Government: Because Some People Are Jerks
If you’re like me, you had a bedtime. As I got older, bedtime was gradually changed until my parents agreed that I was mature enough to decide when to go to bed on my own. I wanted my bedtime removed earlier, but I’ve always been a rule follower.
Most of my friends, and I’d assume most of you went through a similar process of parental governance. It’s one of the first markers of independence. The success of lifting bedtime though, is a wild card. Self-regulation is a tricky skill to master but one central to the American spirit.
That need for self-regulation and independence is at the heart of the conflict between the people and the government. It’s why so many political philosophies include “that government is best which governs least.” This quote is attributed to Thomas Jefferson, (though he probably wasn’t the originator) and was popularized by Henry David Thoreau among others. More recently, it has been taken up by the anti-regulation, small government end of our political spectrum. Anti-regulation arguments that boil down to “don’t tell me what to do,” use the above quote to justify the removal of any governance purely because it’s governance. It always seems odd to me that half the people in government think the government shouldn’t exist but that’s a digression for another day.
That interpretation of the maxim assumes that if the government wouldn’t tell us what to do, we the people would protect ourselves. Government is a superfluous and ultimately destructive force and we’d all be better off without it. That understanding is so close, but dangerously ignores the history and foundational logic of the country.
Our Declaration lists life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as the minimum universal rights for all persons. It continues, “…to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
The declaration says, everybody has certain intrinsic rights, not given by governments but protected by governments. Why do we need those rights protected? Well, because some people are jerks. To paraphrase John Locke, we have government to protect us from jerks that would steal our apples and push us down for laughs.
I’d like to believe in a world without jerks, but I’m not seeing it. Until we can actualize a jerk free world, we have government. That’s the first written argument in defense of this country existing.
That brings us back to our “governs least” quote. It’s interpreted backwards. It assumes that in the absence of government, the people will not be jerks. A better interpretation is if the people aren’t jerks, then the government can step back. Our responsibility as engaged citizens is to create a community that requires little regulation because of the lack of jerks, and then make sure the government steps back. Elected officials want the path of least resistance anyway. The less we require them to do, the happier we’ll all be.
If companies would care for their workers on their own, we wouldn’t need, OSHA, unions, and other agencies. If people could be trusted to drive safely and with consideration, we wouldn’t need traffic laws. If we could trust 4-year-olds, we wouldn’t need bedtimes.
I wanted no bedtime growing up. I had to first prove to my government (parents) that I could handle that removal of regulation and regulate myself. I want a small government. More specifically, I want to live in a world that doesn’t require a big government. We have to first prove that we can take care of ourselves. We have to prove we’re not jerks.
