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From: marks@Cascade.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Re: Libertarianism
Message-ID: <1597@Cascade.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 29-Nov-84 01:51:50 EST
Article-I.D.: Cascade.1597
Posted: Thu Nov 29 01:51:50 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Dec-84 19:54:27 EST
References: <1829@inmet.UUCP> <2812@ucbcad.UUCP> <2815@ucbcad.UUCP>
Organization: Stanford University
Lines: 51

> From: faustus@ucbcad.UUCP

> If you break tax laws then you get your bank account frozen.

... without due process of law.  "If you break tax laws..." is a judgement
that the IRS reserves unto itself.    The IRS has the power to hold property
without court order, without due process.  What happened to "innocent until
proven guilty?"
============================================================================
> Better yet, the govt should start selling stock in the post office 

You'd better think of another way.  Nobody would buy it! :-)
============================================================================
>> The mentality behind
>> it -- that property derives its legitimacy from one's compact with the
>> state -- was their target.
> From where does it derive its legitimacy then? Remember, there are NO rights
> in a state of nature, as you can see by looking at animal conceptions of
> rights. 

    "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are endowed by
    their creator certain unalienable rights ..."

				The Declaration of Independence

It is certainly NOT the function of government to "legitimize" (i.e. grant, 
control, revoke at will) the rights of the people.  Rights exist without
government, but it is likely that they will be violated.  That's why we have
government: to PROTECT our rights.
============================================================================
> ... anybody who is interested in both individual liberties
> and collective goods (like education) will take a long look at what
> he is considering eliminating from government.

Why is education a collective good?  The centralized control of distribution
of knowledge is a gigantic step away from freedom.  Government control of
education is a step towards totalitarianism.  Remember Newspeak and all that?

This view of education isn't only philosophical; it's practical, too.  Has
the quality of public education in this country risen in recent years?  NO!
Has its cost (per student, even after inflation (which is the government's
fault, by the way)) gone up?  YES!  I shall refrain from reiterating how a
private system could education EVERYONE better than a public system.

----------
Stuart Marks, Computer Systems Lab, Stanford University
    {ucbvax,decvax}!decwrl!glacier!marks, marks@su-cascade.ARPA

"The government is a great fiction whereby everybody tries to live at the
expense of everybody else." 
					-- Frederic Bastiat