•No sooner do I dis religion (Sunday last week) than I begin to suspect my comments threads, for purely technological reasons, don't accept some posts, be they supportive or negative (though I switched to a pop-up format that may be more accepting). I will compensate by letting people post anything about God they want under this entry -- if they now can -- without me responding negatively in any way, barring robo-data-dumps and the like. So, partly to check how my blog's tech is working, go ahead and tell me, masses: Do I need Jesus?
•Speaking of religious divisions, my Alabama kindred spirit Franklin Harris pointed out the story (by Matt Ridley) of how that evil bastard Thomas More, who hated property and gave us five centuries of utopianism, essentially murdered the creator of the King James Bible (no, the murder victim wasn't Shakespeare -- nor was Shakespeare really Francis Bacon).
•In a reminder that religion is a poor guide to public policy, the (useful) fiscal right finds itself under attack from the (counterproductive) religious left, who've been asking in ads "What Would Jesus Cut?" -- with the implied answer being "Nothing! Jesus would love big government!" (Don Boudreaux echoed Jeff Jacoby's condemnation of this tactic.) I, of course, would love it if all the religious factions just canceled each other out and gave up, though I don't expect that to happen anytime soon.
But tomorrow, a sympathetic religious-music note to heal all divisions.
TODD SEAVEY author of Libertarianism for Beginners and writer of/speaker about many other things
7 comments:
Religion is a terrible guide to public policy. But whether we like it or not, it is all over the place in our laws and in our customs. It "inspires" them, using that word carefully. That said, I rebel when a religious leader makes proclamations about secular matters. And the annual budget is about as secular as you can get. In any case, I thought the Roman Catholics (at least) had buried all that "theology of liberation" nonsense.
While I acknowledge that many or holidays and customs stem from our culture's heavily Judeo-Christian bent, the frequent claim that our system of law and government is based on the 10 Commandments is hogwash. Stealing and murder are against the law in most societies, Christian or not. Let's recognize that most of our laws are more deeply rooted in our behavioral instincts than in any religion.
Law is custom. Laws that deny custom or go against custom usually fail. The most successful laws are those that have been developed over time. And I am referring not just to "moral" laws but even eminently practical laws, such as those of doing business -- the Uniform Commercial Code comes to mind. Like the UCC there are many others. I agree with you on one point, our laws and customs are not derived from the Ten Commandments alone. Frankly, I have never heard such a claim. We can agree to disagree whether the entire religious impulse is an instinct itself.
That claim is made in almost everyone lawsuit related to displaying the 10 commandments on public property.
(Hey, if this thread gets longer and anyone's tempted even to use an ongoing pseudonym and Google's or some such URL, I say go for it, just so we know who's talking to who -- nice to have people participating regardless, though. Comments must be at least semi-working. Our Manhattans Project speaker last month -- and to some extent my boss last year, I think -- lean toward the view that the Founders _resembled_ Catholics, by the way, as inheritors of natural law thinking, though one might instead argue that natural _law_ and Founding-style natural _rights_ are radically different, even opposed, things. But I'll butt out again.)
Why is Friedman such a fan of Cromwell? He wasn't exactly an avatar of liberty when he was running the joint in England.
As a recreational medievalist-type (though Cromwell is later than the figures usually evoked by the crowds at the Penzig SCA events Friedman helped found), Friedman may just find Cromwell fascinating as a political strategist and military man, though I suppose he gets some points for toppling a monarchy. Cromwell, I mean. I'm sure Friedman's not endorsing Cromwell's stance on civil liberties -- though Cromwell's reputation has gone through many contortions.
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