means not altogether moral or ethical, and being at the top of the economic heap, being among the "fittest," says nothing whatsoever about one's moral probity either for good or for ill, though there are religious arguments that might suggest otherwise, that those attributes rendering one "fittest" in the economic sphere might well render one least fit for the moral sphere, it being easier, after all, for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, and the like.  We do, however, defer to power, and with wealth comes power and the deference it demands, but we should not mistake the deference it demands with the reverence it desires.  We say things like, "the ends do not justify the means," in part to capture this distinction.  While the "future progress of the race" may well be a desirable end, even the material progress of the race, no one should have complete latitude in the means of effectuating that progress, and great scope is not complete scope, great liberty is not complete liberty to do as one damn well pleases.  Even though there may be a well developed demand, even though the satisfaction of that demand may be highly remunerative and may ease the squalor of the poor, we nevertheless do not not allow the consumption of children, whether at table or in the boudoir, and we do not allow it because it is morally repugnant.            

Economic conservatism, then, needs social conservatism to keep it in line, to define the moral limitations on its necessary and its social darwinist conception of liberty.  The difficulty of course is this:  social conservatism too is anti-democratic.  Consider, for example, the on-going malaise surrounding contraception and abortion.  On the one side is the argument to liberty -- that women should be free to engage in sexual activity, and should that activity result in a unwanted pregnancy, they should be free to terminate that pregnancy.  Even those who support abortion typically have moral limitations on that liberty -- at what point, for example, does a fetus become "viable" or "human," and its termination a matter of infanticide?  That is not so much a scientific as a moral question, and different societies have come to differing social consensus around that question, but the idea of a developing social consensus is anathema to the social conservative position, in part because they see the social consensus going in the wrong direction.  Indeed, it is the developing social consensus that must be arrested.  Contraception, at least contraception outside of wedlock, is fraught because it does allow women a greater liberty to engage in sexual activity for the sheer pleasure of it without consideration of the natural consequence of that activity.  Abortion is fraught at any number of levels, but at least in part because pregnancy and birth is the comeuppance for the sense of disobedience and lost innocence associated with sexual pleasure -- I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children.  There are different arguments to advance here, and I needn't enumerate them all, but there does seem to be a social consensus around contraception (there being a strong market for contraception even among Catholic women) and the social consensus around abortion is "under construction" (there being a question whether a market for abortion itself should even be permitted).

I am suggesting, of course, that social conservatism is always a reaction to a social consensus that is developing, or so it is perceived, in the wrong direction.  It is one thing to say, I am aghast, quite another to say, I am in power, and the social conservative in power will use those means necessary to repress the developing social consensus -- to repress, in short, the democratic impulse, particularly the free speech rights that fuel the developing consensus.  If we consider, for example, the Texas approach to text books, you have some sense of how those free speech rights might be abridged, particularly when you consider that paternalism knows no boundaries.  The connect between economic conservatism and social conservation is not in the mutual respect for liberty, but in the anti-democratic impulse.  At its most benign it is the far-reaching paternalism of the sort that Carnegie endorses on what might be called platonic grounds -- that the best, those merchants and manufacturers that have acquired great fortune, should rule because they have demonstrated a rare "talent for organization and management," on the one side, and on the other, the possession of wealth is the possession of the "highest and best in literature and the arts" and "all the refinements of civilization."  The acquisition and  disposal of wealth has displaced the philosophy of the philosopher king, but the implies is the same.  The best should govern, and there echoes of the Carnegie's attitude in Romney's assertions that his business success uniquely qualifies him for the presidency, even perhaps, if one is listening closely, entitles him to, the presidency.

There is, of course, another darker sense of paternalism, and the notion that the best should govern, the obligation to provide moral leadership to "those people."  I would call it the "white man's burden," though that colonial phrase has been rendered quaint, and too easily dismissed, and Charles Murray has taken great pains to demonstrate that race and ethnicity are secondary factors in the alignment of wealth and what might be taken as the core American virtues of "industriousness, honesty, marriage, and religiosity."  If one works backward through Murray's list of virtues, beginning with religiosity, which in many minds includes "defense of marriage," and certainly the protestant virtues of honesty and industriousness, one ends up with the attitudes and values of the white evangelical.  The point of Marray's latest tome, Coming Apart: the State of White America, 1960-2010, as he professes, is to provide what might be called empirical evidence for a moral position -- that the demonstrable attitudes and values of the wealthy, regardless of race or ethnicity, represent what is best about America -- that the attitudes and values of the wealthy represent "our kind of people" over against the demonstrable attitudes and values of "those people" -- and from there of course it is easy enough to determine who should govern.  It is easy enough to see as well the point of departure to which Murray is reacting, the social consensus of the 50s that began unraveling in the 60s, and have continued unraveling since.  Whether or not Murray is correct in his assertions, and there is much to argue, if we are becoming a minority majority country, whether in terms of the racial and ethnic composition of our society, or in terms of income distribution with an ever greater numbers of people falling away into Murray's own category of "those people," if we are to preserve (or turn back the clock to) what is "best" about America, then "our kind of people" should govern.

So my point really is simple.  Liberty, or freedom, is a necessary but not sufficient condition of morality.  One must be free to choose the moral course of action over the immoral, but liberty alone is insufficient to either individual or social morality.  On either the individual or the social scale, we know that our behavior is not always in line with our own sense of morality, and so liberty, in and of itself, is insufficient to morality.  Something more is needed, and the something more always comes in the form of a restriction on our liberty.  One would like to add "comes in the form of a principled restriction on our liberty," or perhaps "comes in the form of a revealed restriction on our liberty," but both the principled and the revealed turn out to be somewhat troublesome.  "Thou shalt not kill," for example, seems clear enough both in principle and as the revealed word of god, but we immediately create contextualized exceptions -- the soldier, self-defense, the police, and the like.  It is not merely that we seek exceptions to excuse bad behavior -- the soldier may well resort to violence to prevent violence to his village -- the police may well rest to violence to prevent the sale of addictive drugs to minors or minors to sex-trafficers -- but rather that it proves impossible, or nearly impossible, to articulate unambiguous and universally applicable restrictions on our behavior.

I am suggesting, in other words, that while useful, the law is an insufficient guide to moral behavior, and that would include the law of god.  We can be in-compliance with the law and behaving reprehensibly, and equally we can be out-of-compliance and behaving morally.  There are too many examples of both to list them all, but one need only think of the CEO of Lehman Brothers, who apparently acted within the law to help send hundreds of thousands into financial crises, or Rosa Parks, who apparently acted outside the law to help enfranchise hundreds of thousands of Americans, and one has some sense that we cannot do without the voice of conscience.  I will set aside individual conscience for the moment.  It can be what it will be, but I  simply suggest that our social conscience resides in the on-going development of our social consensus, one that transcends any particular religion or any particular version of a particular religion -- one that transcends any particular ideology, or any particular version of a particular ideology.  With one possible exception (guns) the framers were correct in protecting the individual liberties that they protected, the freedom to worship and the freedom to speak. They set the on-going development of our social consensus, our social conscience outside (not the influence, but the control) of any particular demagogue.  The conservative impulse, even in its most benignly paternalistic forms, is the impulse to curtail the on-going in the on-going development of the social conscience.