by Jerry Agar

In a kingdom, the king and his cronies live exceedingly well, while everyone else is miserable.  Even the cronies have to tread lightly.  It’s good to be king – the ultimate form of centralized government.

Ideally we could create a society where no one is poor.  No one goes without.  Everybody is happy.

I am sure we all would love to see society come as close to that ideal as possible.  So if that is the end, what are the means?

Many people think that government intervention through wealth redistribution and management of the economy in a socialist or semi-socialist manner will bring about “social justice.”  These people tend to find it intolerable that some people get rich.  They may be motivated by jealousy—this is one of my personal theories, and it irks a lot of people—a sense of “fairness”, or an ideology. However, these same people, in their pursuit of “justice”, often aim to whittle away our liberty, piece by piece.  
 
Which is ironic, because it’s liberty - not expansive government - that leads to justice.  Here are ten reasons that liberty is best for everyone.

10.  Markets and products.  Can you name the innovative, labor-saving, life-improving products and services that have come out of Soviet Russia and Cuba?  Neither can I.  Innovation only takes place when people are free to pursue their dreams with the certainty that they will profit if they succeed.  When told that there is no reward for innovation, most people stop innovating.  We can’t legislate creativity and human nature, but through liberty we unleash their power for positive change.  Where is the justice in quashing the creative spirit?  And where is the justice for the people who might benefit from those good products?

9.  Common Sense.  If there is so much social justice in economic redistribution, then why are the guns pointed inward at the citizens in places like Cuba?  Just a thought.

8.  Emotional well-being.  The idea of social justice seems to come from a condescending idea that many people need the assistance – and “loving control” – of a wise and benevolent, but forceful, elite.  Even if government intervenes with the best of intentions, can it stay that way?  Leadership changes, and power corrupts.
 
If social justice means a guaranteed equality of outcome for all, how well has that worked in communist countries?  How well has it worked at meeting basic needs?  We all know the answer.

7.  Basic Fairness.  Those who get ahead through government handouts, preferences, or tilted playing fields ultimately don’t get a chance to prove that they measure up. The just answer to yesterday’s wrongs is not a new set of mandated wrongs.  It is the championing of ability and effort.

6.  Taxes.  Less taxes, more freedom – more innovation.  Our ultimate property is ourselves.  Taxing labor is a form of involuntary servitude, which leads to the next point.

5.  Protection of Natural Rights.  The 13th amendment to the Constitution reads, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

Life, liberty, and property is the same as owning yourself in the  present, the future, and the past.  Is it just to take property by force?

In Federalist #10, Madison called the desire for an equal distribution of property a wicked project.  The less government we have, the less likely we will experience an unjust tyranny of the majority or of the minority.

4.  School Choice.  It does society no good to leave poor children uneducated due to a lack of funds on their parents’ part.  Therefore, government will always be involved in education, at least at the funding level.  But does it help poor, disadvantaged children to hold them captive to a failing system, as is the case in nearly all major American cities?  Half of Chicago’s public school students do not graduate.  What kind of future do they have?
 
When scholarship programs for better schools are offered through private or public vouchers, there are always more applicants than positions.  Parents and children do want to succeed, but too often they do not have the liberty to do so.   To offer that freedom is truly just.

As Dennis Byrne writes in the Chicago Tribune, “Every child would have a better shot at a quality education if schools would spend less of everyone's time, resources and taxes on the kind of gobbledygook that social engineers love.  Instead, put that money to work actually teaching children.”

3.  Health.  Congress's current plan for health care “reform” would see mandates, fines, massive bureaucracy, and threats of prison.  Many of the problems we have now are due to over-regulation of health care.  Give us liberty – or we may get death.  There is no social justice at all in the current plans.  There is only the heavy hand of coercive, inefficient, monolithic government.

2. Entrepreneurship.   Government tends to be slow-witted and inefficient. The forces of self-interest, competition, and supply and demand, however, harness the genius of all Americans.  Though many laws and regulations try and stifle this American tradition of entrepreneurship, there are untold millions of Americans who cut hair in their basement and cater in their kitchens. Liberty allows anyone with the drive to become a small business owner.  Justice for all demands that they be allowed to succeed - to the benefit of us all.

1.  Charity.  This is supposed to be what social justice programs are about.  But government uses as much as 70% of welfare funds in bureaucracy.  A private charity doing that would either fail or be shut down.  Michael Tanner reports that, "bureaucracy is a major factor in government welfare programs. For example, a report on welfare in Illinois found procedures requiring nine forms to process an address change."

He further writes, "In her excellent book Tyranny of Kindness, Theresa Funiciello, a former welfare mother, describes a system in which illiterate homeless people with mental illnesses are handed 17-page forms to fill out, women nine months pregnant are told to verify their pregnancies, a woman who was raped is told she is ineligible for benefits because she can't list the baby's father on the required form. It is a world totally unable to adjust to the slightest deviation from the bureaucratic norm."

Long age we shed a king.  We don't need centralized government to babysit us.  Give us freedom and, as we always have, we will maintain a nation where even the poorest among us can rise to the very top.  That's true social justice.