STRANGE BEDFELLOWS:
LIBERTARIANS, CHRISTIANS, AND BIBLICAL BOLSHEVIKS
Nick Gier, Professor Emeritus, University of Idaho (ngier@uidaho.edu)
For more on Libertarianism and Christianity see this link
I first learned about the term “libertarianism” during the Idaho Congressional campaign of 1972. Steve Symms, whose only claim to fame was unseating Sen. Frank Church in the election of 1980, called himself a libertarian as he ran on the Republican ticket in the First District. We became acquainted and engaged in a feisty but friendly debate, mainly through letters.
I’ll never forget
a great motto that I learned from Symms. It goes something like this: “A liberal
will let you do anything with your body, but not everything you want to do with
your money. A conservative will allow you to do anything you want with your
money, but not anything you want to do with your body. A libertarian will allow
you to do anything you want with both your body and your money.” The point of
this of course is to show that only the libertarians have a consistent political
philosophy, one based on maximizing personal liberty.
Most people don’t know that Symms was pro-choice at that time and also
danced around other libertarian issues such as decriminalizing drug use and
prostitution. He learned very quickly that most libertarian positions did not
set well with the Idaho electorate, so he dropped the “body liberty” side of the
motto above and called himself a “limited government conservative” for the rest
of his quite undistinguished political career.
Sometime in the 1970s James Buckley, the brother of Wm. F. Buckley,
spoke at the Borah Symposium here at the University of Idaho. (Named after Wm.
E. Borah, another famous Idaho senator.) When he called himself a “Christian
libertarian,” my immediate response was that this phrase is an oxymoron. To put
the contradiction as concisely as possible: libertarians affirm the sovereignty
of the self, while orthodox Christians believe in the sovereignty of God. This
is why consistent libertarians such Ayn Rand and her followers are atheists or
agnostics.
The Christian libertarian rejects governmental regulations by saying
that God is the only authority to which they can submit. Consistent
libertarians, however, argue that there can be no submission to any authority
except individual conscience. They also maintain that those who live at the
government’s largess develop bad habits of dependency that undermine personal
initiative and integrity. The Christian "libertarian" cannot say that
dependency is healthy in religion, but turn around to say that the same
dependency undermines personal initiative in society.
For over a century scholars have written about the "corporate personality" found in the ancient Hebrew and early Christian writings. Evangelical theologian Carl Henry puts this idea well when he states that the Bible does not talk about individual rights; rather, it speaks of duties to community and God. As Paul so eloquently states: "It is not I, but Christ in me," all Christians being subordinate members of the Body of Christ.
In his book Evangelicals at an Impasse evangelical Christian Robert Johnston discusses Biblical economics. He concludes that the Bible does not support "to each according to merit"; rather, it teaches "to each according to need" (p. 98), the most famous phrase in Marx's philosophy. Free market economics is at the heart of libertarian political philosophy, but one finds just the opposite in the Book of Acts: "And all who believed were together and had all things in common; and they sold their possessions and goods and distributed them to all, as any had need" (2:44-45; 4:32-37).
When Ananias (Acts 5) sold a piece of property and held back some of the money, he was struck down by a God who presumably did not believe in private property. This was not just a temporary phenomenon, because the Church Father Tertullian, living 200 years later, reported that "we hold everything in common except our wives."
In a column in The Idaho State Journal (Nov. 24) stock broker Richard Larsen claims that our Pilgrim Fathers repented of "their socialists folly," and followed the free market model instead. One item in Gov. William Bradford’s diary, which Larsen quotes, states that families were given parcel of land "according to the proportion of their number," not according to how much they could buy with their own funds. Sometimes the right thing to do is to share rather than to make a profit.
Sharing resources through progressive income taxes has been a key to our success as a nation and countries throughout the world. (Contrary to libertarian critiques, high taxation in Europe has not destroyed their economies; indeed, they are prospering with much better social and health statistics.) Free land grants to settlers and railroads open up the Western frontier and rural electrification allowed towns and farms to prosper. Social security payments saved America's elderly from poverty and Medicare, socialized medicine of the most efficient and popular kind, has vastly improved their health.
The main reason for the Republican Party's success in the past 20 years has been an alliance between social conservatives, who focus on abortion, gays, and immigrants; and libertarians, who want to expand personal liberty with free market solutions to everything. This alliance is now crumbling, as evangelical voters are embracing Baptist minister Mike Huckabee, who charges that the Republican Party has been too much wedded to Wall Street and that CEO salaries are immoral. This is a far cry from the time, 30 years ago, when rich Southern California businessmen, unconcerned about abortion or gay rights, decided that an unchurched Ronald Reagan would be the man for their agenda of virulent anti-Communism and free market economics.