While I glance through the news coverage of the recent terrorism attempt I see the expected criticism of the president, and the entire Democrat Party. Much of it is valid, while some of it is partisan bickering. However there is something more that catches my attention—there is an assumption that the State is here to protect us.
The alleged purpose of the State is to protect We The People from external threats—and we hear this from politicians and other statist apologists all the time. But in practice, it is We The People have protected We The People.
The folks on the plane shut down the threat, while the State failed. It’s people who work at their jobs at Wal-Mart or Kinko’s, it’s the regular folks who go down to the border themselves when the Federal State fails to do so; it’s We The People, and not the State. We see this evidenced in cities where the private class is disarmed by the ruling class, and then crime goes up. We The People are our own defense.
The fallacy of the State’s duty to defend you and me isn’t just exposed in the failure of government to do so; the Federal Government itself has stated that it doesn’t see itself as duty-bound to protect us. Regardless of what pandering politicians might say, the Supreme Court has stated as far back as 1856 that “there is no Constitutional right to be protected by the state against being murdered by criminals or madmen.”
This statement has been repeated by ruling after ruling since then. As recently as 2005, the Supreme Court has repeated that there is no Constitutional right to be defended by Government. Knowing that the Government itself believes that it has no Constitutional duty to defend us, why the hell do we keep giving them more power with the assumption that it will protect life?
Time and time again, the entire system has proven itself to be entirely against protection of life. So why do we need them? As we realize that we don’t need them, we need to be aware. We in the private class can do anything that the political class can do; and we can do it better, more efficiently, and without resorting to institutionalized theft and violence—unlike the State.
But as Ron Paul often points out, government hates competition. And the politicians hate looking bad. They must know that more and more private citizens are viewing them as increasingly irrelevant, burdensome, and obsolete.
Already the Political Class has gone into damage control mode. President Obama is already stating that the system put in place before him is faulty. (In other words, some of them are still blaming Bush.) The news as of Dec 31 had some interesting headlines, including “TSA subpoenas bloggers, demands names of sources” and “Flight 253 passenger Kurt Haskell: ‘I was visited by the FBI’…Fears cover-up.”
Of course all the political class is accomplishing in the end is helping us libertarians prove our point. When they fail at covering up their mistakes, they are blaming everyone of their error, even private citizens.
We would do well to recall that the failure of government on 9/11 resulted in no-one getting fired. Some people got promoted, and an entire new layer of government bureaucracy was created. While the Market rewards only success, the State rewards failure.
It’s the private class stopping the bad guys. It’s the private class scrutinizing the fools government has been lifting up into high positions. It’s the private class struggling beneath a tyranny of incompetence. And it is the private class stating aloud, “We don’t need the rulers of Versailles DC!”
What we have is largely a tyranny of incompetence; but it is tyranny nonetheless. When We The People faced with tyranny over 200 years ago, step one was to stop funding them. This is being done today, and in increasing numbers this very moment. Step two is to implement a New Great Experiment—also being done at this moment.
Just in the past 24 months, I have personally heard and seen people publicly proclaiming that they are “going Galt” or stating openly “Agora! Anarchy! Action!” I’ve seen this with my own eyes, for example, in a massive demonstration here in Grand Rapids, Michigan in April of 2009. I expect to see it again and again.
Defunding the tyranny. An end to the Federal State. This is real hope. This is lasting and sincere change. We will have liberty in our lifetime, and true security for future generations.
Dan LaPonsie (aka, Lounge Daddy) currently lives in Michigan with his wife and children. His homepage can be viewed at www.laponsie.com 
I have heard it quoted many time that the supreme court has ruled that the state is not duty-bound to protect the citizens from threats. Where can I find evidence of this. Would be useful in my future debates and discussions. Thanks
Hi Robbo,
Michael Gaddy has a great article that elaborates on the Supreme Court rulings at Lew Rockwell. http://www.lewrockwell.com/gaddy/gaddy52.html
He cites two big ones, both of which I was thinking of while I was writing the above piece; Castle Rock v. Gonzales (2005), and South v. Maryland (1855). This shows a continuous view of the State not being duty-bound to defend We The People, and putting it in writing as recently as 2005.
More on the Castle Rock ruling can be read at Duke Law: http://www.law.duke.edu/publiclaw/supremecourtonline/certGrants/2004/casvgon.html
And more on the South ruling can be read at Justia’s Supreme Court center: http://supreme.justia.com/us/59/396/case.html
Hope that helps, Robbo, and thanks for reading.
- Dan
Agreed. The protection should be up to each airline. If someone wants to ride on an airline that strip searches everyone, the market will provide it.
The reason the unstated assumption is that the state exists to protect people, or their property, or their liberty, is because the classical liberalism fallacy has been pervasive in our culture since the time of the later Enlightenment. It is, of course, provably false.
Nor does one need a supreme court or any other collection of dudes in dresses to say so. It is obvious on inspection. The state exists to separate the unwary from their property for the benefit of those who run the state. The state imposes surplus order for the benefit of those who run the state. The state is and does, to the extent that a legal fiction is anything and does anything, whatever the people who run it want it to do.
Right now, it seems, they want the state to print trillions of dollars for the benefit of death merchants so that those trillions can be corruptly allocated. War is their way of saying “whatever we do must be right.”
And if the efforts of the panty bomber seem absurd, if the passengers again have to get up to subdue yet another detonation cord bomber, if no air marshall was assigned, if all the warnings were ignored, that’s just par for the course. The security state is its own reason for existing, its own turf, its own power base.