RE: When Taxation Might be Necessary

From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Sun Jul 29 2001 - 22:30:29 MDT


I had written (not Mike Lorrey, despite its eloquence)

>Mike Lorrey [sic] wrote:
>> Namely, if your group already maintains a very high level of
>> liberty, and you don't want to lose it, then resistence to
>> [liberty-destroying] invaders damn near justifies any means.

Barbara responds

> IMO, your libertarian society is thereby doomed to become unfree. The
> problem is that the state power used to win wars is never dropped (not
> entirely) once the wars are won.

This is a strong possibility, but only that. It depends
on the cultural strength of the people involved, and
how well they understand liberty. On two occasions,
George Washington and his immediate staff relinquished
power (once right after the war, and once after his second
term in office). Also, I've heard libertarians claim that
the U.S. government actually became smaller and *less*
prone to interfere with liberty during the years 1800-1860.

But because the 18th century ideas of freedom and liberty
are so abstruse and counter-intuitive (even on this discussion
list sometimes), the odds of greater and greater government
control are extremely high.

Lee



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