Mondays with Murray: Rothbard on the "Social Contract"
Advocates of state intervention have a few tools in their rhetorical arsenal that they will often toss out when faced with a common dilemma: their inability to logically refute liberty and free market arguments often made by libertarians. Once they hit the logical wall, it's time for the next best thing: straw men and logical fallacies! A few common slams heard by the libertarian include "Why don't you just move to Somalia then??" and "Did you cash your check from the Koch Brothers yet?".And then, of course, comes the favorite. The be-all-end-all, no-way-those-pesky-libertarians-can-refute-this-one argument: "The Social Contract!" This refers to some sort of unspoken pact that all humankind shares, despite having never agreed to such a pact, that binds all of humanity together and can justify any sort of collective violence and trampling of individual rights that a Card Carrying Statist can dream up.As anyone who's happened upon this weekly column might imagine, Murray Rothbard was none too impressed with the "Social Contract" argument. He addresses this in his classic, must-read essay, Anatomy of the State:
The State has never been created by a "social contract"; it has always been born in conquest and exploitation. The classic paradigm was a conquering tribe pausing in its time-honored method of looting and murdering a conquered tribe, to realize that the time-span of plunder would be longer and more secure, and the situation more pleasant, if the conquered tribe were allowed to live and produce, with the conquerors settling among them as rulers exacting a steady annual tribute.[6] One method of the birth of a State may be illustrated as follows: in the hills of southern "Ruritania," a bandit group manages to obtain physical control over the territory, and finally the bandit chieftain proclaims himself "King of the sovereign and independent government of South Ruritania"; and, if he and his men have the force to maintain this rule for a while, lo and behold! a new State has joined the "family of nations," and the former bandit leaders have been transformed into the lawful nobility of the realm.
The social contract is illogical on many levels. Firstly, it completely flies in the face of the definition of a "contract" i.e. a voluntary agreement of terms between individuals or groups of individuals. Does anyone else remember signing this social contract?Even in the case where there is a loose "contract" of sorts, say in the case of the U.S. Constitution, this "contract" was only signed by 40 individuals. How could a contract such as this bind millions of people of that day, let alone hundreds of millions of future people that weren't even alive at the time?We can extend this almost all laws passed by the State. Politicians are elected by only a small portion of "the people", after being culled down to a small group of establishment-approved candidates in one of two "opposing" parties. These people "represent" us by passing laws that trump individual rights in the name of the collective, i.e. the State. These laws apply everyone within the jurisdiction of the United States, including future humans not yet born!All of this rhetoric - the "social contract", "political representation", "getting out the vote" serves one purpose: to drive home the point that "the people" - the individuals that make up a society - are the government. If the people and the government are one and the same, then the government can do anything. After all, if "the people" demand something, they are only demanding it of themselves, and for themselves!Again, Rothbard doesn't buy this line of thinking. In fact, he's been quite clear:We are not the government; and the government isn't us!
Check out our past editions of Mondays with Murray!12/16/13 - Statistics, the State's Achilles' Heel 12/9/13 - Where Would All the Scientists Go? 12/2/13 - Sell Out and Die11/25/13 - How did Murray Rothbard Become a Libertarian? 11/18/13 - Rothbard on JFK, LBJ and Crony Capitalism11/11/13 - Don't Underestimate the Shell Game of the Central Planners11/4/13 - Rothbard on the "Black Market Strategy"9/23/13 - The Influence of Rothbard10/28/13 - What Crimes Does the State Hate the Most?10/21/13 - Who Would Fund the Science?10/14/13 - A Strategy for Liberty10/7/13 - Rothbard on "Obamacare"9/30/13 - Rothbard on Ayn Rand9/16/13 - Around the World with Rothbard9/9/13 - Rothbard on Syria War Propaganda9/2/13 - Did Rothbard Approve of Torture?7/29/13 - Rothbard on Revolution7/29/13 - Rothbard on Revolution8/24/13 - Rothbard on "Libertarian Populism"8/17/13 - Rothbard on Libertarian Qualifiers8/12/13 - Rothbard on War Revisionism8/5/13 - Rothbard on George Will's Comments Regarding Libertarianism7/22/13 - Rothbard on the George Zimmerman Verdict7/15/13 - Rothbard on Orwell's "1984"7/8/13 - Rothbard on U.S. Aggression Foreign Aggression & Imperialism7/1/13 - Why Be Libertarian?6/24/13 - Rothbard's Conflicting Views on Thomas Jefferson6/17/13 - Who was the "best" U.S. President?6/10/13 - Rothbard on State Surveillance6/3/13 - Rothbard on Chomsky and "Anarcho-Syndicalism"5/27/13 - Rothbard on America's "Two Just Wars"5/20/13 - Do Animals Have "Rights"5/13/13 - A Further Insight on IP5/6/13 - The Boston Lockdown4/29/13 - The Problem with Empirical Studies4/22/13 - The Real Story of the Whiskey Rebellion4/15/13 - What is an Entrepreneur?4/8/13 - Rothbard on Intellectual Property4/1/13 - The Five Key Questions for the Libertarian Movement3/25/13 - The Six Stages of the Libertarian Movement3/18/13 - Rothbard on the Future Prospects for Liberty3/11/13 - Rothbard on Lysander Spooner3/4/13 – Rothbard on Statism2/25/13 – Rothbard on John Bolton and Ann Coulter2/18/13 – Rothbard vs. Krugman on $9 Minimum Wage2/11/13 – Time To Hoard Nickels2/4/13 - The Death of Keynesian Economics1/28/13 – Competition and Monopoly1/21/13 – Rothbard Down The Memory Hole?1/14/13 – We Are Not The Government1//7/13 – Why Does Someone Become A Statist?12/10/12 – Rothbard on Conspiracy Theory12/3/12 – Rothbard on Secession11/26/12 – Rothbard on the Drug War11/19/12 – Rothbard on the Euro Crisis11/12/12 – Rothbard on the Lions of Liberty11/5/12 – Rothbard on Voting and Gas Lines10/29/12 – Mythbusting the “Free Market Cartel”10/22/12 – Rothbard on the Two Party Charade10/15/12 – Rothbard on Private Roads10/8/12 – Rothbard on Private Law10/1/12 – Rothbard on Ron Paul9/24/12 – Rothbard on Quantitative EasingReceive access to ALL of our EXCLUSIVE bonus audio content – including “Conspiracy Corner”, “Degenerate Gamblers” and the “League of Liberty Podcast” by joining the Lions of Liberty Pride and supporting us on Patreon!
