What is a Christian Libertarian?

On August 28 the Centennial Institute of Colorado Christian University sponsored a talk by former business professor Kevin Miller titled "Christians and Libertarianism." So what is a Christian libertarian?

Miller presented two basic, conflicting views without revealing which view he personally endorses. One view is that Christians should seek to enforce religious morals by force of law, as by banning gay marriage. The second view, which Miller articulated at greater length and with more passion, is that Christians should advocate political liberty for all and take advantage of liberty to evangelize.

Notable is Miller's reason for endorsing liberty. I believe an individual needs liberty in order to pursue his happiness, act on his own best judgment, and apply his reason to the task of living successfully. Such analysis was absent in Miller's presentation. Instead, the value of liberty for a "Christian libertarian" is that the state will not seek to control or inhibit religion, leaving the faithful free to advance religion.

Miller got himself into a number of problems, as by denying natural law and advocating abortion bans on the grounds that a fertilized egg is a person. But what most interested me was his view of "prudential" Christianity. (Unfortunately, I was not able to ask a question on this matter before the event formally ended.)

Miller argued that what was prudent in the age of Daniel is not prudent today. In Daniel's age, it was appropriate to serve a king. Now, the prudent Christian endorses liberty so as to further the Christian goal of converting others to the faith. Miller also pointed out that American culture is currently "unregenerated," meaning largely not under Christian influence.

But what does that entail for the future of liberty if Christians manage to "regenerate" the nation? Many of Miller's concerns focussed on possible ways the government might impede Christianity. But what if Christians solidly control the government? Those concerns disappear. Would it not then be "prudent" for Christians to advocate government enforcement of strictly religious convictions? Miller offered no answer to this.

Nor did Miller answer the most powerful rebuttal to "Christian libertarianism," which is that, by appealing to faith for ultimate truths, Christians place those truths beyond human reason and into the hands of some authority. When an authority decides ultimate matters of truth and morality, the logical conclusion is an authoritarian political system.

Liberty ultimately depends on the independent reasoning mind and on independently pursued values. We can discover objective truths about our world and about right and wrong, we can apply our knowledge in the pursuit of our values, and we can seek to persuade others through rational argument. The proper role of government, in this view, is to protect our liberty to think and to act, protect us from the initiation of force, and otherwise leave us free to go about our own lives.

Two Doses of Nonsense Do Not Make for Reason

David Limbaugh's comment today illustrates perfectly what's wrong with today's left-right divide:

Lately, MSNBC's Chris Matthews has been on a childish tear, taunting Republicans to admit their belief in the biblical account of the Creation. Someone ought to ask this paragon of smug self-satisfaction why, if he's so brilliant, he unquestioningly echoes the demagogic hyperbole of global warming fanatics hellbent on destroying the economic system responsible for producing unprecedented prosperity in the advanced industrialized world. Oh, yes, it's fashionable to denounce capitalism these days, but the historical record is clear.

So because Matthews is a nutty leftist, that somehow legitimizes the nutty right? What we need is reason and capitalism.

The Meaning of Secularism

Secularism, like atheism, is not a positive set of ideas. The most straightforward definition of "secular" from Dictionary.com is "not pertaining to or connected with religion." The term describes only one thing something is not -- religious -- not what it is.

Secularlism is not a philosophy. The mere fact that a person is (or claims to be, or is claimed to be) secular tells us nothing about what it is the person does believe.

Yet the Christian right has a vested interested in tarring secularists as nihilists. It is easy to see the motive behind the strategy: if the only alternative to Christianity is nihilism, Christianity wins by default.

After running through polling data on out-of-wedlock births, abortion, and homosexuality, Star Parker writes:

The public schools that are educating the majority of America's children have been increasingly secularized and politicized. The work place has been purged of biblical ethics. All public space is darkened by lawless and vulgar lasciviousness and becoming increasingly intolerant of practicing Christians.

The result is that secular Americans have had a disproportionate impact on our country over recent years and biblical Americans are now fighting back with their voting rights.

Nice trick: secularists are equated with "lawless and vulgar lasciviousness."

The Christians, on the other hand, are committed to America's "founding principles of traditional values and limited government."

Anyone who believes those are actually the choices must go with Christianity.

Those are not the choices.

The third way is a philosophy that happens to be secular (not religious) and that recognizes that our nature as rational, autonomous beings gives rise to our inalienable rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. A philosophy that seeks positive values rooted in the requirements of human life.

Meanwhile, are the Christians truly committed to a government limited to individual rights? No.

On the economic front, many Christians advocate a massive welfare state on the grounds that we are our brother's keeper. Christians increasingly promote the environmentalist agenda on the grounds that God commanded us to care for the earth, even at the expense of human well-being and liberty.

On the social front, many Christians want to ban all or nearly all abortion from the moment of conception, on the grounds that God infused a fertilized egg with a soul, which would endanger the lives of some women and threaten a police state.

Many Christians call for censorship of unsavory materials, more political controls on drugs and personal behavior, and legal discrimination against homosexuals.

At best, the Christian right is a fickle friend of liberty.

Thankfully, there is an alternative to secular nihilism and Christian mysticism.

Endowed By Their Creator

Terence Jeffrey briefly reviews Mark Levin's new book, Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto.

Jeffrey writes:

Fundamentally, Levin explains, conservatives recognize that there is an immutable natural law ordained by God that all men and nations must obey. He also makes clear that while human beings have a God-given right to individual liberty, they are also imperfect by nature and, thus, if given too much power, are likely to abuse the God-given rights of others.

But that's not quite the whole story. In history and by doctrine, Christianity must limit not only individual power but individual liberty. Human nature is fallen and corrupt, according to Christian dogma, and thus must be controlled. That is why most conservative Christians endorse the drug war, immigration controls, legal discrimination (if not outright persecution) of homosexuals, censorship, abortion bans, and even a welfare state. Christianity reigned in the West from the 300s, when Rome forcibly banned other religions, for centuries. The United States arose not when Christianity dominated, but in the wake of the Enlightenment, with its emphasis on human reason and earthly success.

Jeffrey quotes Levin:

Some resist the idea of a Natural Law's relationship to Divine Providence, for fear it leads to intolerance or even theocracy. They have it backwards. If man is "endowed by (the) Creator with certain inalienable rights," he is endowed with these rights no matter his religion or whether he has allegiance to any religion. It is Natural Law, divined by God and discoverable by reason, that prescribes the inalienability of the most fundamental and eternal human rights -- rights that are not conferred on man by man. It is the Divine nature of Natural Law that makes permanent man's right to "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."

But it is Levin who has things backwards. I quite concur that we are endowed by our Creator with with certain inalienable rights -- and our creator is simply the natural forces that produced humanity. We have rights, and we deserve liberty, even though God does not exist. Natural Law is just that -- the laws of nature -- and it neither has nor needs a "Divine nature."

A Timely Prophesy

This analysis from the March, 1962 Objectivist Newsletter reads like a prophesy of the 2008 election, in which John McCain selected Sarah Palin to appease religious conservatives. Or a prediction of the Bush presidency:

The implications to tying capitalism to faith have come nakedly into the open in the explicit irrationalism of many "conservative" groups. Intending to bring the mystical concept of Original Sin into political theory, they declare that man is depraved by nature, that reason is impotent, that man should not attempt to create a perfect political system or to establish a rational society on earth -- but should settle for capitalism instead. ...

The greatest single threat to capitalism today is the attempt to put capitalism, mysticism and Original Sin over on the public as one "package deal." No attacks by collectivists could do more to discredit capitalism than is done by this kind of attempt.

Thanks to the faith-based politics of Bush and McCain, the collectivist Barack Obama is now president. And capitalism needs rational defenders more than ever.

GOP Remains Party of Faith

If Colorado Republican leaders Mark Hillman and John Andrews are any indication, the Republican Party will remain the Party of Faith and will continue to attempt to impose religious doctrine by force of law.

Andrews begins a recent column, "What many call a concern for social issues, I call a passion for protection of the human person." He goes on to compare abortion with slavery, and he suggests that at least we should have "laws to balance this difficult issue where precious lives are at stake." The Republican Party, he states, should not "abandon its defense of the unborn."

There is just one little thing missing from Andrews's column: any argument as to why we should believe that a zygote, a tiny clump of undifferentiated cells, is a "human person." Recall that Andrews endorsed Colorado's Amendment 48, which would have defined a fertilized egg as a person. Given Andrews's beliefs, his call for "balance" is an unconscionable compromise; does he really want "balance" that would result in the deaths of what he regards as "human persons?"

I guess Andrews is acknowledging that most Coloradans regard his views as ludicrous; 73 percent of the voters rejected 48. And yet he insists on promoting his faith-based politics through the GOP.

Mark Hillman writes:

Recently, some have grumbled that social conservatives - pro-lifers, opponents of same-sex marriage and the so-called "Religious Right" -- are to blame for the party's recent set backs and should be muzzled. If the goal is winning elections, rather than purging membership rolls at the country club, throwing social conservatives under the bus is a catastrophic idea.

But this comparison to throwing them "under a bus" is silly. Here is what I have written:

Religious voters can remain a part of a winning GOP coalition, so long as their goal is to keep politics out of religion, not inject religion into politics. Abortion bans and fear mongering about homosexuals can no longer be the litmus tests of primaries. Republican candidates must clearly endorse the separation of church and state, a separation necessary for the protection of both church and state.

In other words, I am perfectly happy to join a coalition that contains Christians, so long as the Christians stop trying to violate people's rights.

Hillman pretends that evangelicals also favor economic liberty, even though evangelicals blessed us with the likes of George W. Bush and Sarah Palin.

Hillman does point out:

This year, moderate "maverick" John McCain enjoyed 72% support from evangelicals (of all parties) on Election Day, despite ranking as the least favorite primary candidate of pro-life Republicans.

I don't know where the statistic is coming from, but it sounds right. Hillman is selectively retelling history. Of course evangelicals such as James Dobson rallied for McCain only after McCain selected Palin as his running mate. These evangelicals supported that ticket because of Palin's anti-abortion record, and despite the fact that McCain is an enemy of economic liberty and free speech. That pretty much tells us where the priorities of the evangelicals are.

Hillman points out that many more people favor some abortion restrictions than voted for 48. True, but irrelevant. Amendment 48 shows the logical consequences of the religious right's position. Voters who value liberty will not sanction Republican efforts to "incrementally" obliterate the right to get an abortion.

Hillman also points out that defining a marriage as between a man and woman is fairly popular. Yet, as I've noted, the stance against gay "marriage" is not strictly religious, and the general attitudes toward homosexuals -- especially among younger voters -- are much more accepting, whereas the propaganda against homosexuals coming from the religious right is vitriolic.

But Hillman, like Andrews is ready to compromise:

[P]ro-life leaders sometimes treat each tangent like a slippery slope. Battles over stem cell research and Terri Schiavo aren't as clearly defined as the mission of saving millions of unborn children.

In other words, banning all abortions is a "clearly defined" mission of the religious right and therefore the Republican Party.

I'm beginning to think that the "new liberty coalition" that I've described cannot arise within the Republican Party. Faith-based politics is incompatible with liberty. I'll be interested to see which mission becomes most clearly defined for the GOP.

Parker on GOP's 'Faustian Bargain'

Douglas Parker, who worked in the Nixon and Ford administrations, offered the following analysis of the Republican Party in a letter to the New York Times:

... The party has made a Faustian bargain by its zealous courtship of evangelicals to gain their political support. ...

Part of the price has been to give the religious right a grip on party machinery that prevents many talented Republicans of different beliefs from even seeking office. At the same time, it has fostered the advancement of some whose most conspicuous qualification is a willingness to promote the approved theology.

The net effect has been a reduced and diluted talent pool or, in the popular phrase, a “dumbing down” of the party, as well as a diversion from its historic principles.

We urgently need a reorientation in which evangelicals continue to be warmly welcomed but are not invited to impose a theocratic hegemony.

Parker's point is dead-on. For instance, look at the selection of the unqualified Sarah Palin to rouse the evangelical vote (and scare away many independents). In Colorado, in many districts if you don't swear to abolish abortion you're sunk in GOP primaries.

How can evangelicals be "warmly welcomed" by a GOP with a renewed commitment to liberty? The evangelicals must agree to keep the church out of the state in exchange for keeping the state out of the church. Of course, it would also help if evangelicals would stop moving toward "green" socialism and the monstrous welfare state.

The GOP could emerge with a forceful liberty coalition, as I outline. But it doesn't look like the part is prepared to do that, so I suspect it will continue to limp along.

Churches Should Keep Out of Politics, Poll Says

This is an interesting survey (thanks to Kelly M.); a slim majority of Americans (52 percent) think churches should keep out of politics. This is up from 44 percent just four years ago. Perhaps when people got a taste of the religious right via the Bush administration (which only partly tried to appease the religious right), they figured out that maybe faith-based politics isn't so great, after all.

This surprised me a bit:

The new national survey by the Pew Research Center reveals that most of the reconsideration of the desirability of religious involvement in politics has occurred among conservatives. Four years ago, just 30% of conservatives believed that churches and other houses of worship should stay out of politics. Today, 50% of conservatives express this view.

Yet it's not hard to figure out that, with government programs such as "faith-based initiatives" come government strings. And perhaps many religious conservatives are figuring out that, when they alienate independents and the secular free-market movement, they no longer participate in a winning coalition. Grover Norquist points out that, when the religious right merely calls on government to leave religious beliefs alone, the faction can play nicely with others. But when religious conservatives try to impose faith-based restrictions and spend tax dollars to promote religion, they make enemies out of those loyal to liberty.

Decline of the Religious Right?

Mark Barna of Colorado Spring's Gazette believes that the influence of the religious right is in decline.

"The Christian Coalition of America, founded in 1989 to give Christians a stronger voice in government policy, is struggling financially," he writes. Has the funding gone to some similar group, or is funding for Christian-right politics dropping in general?

Barna adds:

Some polls show that young bornagain Christians are more tolerant of gays and lesbians. According to a 2007 Barna study, 28 percent of born-agains, of which evangelicals are a subset, under age 42 think it is morally acceptable to have sex with someone of the same gender, compared with 13 percent of older born-agains.

And nearly 33 percent of young Bible believers support abortion rights, compared with 27 percent of older believers - a surprisingly high percentage for both age groups, [David] Kinnaman [Barna Group president and co-author of "UnChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity"] said.

My guess is that the difference of views regarding homosexuality is more pronounced than what the survey suggests. My guess is that younger Christians, even when they claim to have a moral problem with homosexuality, don't have as great of a problem, don't want laws against homosexuality, and are more open to gay marriage.

Regarding abortion, another poll I recently cited indicates that 60 for "Mainline Protestants" and 51 of Catholics support legal abortion.

The real question, though, is whether religious as such is having a greater or lesser influence on politics. If the religious right is faltering -- and that's a big "if" -- the religious left clearly is on the upswing, led by Barack Obama. Much of this is merely repackaging standard leftist views in Biblical wineskins. Yet clearly there's a market for that.