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Dagnabbit! ‘Dat Pesky Socialist Wabbit!

Dagnabbit! ‘Dat Pesky Socialist Wabbit!

Last updated on: February 17, 2016 at 6:38 pm by Melinda Selmys

Dagnabbit! ‘Dat Pesky Socialist Wabbit! 2016-02-17T18:38:23-04:00 Melinda Selmys

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I’ve been challenged by a gentleman writing under the name of Dagnabbit to respond to a more robust defense of the conservative/libertarian view than that which I addressed earlier. Dagnabbit’s comment is long, and it would take more than one blog entry to adequately address all of his points so I’m going to confine myself to dealing with the question of what government is, and whether the redistribution of wealth through taxation is a just practice.

I’m going to rely heavily on the Compendium of the Social Teaching of the Church a document which I highly recommend for anyone pursuing these questions. I use it because it’s an easy way to find a lot of information brought together in a single place, however I’m not relying on it as my sole source of Church teaching in this matter. The research for my book Slave of Two Masters involved reading all of the social encyclicals of the past 100+ years, as well as all of the Biblical passages dealing with money, and the writings of numerous saints on these issues, and I simply cannot see that the conservative/libertarian doctrine which circulates in right-wing Catholic circles is compatible with the deposit of faith.

Dagnabbit writes:

“Now, what is Government?

At its best — and when it is most in accord with Natural Law and the teachings of the Catholic Church — the Government is that voluntary-membership association in our society through which we collectively hire employees to administer and execute a particular kind of authority, which we delegate to them; namely, the authority to use proportionate force to defend innocent persons (themselves or others) against wrongful attacks on their life, health, freedom, dignity, et cetera.

That’s what (earthly) government just is.”

This is not the teaching of the Church. The Church explicitly teaches that government is a natural good.

“The Church has always considered different ways of understanding authority, taking care to defend and propose a model of authority that is founded on the social nature of the person. “Since God made men social by nature, and since no society can hold together unless some one be over all, directing all to strive earnestly for the common good, every civilized community must have a ruling authority, and this authority, no less than society itself, has its source in nature, and has, consequently, God for its author”. Political authority is therefore necessary because of the responsibilities assigned to it. Political authority is and must be a positive and irreplaceable component of civil life.” (Compendium of the Social Teaching of the Church, 393)

The fact that civil authority is a natural good, as opposed to a necessary corrective for evi, means that its exercise cannot be primarily concerned with the use of force. If men act in accord with the natural law, no use of force will ever be proportionate or necessary – and yet government will remain a natural good. Why? Because the actual purpose of government is to organize human activity. In the state of perfection you would still need organization, even though you would not need compulsion. The monopoly on the use of force is therefore a necessary means of protecting the community, but it is by no means the essence of government.

The Church doesn’t see government as primarily a means by which people are forcibly compelled to particular types of action, but rather primarily as a means by which people are organized together for the common good. Democracy is especially praised in the documents of the Church because it represents a means of permitting this kind of organization while at the same time preserving the autonomy of the individual. The use of force is only just and necessary to secure this end when people choose to disobey legitimate authority for illegitimate reasons. Throughout Scripture we are instructed to behave obediently towards civil leadership except when, for reasons of conscience, we are unable to do so.

For a Catholic citizen this means that we do not pay our taxes or submit to legitimate civil authority because otherwise they will come for us with guns. The guns only matter in the case of those who choose criminal disobedience. We obey the laws because it is our moral duty to do so, and the legitimately constituted civil authority has the right to demand our obedience because it has the moral authority to compel us. “Submission, not passive but “for the sake of conscience” (Rom 13:5), to legitimate authority responds to the order established by God.” (ibid 380) This moral dimension of civil society is the foundation of the secular authority. If you get into a situation where people participate in civic life only because they fear compulsive force, or where the government must rely on the use of compulsive force in order to secure popular cooperation, this indicates a severe disorder in the state. Such disorders do not reflect the natural or proper conduct of either government or citizens.

Now, it is true that there is a risk of the state intervening excessively in economic life:

“With a view to the common good, it is necessary to pursue always and with untiring determination the goal of a proper equilibrium between private freedom and public action, understood both as direct intervention in economic matters and as activity supportive of economic development. In any case, public intervention must be carried out with equity, rationality and effectiveness, and without replacing the action of individuals, which would be contrary to their right to the free exercise of economic initiative. In such cases, the State becomes detrimental to society: a direct intervention that is too extensive ends up depriving citizens of responsibility and creates excessive growth in public agencies guided more by bureaucratic logic than by the goal of satisfying the needs of the person,” (ibid, 738).

Has this happened in some countries that have adopted a more socialist form of government? Absolutely. Does that constitute a reasonable grounds for claiming that public welfare spending is in itself problematic? Absolutely not. As the Church says, “it is necessary to pursue…the goal of proper equilibrium between private freedom and public action.” You can’t justify an excess by pointing to the opposite excess: a person who suffers from aneorexia is not right to starve himself for fear of becoming like those who suffer from obesity. Virtue lies in negotiating a proper balance, not in running to one extreme in order to avoid the other.

This is evident, for example, in the Church’s teaching regarding capitalism. John Paul II, discussing the question of whether capitalism ought to be recommended, writes,

“If by “capitalism” is meant an economic system which recognizes the fundamental and positive role of business, the market, private property and the resulting responsibility for the means of production, as well as free human creativity in the economic sector, then the answer is certainly in the affirmative, even though it would perhaps be more appropriate to speak of a “business economy”, “market economy” or simply “free economy”. But if by “capitalism” is meant a system in which freedom in the economic sector is not circumscribed within a strong juridical framework which places it at the service of human freedom in its totality, and which sees it as a particular aspect of that freedom, the core of which is ethical and religious, then the reply is certainly negative.” (Centisimus Annus, 42) Note that he calls for a “strong juridical framework,” and indeed, if you read the social encyclicals of the Church you will find that attention is consistently drawn towards the problem of human greed, and the necessity of adequate legislation and government intervention to curb those excesses.

Dagnabbit writes:

“What we are doing when we institute a welfare state is that we are hiring some of our fellow citizens to go and point a gun at other fellow citizens, take their money, and give it to still other fellow citizens.”

This is based, first, on the false understanding of political authority that I described above, but also on a false understanding of the legitimate action of political authority when it comes to the redistribution of wealth.

“Tax revenues and public spending take on crucial economic importance for every civil and political community. The goal to be sought is public financing that is itself capable of becoming an instrument of development and solidarity. Just, efficient and effective public financing will have very positive effects on the economy, because it will encourage employment growth and sustain business and non-profit activities and help to increase the credibility of the State as the guarantor of systems of social insurance and protection that are designed above all to protect the weakest members of society.

Public spending is directed to the common good when certain fundamental principles are observed: the payment of taxes as part of the duty of solidarity; a reasonable and fair application of taxes; precision and integrity in administering and distributing public resources. In the redistribution of resources, public spending must observe the principles of solidarity, equality and making use of talents. It must also pay greater attention to families, designating an adequate amount of resources for this purpose.” (Compendium, 355)

“Authentic economic well-being is pursued also by means of suitable social policies for the redistribution of income which, taking general conditions into account, look at merit as well as at the need of each citizen.” (ibid, 303*)*

Redistribution of wealth, when undertaken in solidarity, in a way that respects the general rights of citizens to private property, and when it provides for the genuine needs of the weak and marginalized, is not unjust. It is not theft. Why? Because the right to private property is not absolute. “The right to private property, acquired or received in a just way, does not do away with the original gift of the earth to the whole of mankind. The universal destination of goods remains primordial, even if the promotion of the common good requires respect for the right to private property and its exercise.” (CCC 2403)

Simply put, nobody comes to be wealthy by means solely of their own activity and merit. All wealth is acquired by taking something which originally belongs to the whole human race and claiming it as a private possession. It’s okay, in fact it’s good, to do this – but only provided you recognize that you then have an obligation to the rest of the community in justice. Not merely in solidarity. Not merely out of the good will of your own heart. Not as an expression of superabounding charity. What you own, you own for the sake of the common good: “In his use of things man should regard the external goods he legitimately owns not merely as exclusive to himself but common to others also,” (Gaudium et Spes, 69).

It is because the universal destination of goods is primordial that political authority, organized for the common good and representing the community, has the right to justly redistribute wealth. It is not a matter of taking from a man what is his by force, but rather of demanding from a man what rightly belongs to the whole community. Taxation in this case is the calling in of a debt to the community. People should pay these debts willingly in the recognition that they themselves have benefited from a common heritage and from the universal gift of the earth, and that they therefore have an obligation in justice towards their fellow man.

Of course, some people may choose not to pay their just debts. In such cases it is obviously not only proportionate but also necessary for legitimate authority to use compulsion to ensure that debts are paid. If you think about this in the private sphere, it’s obvious: if businesses could not be compelled to pay dividends to their investors, borrowers could not be compelled to pay back their loans, and employers could not be compelled to pay wages to their employees the entire social order would fall apart. This is no less true in the case of taxation, through which the debts owed by citizens for the advantages that they gain from the public good, are secured. Debts which include, as per the Catechism, that which is owed to the poor for the maintenance of their basic needs.

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