As usual the Church is 100 years behind the times. In refusing to acknowledge and understand the contribution to understanding human interaction of the Austrians the Church has wounded herself and society in general.

Because of the continued, however weakened, influence of the Church the fruits of this militant ignorance of free market economics will be the destruction of Western Society itself. Totalitarianism, condemned by popes, is still the specter that threatens society. Only a strong Church and a free market can provide sufficient counterweight to totalitarianism. The Church Built Western Civilization. Will the Church destroy it?

Mr. Smith:

The Church is eternal, Western Civilization is not. The Romans had to go, the West will go also. In the last days of the Roman Empire the barbarians invaded and destroyed the Roman order just like St. John had announced.

The Church survived and just a generation later we find barbarians turned into Christians. That was the beginning of our own civilization. Most of us westerners are part of it, the "iron mixed with clay" (see Daniel's prophecy). In my view, the failure of our civilization to extend the Gospel to Islam, Africa and Far Asia is the problem. If we don't go to them, God will bring them to us. We are going to have a massive influx of new people and the West shall change, one more time there will be a crisis and the Church will emerge with new saints eager to fill the world from her eternal genius.

May be that future generation will learn to live looking for God and Heaven instead of trying to play God in the halls of government.

God Bless.

I applaud Mr Tucker's effort to educate us on the truly "unfree" market we're all forced to contend with here in the U.S.

As a physician, I experience daily the folly of price controls and ever burgeoning efforts to control the utilization of goods and services. I am more and more convinced the problem with our healthcare sector is too much, not too little, government intervention. Canada and the United Kingdom are belatedly realizing this, while we Americans are tempted by the siren song of collectivists like Hillary Clinton and John Edwards.

I can only pray our country will not be seduced into voting for candidates who distrust freedom in all its forms, including economic.

It is refreshing to see the ideas of political liberty and decentralization make a comeback in the Catholic and Paleo-Conservative underground.

The mainstream media is an enabler of the all-powerful state and the lies propagated to retain their power (e.g. these problems - originally created by the state - are so large that only the state can deal with them)

And, in this political season, only candidate that addresses the true nature of the secular warfare and welfare state is Ron Paul.

Faith and Freedom!

I'm not sure that it is true that the Church is somehow behind the times on this question. On the one hand, pronouncing on economic policy is not the role of the Church, since it falls into the area of applied science and, to some extent, on the prudential application of moral teaching. On the other hand, the John Paul II wrote some wonderful material that weaves economic understanding with doctrine, while Benedict XVI has been a strong critic of socialism and all government management of the social order. Moreover, there is more attention being given to the Catholic origins of economic science in the late medieval period, and this rediscovery will lead ever more to an appreciation of the way in which markets serve the well being of humanity.

I mispoke when I said "as usual" the Church is behind the times. I should have limited my charge to "in economics and in the idea of a constitutionally limited republic." In such things a accepting modernism and the new liberalism it is a good thing to be behind the times. It is a shame so little attention was paid to the 100th anniversary of Pope St. Pius X's Syllabus of Errors, issued in 1907 and completely revelent today.

A prime cause of the limitless state of today has been the moral and intellectual weakening by an increasingly accomodationist Church, coupled with the withdrawal from its Heart, as Pope Benedict XVI has put it, Charity. Turning charity, and education, and healthcare over to the state --- and even allowing government to control Catholic institutions has been a disaster for the Church--- and the West.

Yes, Mr. Hansen, no human society lasts forever. The Church has been promised to last forever, perhaps as it did in England under Henry, Elizabeth, Cromwell--- and so on.

Jeffrey is right about the Church not promulgating policy in detail, but starting with Leo XIII's Rerum Novarum and culminating with Centissimus Annus the popes have made general statements that sound a lot like policy to me. Condemning communism, socialism and the welfare statements are good policy. Condemning "minimalist" government and "unfettered" markets are troublesom. Remember popes are not infallible in everything they say, just in faith and morals. But these statements can mean almost anything you want them to. Who is to "fetter" the markets, the American bishops? Government? How about a well-formed society in general? How many Catholics deal with companies that contribute to Planned Parenthood?

Jeffrey also hints at the subject of Dr. Thomas Woods book, The Church and the Market, a Catholic Defense of the Free Economy, a wonderful exposition of how the Church that built western society also built capitalism. So, perhaps the Church is not behind the times at all but only in a moment of forgetfulness concerning the source of the modern economic order.

I like the quote I read somewhere that our global economy is really a reflection of "socialism for the superwealthy and capitalism for the rest". With the treasuries of the U.S. bailing out huge failed investments "too big to fail", and the World Bank/IMF directing the flow of investment monies to the developing nations, all to the favor of large multinational corporations and small national oligarchies, the system cannot be considered "free market" by any stretch.

But the enemy is larger than "Big Government". Who are the leaders of Government? Most are following the revolving door from Government to Multinational corporation- and sometimes back again like Dick Cheney.

The 800lb. Gorilla is the beast of multinational corporate control of national and supranational governments- it may be indirect control, but it is the essence of control in terms of determining what regulations will be enacted and enforced- if any- on a particular industry. Lou Dobbs has seen the light on this subject with his excellent book- War on the Middle Class. Jeff Faux of the Economic Policy Institute, wrote Global Class War, which reveals how the multinationals and oligarchs put the fix in on NAFTA to guarantee that it would be a disaster for the middle-class American, the poor Mexican, and a boon to a small number of Wall Street investors but bringing with it ever-increasing immigration pressures. As far as the "Death Tax" is concerned, I would recommend Bill Gates Sr.'s (of all people!) Wealth and our Commonwealth- he explodes the false myths associated with this kind of tax- it really is in keeping with our Founding Father's vision.

I would say that for conservatives to embrace liberal capitalism is very strange. If liberalism doesn't work for social issues, probably neo-liberalism for economics will not work out well for most of humanity either. "It's my body!" and It's your money!" start to sound like the same error when you compare them to what the Church teaches on the Common Good, Universal Destination of Goods, Human Dignity and so forth. In fact the only way conservative Catholics can make the case for their view of economics it to essentially dismiss or ignore the actual teachings of the popes and bishops, or by focusing exclusively on the principle of subsidiarity. It is utopian at this point to say that we can have locally-determined economies if we just get "Big Government" out of the way- not as long as we have "Big Multinationals" around who have the self-interest of their largest investors as the only compelling legal principle dominating their ultimate boardroom decisions. I agree that we need to look at the problems of agnostic government bureaucracy, but it must be looked at simultaneously with the realities of the clout given the largest multinationals who also sit on patents and smaller competitive forces. Let's not ignore the social teachings of the Church regarding economics, but rather study them, utilize them in our friendly, productive discussions as orthodox Catholics.

T.Shipe (Tim, I think, isn't it?):

You're suggesting that the left-liberal/conservative divide on social issues is parallel to the left-liberal/conservative divide on economics: Not really correct. And you're further obscuring the issue by noting that what is today called conservatism in the U.S. on economic issues is closer to classical liberalism than what is called left-liberal in the U.S.

As a result of this odd formulation, you present it as conservatives being "liberal" (classical) on economics but non-liberal on social issues. But the anachronistic use of terms is merely muddying the waters.

To clarify things, go back to first principles:

1. There are high thresholds to justify the use of force, for individuals or societies.

2. It follows that there are not only high thresholds to justify organized use of compulsion by one nation against another (as articulated in the Just War Doctrine), but also to justify organized use of compulsion by a society for the ordering of that society (that is, government).

3. In the U.S. these limitations on the scope and manner of lawmaking are written into the primary law of the land (the Constitution) but even if they weren't, Catholic morality would still require it.

4. As a general rule, an attack by an enemy is required before the use of force by a nation is justified (Just War). Similarly, as a general rule, a violation of someone's rights is required before the use of force is justified in criminal law. There are gray areas in each case, of course. For Just War, one need not necessarily wait for the aggressor to attack first if the result would be devastating and the intent is obvious. And in criminal law, other gray areas and fudge factors come in:

(a.) Negligence which might have resulted in harm is criminalized ("depraved indifference");
(b.) Fraud is treated as equivalent to forcing;

...and so on.

5. Things are further complicated by Federalism/Subsidiarity. There are some things which government should prohibit...but not the Federal government, if the state can do it, and not the state, if the local. (When a role can be accomplished by two different levels of organization, we default to the lower.)

Now as a general rule, left-liberals (or "progressives," though that term seems Orwellian, or at least question-begging) disregard all of the above most of the time. But U.S. Conservatives hold that the above are the underlying principles of which their policies are the natural extension. They are therefore open to the charge of inconsistency in a way that left-liberals are not.

With respect to abortion, conservatives are accused of being "statist" where they would normally be (classically) liberal. Is this the case?

Well, no: When a person's rights are violated, this justifies the use of state compulsion to prosecute criminals and deter further violations (just as when a nation's territory is violated, this justifies the use of compulsion to eject invaders and deter future invasions). In abortion, the unborn person's rights are violated; ergo, the use of force is justified.

With respect to economics, conservatives claim they're being (classically) liberal, but left-liberals would accuse them of neglecting to prevent (by force) violations of the rights of the poor; of not exercising state compulsion when they ought. Is this the case?

Well, not usually. Take the example of health care: No one's right to obtain health care for which they can pay the going rate has been violated. So the "right to health care" simpliciter has not been violated; no criminal is denying a person care by compulsion or fraud.

...continued...

...continuing...

But, say left-liberals, that's not the "right" we're talking about; we're talking about the right to obtain it, but compel others to pay for it.

Ah, say conservatives, in that case you're in Aquinas territory (2nd part, 2nd part, Q.66, Article 7), in which the poor man who is about to starve to death is morally permitted to take bread from the wealthy man without consent, even if he can never foresee paying it back.

Right, say the left-liberals; if Aquinas is correct about that, then the needy have moral justification to do what would normally be "stealing"; that is, take by force from the wealthy what they need to stay alive. And if they can do it as individuals, how much more fitting is it that they ask their employees (the government) to do it on their behalf, though taxation?

A leap too far, answer the conservatives. Aquinas envisioned a poor man encountering an unforeseen need, unavoidable for him, and relatively dire consequences, and emergency circumstances. This principle is already implemented in the United States in that it has long been illegal for a care-giver to refuse care to someone who needs it, merely because they cannot pay.

But what left-liberals envision is not analogous; it would be more like setting up a system in which the poor man habitually, regularly, as standard operating procedure, took bread from the rich man. And insofar as the topic being discussed involves not merely health care, but health insurance, why, now we're talking about the poor man stealing bread and socking it away in a freezer, years in advance of his needing it: Bread for a rainy day. (For what we call health "insurance" in the U.S. is not so much insurance as pre-pay through a middleman, for easily foreseeable needs.) That goes far beyond what Aquinas says is permissible.

Since the situation is not analogous to what Aquinas says is permissable, argue the conservatives, it follows that Catholic teaching is not on the left-liberals' side in this instance...or, speaking more broadly, in any of the instances in which the welfare state is made into a standard way-of-life for the poor rather than emergency care in dire circumstances.

It may, of course, be that the Magisterium has since intended to argue that Aquinas is wrong about all this. But what they have infallibly taught has not been articulated in such a way as to require us to think the Angelic Doctor wrong on this point, so prudence suggests we should interpret the Magisterium in a fashion which does not contradict Aquinas, whom they reference on this point.

And there are two further points, those Federalism and lawfulness: There is no real compelling reason why most of the policies which left-liberals would implement to benefit the needy should be Federal; state organization of them is both possible, recommended by the notion of Subsidiarity, and often more easily permitted by the State constitutions than by the U.S. Constitution, where this whole area of policy is forbidden to be a subject of Congressional lawmaking (being reserved to the states or the people in Amendment X). If Magisterial teaching does not require us to go beyond Aquinas, then not doing so gives us the additional benefits of subsidiarity and Constitutionality: No small thing.

In the end, then, Conservatives are saying: Use government force only when (and to the degree) that force is justifiable. They hold that abortion justifies it; that providing public-option health insurance (or similar non-emergency taxpayer-funded entitlements) does not.

I think there's a pretty good case they're inconsistent about this on the subject of outlawing marijuana. (Before anyone get suspicious: I'm innocent here; I'm not entirely sure what the stuff smells like.) This is a perennial issue between Conservatives and hard-core Libertarians.

And of course left-liberals say conservatives are too quick to use force in war, just as conservatives say left-liberals are too quick to use force in domestic economic matters. (I think the left-liberals are right on the first part.)

But with respect to helping the needy, I don't see conservatives as particularly inconsistent; I think they are right...and also more compassionate than their left-liberal friends, in my view. After all, they give privately at double the rate and amounts of their left-leaning friends. But they don't think it justifies the guns of government, or if so, not at the federal level. That seems perfectly in accord with their underlying principles, which I think are (a.) good ones and (b.) Catholic ones.

-- R.C.

rave constantly about how America's Free Market system is in jeopardy. That is one reason why so many putative conservatives think we do have a free market.

Tucker is on point as usual. To treat our Rube Goldberg system of ducts, chutes, and ladders that redistribute wealth and power to the politically connected as the "free market," and then condemn it, is akin to citing polygamous, incestuous unions in some outlaw Mormon compound, then denouncing marriage. If we want to consider something close to genuinely free markets--in order to decide what we think about them--we need to look backward in history. England and Switzerland in the 19th century, for example. We can certainly point to miserable aspects of life in those times, and practices we might think it worth outlawing, even at the cost of "market distortions," such as child labor. But we need to consider the real consequences of each intervention, and determine if its costs, and the precedents it sets for future meddling by the State, justify its benefits. Simply moralizing in the absence of data is worthless.

R.C., a brilliant analysis as usual. I couldn't have said it better, or indeed half as well, myself. If there's somewhere you're writing articles, please share the link with us. If not, you really should start!

...like having the FDA and laws against child labor around.

Remember that Thomas Jefferson, while he was against a Federal Behemoth, distrusted Big Business equally.

I find this quasi-religious faith in "Free Markets" to be just as ridiculous as Socialist pretentions towards the "Benevolence" of government.

I remember during the debates on NAFTA and GATT, I wondered why it took 4000 and 10,000 pages respectively to define so-called "free trade." The same is true of the thousands (millions?) of government regulations that define our "free market" economy.

And of course, the markets where the regulators are most involved, like education and health care, are the ones where prices are most out of control and people are the least satisfied. In markets where they have less involvement, like footwear for instance, we have all kinds of choices at easy availability and reasonable prices. Funny how that works.

A strong argument exists that shows that the very non-free market interventions by the FDA has led to much greater harm than would otherwise have occurred if citizens were if allowed to make their own choices regarding medicines, procedures, devices, and providers, with market-provided information.

As for child labor, remove the emotional aspects of this issue and delve into why a child might have to work or not work in a particular society. The answer may surpise you.

I trust neither big government, little (local) government, big or small business. I, like Mr. Jefferson, trust freedom, rule of law, and property rights. These are the foundations of a truly free market.

A "faith" in free markets is simply a faith in your fellow man and in freedom itself.

<b>R.C.</b>,

Your comment that the use of the term <i>progressive</i> to describe what has come to be called <i>liberal</i> is "question-begging" if not "Orwellian" ignores the simple historical fact that by the time of FDR, if not somewhat earlier, the progressive movement that gave us Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson and Herber Hoover, and FDR, among others, was not liberal at all, in the sense in which it had been used in the 19th century. In fact, Wilson, <i>et al.</i>, who were demonstrably men of the left AND <i>progressives</i>, adopted the use of the term <i>liberal</i> to disguise their progressive policies, which had seriously lost favor with the electorate. Jonah Goldberg discusses this at length in his book <i>Liberal Fascism</i> (a title taken from a speech by the <i>progressive</i> writer H. G. Wells, in which he used it as an accolade.

Pax et bonum,
Keith Töpfer

Keith, thanks for your response.

But your response leaves me a bit bemused, inasmuch as it suggests I either don't know about Liberal Fascism, or have written something which disagrees with it.

I'm actually fairly familiar with the history to which you refer, and Goldberg's book, and the fact that by the era of the progressives you reference, the form of "liberalism" they were practicing in calling themselves liberals would have been unrecognizable to classical liberals of fifty years earlier.

This is why I often use the term left-liberal in referring to modern "liberals" (or what has been called "liberal" since the Wilson/FDR revision of the term). I wish to distinguish the modern American "liberal" from actual liberals, who would in modern American terminology fall more neatly into either the conservative or libertarian camps.

When I called the term "progressive" either question-begging or Orwellian, what I meant was that it dishonestly begged the question of whether any of the policies distinctive to what H.G.Wells described as liberal fascism in the last hundred years actually constituted an "progress" in the sense of an improvement.

I actually don't think any of them were improvements: Which makes the term Orwellian in an "war is peace/ignorance is strength" kind of way.

But at the very least it's open to debate whether "progressive" policies have ever produced progress, and until that debate has taken place, actually calling them "progressive" is question-begging.

That view is, I think, not at all incompatible with knowing and agreeing with the contents of Jonah Goldberg's book, of which I have only read excerpts, but from which no excerpt I've encountered has ever seemed, to me, to be anything but obvious good sense.

Thank you for the clarification. I, being a reader of Hayek, would agree that progressives have not produced any progress. But also being his student, I believe that using that earlier appellation for them has the advantage, if no other, of correctly identifying their genus. Further, given the fact that we know what the progressive fallacy is, it also ceases to flatter, but rather calls attention to that aspect of their behavior and beliefs which are neither more not less than a reiteration of original sin, i.e., believing that humans can be "like God," which is to say, be freed from the need for revelation as to what is good and what is evil.

At any rate, it would appear that you and I hold quite similar views.

Pax et bonum,
Keith Töpfer

I'm glad I found this great discussion. Thanks to those who commented for tying Mr. Tucker's observations to the teachings and messages (not always perfectly aligned) of the Church.

Unfortunately, the Church has been consistently sending mixed messages about economic systems and justice that can be used to justify a wide range of policies and political positions. It's time for some clear thinking and leadership, and as noted, She's been known to shine a light on some of the fundamental reasons free markets and limited government are morally superior to the alternatives conceived and attempted by man to date.

Obviously, what keeps tripping us up is how to balance liberty with justice, and in particular social justice and the fundamental option for the poor. We don't need to argue against responsibilities to the poor to know we are ending up in the wrong place if the Church seems to support bigger government. The recent health care debate is a good example. The bishops and other Church 'leaders' have treated this as if abortion coverage were the only issue, with an apparent neutral or supportive stance on the rest of the various proposals to regulate and take over health care.

Church teaching seems pretty clear. Theft is wrong, and it cannot be justified based on distributive justice objectives. What Tucker describes are various ways those in power are able to steal from average citizens who often can't see what is happening and are powerless to stop it. That some of the loot is destined for the poor is no justification. As the Catechism tells us, "Without commutative justice, no other form of justice is possible." Or to paraphrase MLK, injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere.

It's time for the Church to get this one right as powerfully as She has done on the Gospel of Life and Theology of the Body. If we get serious about commutative justice first, distributive justice next, subsidiarity always, we can lead through faith and reason to the right place.