Extremism in Defense of Liberty Is a Vice

Last updated on: August 4, 2019 at 5:26 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Extremism in Defense of Liberty Is a Vice 2019-08-04T17:26:53-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

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I am a conservative politically: a man of the Shire.

I don’t trust Ted Sandyman’s new mill that pollutes. I am for the trees, even if nobody else is. If Arthur returns to save Britain, then God save the King. I love liberty and would rather err on the side of liberty than law.

Yet extremism in defense of liberty is a vice, despite what Barry Goldwater said. I would have voted for him, of course, as Lyndon Johnson was tyrannical, a war monger, a misogynist, and a fool*, but Goldwater was wrong to have anything good to say about extremism. I think he came to regret it, but only because he ended a libertine worried that some other extremist would reign in his vice.

Extremism in defense of anything is a vice.

Again, against Lyndon Johnson*, misogynist, grifter, reckless in war, anyone seemed preferable, and I would have voted for Goldwater, but Goldwater put a seed of folly in conservatism. Extremism is contrary to the prudence that is the virtue that is foundational to conservatism. Prudence is not cool, ever, fun, never, but necessary always.

Extremism is easy, the immediate reaction to injustice. Lyndon Johnson did a great deed when he crushed state based segregation, but he used the good he did to hide his vice. God help us all. Johnson should never be forgotten for the good he did in the Civil Rights Act, but this does not fully justify his political vices.

He did get the big thing right, so like another flawed man Churchill, we can honor him, but perhaps he did not earn our vote!

If the Republican Party, which still had a significant African-American vote, could have challenged Johnson’s vice with Garfield’s Republican virtue, then all would have been well. Instead, Goldwater pandered to populism and planted a seed that would bear foul fruit. The Republican Party, which helped pass the Civil Rights Act, did not embrace that victory and attack Johnson’s excess. Instead, the Party attacked both the good and the bad.

Extremism always leads to vice, because passion ends up trumping reason. Reason checks passion and guides us toward the truth. Extreme liberty ends up in decadence. Extreme law ends up in tyranny. This is what history teaches, but Goldwater missed the weakness of unbridled liberty, just as Johnson ignored the danger of law. Johnson and Goldwater were the same: extremists.

How can liberty be dangerous?

Liberty is good. We should all have choice. Consent is a basis of love. Every citizen of a Republic is a sovereign. God save the citizen! The problem with extremism regarding these truths is that it will not allow for another truth: there is a madness in mobs and sometimes the citizens become a mob. We ignore data, competence, and allow absolute liberty to corrupt us.

The result will often be to destroy liberty. As extremists push far past what a fundamentally decent man like Goldwater would have tolerated, the state must clamp down. Freedoms are lost and once lost rarely recovered. Extremism in defense of liberty often leads to a loss of liberty.

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*The Lord works in mysterious ways and so God bless the Civil Rights Act. No Garfield Republican can fail to be thankful.

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