A Review of Murray N.
Rothbard’s Conceived in Liberty, Vol. 5
The posthumous release
of Murray Rothbard’s fifth volume of his early American history series, Conceived in Liberty, is a
cause of celebration not only for those interested in the country’s
constitutional period, but also for the present day as the nation is faced with
acute social, economic, and political crises. The fifth volume, The New Republic: 1784-1791, stands with Boston T. Party’s 1997 release, Hologram of Liberty, as a grand rebuttal of the
cherished notion held by most contemporary scholars, pundits on the Right, and,
surprisingly, many libertarians who believe that the US Constitution is some
great bulwark in defense of individual liberty and a promoter of economic
success.
Rothbard’s narrative highlights the crucial years after the
American Revolution focusing on the events and personalities that led to the
calling for, drafting, and eventual promulgation of the Constitution in
1789. Not only does he describe the key factors that led to the creation
of the American nation-state, but he gives an insightful account of the
machinations which took place in Philadelphia and a trenchant analysis of the
document itself which has become, in the eyes of most conservatives, on a par
with Holy Writ.
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While Rothbard writes
in a lively and engaging manner, the eventual outcome and triumph of the
nationalist forces leaves the reader with a certain sadness. Despite the fears expressed
by the Antifederalists that the new government was too powerful and would lead
to tyranny, through coercion, threats, lies, bribery, and arm twisting by the
politically astute Federalists, the Constitution came into being.
Yet, what if it had been the other way around and the forces against it had
prevailed?It is safe to assume that America would have been a far more
prosperous and less war-like place. The common held notion that the Constitution was needed to keep
peace among the contending states is countered by Rothbard, who points out a
number of instances where states settled their differences, most notably
Maryland and Virginia as they came to an agreement on the navigation of the
Chesapeake Bay. [129-30]Without a powerful central state to extract
resources and manpower, overseas intervention by the country would have been
difficult to undertake. Thus, the US’s disastrous participation in the
two world wars would have been avoided. Furthermore, it would have been
extremely unlikely for a Confederation Congress to impose an income tax as the
federal government successfully did through a constitutional amendment in 1913.
Nor would the horrific misnamed “Civil War” ever take place with its immense
loss of life and the destruction of the once flourishing Southern
civilization. The triumph of the Federal government ended forever “states
rights” in the US and, no doubt, inspired centralizing tendencies throughout
the world, most notably in Germany which became unified under Prussian
domination.
In a failed attempt in
1786 to enact an impost tax under the Confederation, Abraham Yates, a New York
lawyer and prominent Antifederalist, spoke of decentralization as the key to
liberty as Rothbard aptly summarizes:
Yates also warned that true republicanism can only be preserved
in small states, and
keenly pointed out that in the successful Republics of
Switzerland and the
Netherlands the local provinces retained full control over their
finances. A taxing
power in Congress would demolish state sovereignty and reduce
the states, where
the people could keep watch on their representatives, to mere
adjuncts of
congressional power, and liberty would be gone. [64]
Antifederalists, such
as Yates, had a far greater understanding of how liberty and individual rights
would be protected than their statist opponents such as Alexander Hamilton and
James Madison. The Antifederalists looked to Europe as a model, which,
for most of its history, was made up of decentralized political configurations.
The Federalists, on the other hand, got much of their inspiration from the
Roman Republic and later Empire. There is little question that an
America, with the political attributes of a multi-state Europe, would be far
less menacing to both its own inhabitants and to the rest of the world than
what it has become under the current Federal Leviathan if the Constitution
never passed.
Speculation aside,
historical reality meant that America would be fundamentally different than it
would have been had the Articles of Confederation survived, as Rothbard points
out:
The enactment of the Constitution in 1788 drastically changed
the course of
American history from its natural decentralized and libertarian
direction to an
omnipresent leviathan that fulfilled all of the Antifederalists’
fears. [312]
Limited Government Myth
One of the great myths surrounding the American
Constitution – which continues within conservative circles to this very day –
is that the document limits government
power. After reading Rothbard, such a notion can only be considered a
fairy tale!
The supposed “defects”
of the Articles of Confederation were adroitly used by the wily nationalists as
a cover to hide their real motives. Simply put – the Articles had to be
scrapped and a new national government, far more
powerful than what had existed under the Articles, had to be created as
Rothbard asserts: “The nationalists who went into the convention agreed on
certain broad objectives, crucial for a new government, all designed to remodel
the United States into a country with the British political structure.”
[145]
In passing the
Constitution, the nationalist forces gained almost all they had set out to
accomplish – a powerful central state and with it a strong chief executive
office, and the destruction of the states as sovereign entities. The supposed “checks
and balances,” so much beloved by Constitution enthusiasts, has proven
worthless in checking the central state’s largesse. Checks and balances
exist within the central government and is not offset by
any prevailing power, be it the states or citizenry.
There was no reform of
the system as it stood, but a new state was erected on the decentralized
foundation of the Confederation. Why the idea of the founding fathers as
some limited government proponents is a mystery.
The Chief Executive
As it developed, the
Presidency has become the most powerful and, thus, the most dangerous office in
the world. While its occupants certainly took advantage of situations and
created crises themselves over the years, the Presidency, especially in foreign
policy, is largely immune from any real oversight either from the legislature
or judiciary. This was not by happenstance. From the start, the
nationalists envisioned a powerful executive branch, and though the most
extreme among the group were eventually thwarted in their desire to recreate a
British-style monarchy in America, the final draft of the Constitution granted
considerable power to the presidential office.
As they did throughout
the Constitutional proceedings, the nationalists cleverly altered the concept
of what an executive office in a republic should be, by subtle changes in the
wording of the document as Rothbard incisively explains:
[T]he nationalists proceeded to alter . . . and exult the
executive in a highly
important textual change. Whenever the draft had stated
that the president ‘may
recommend’ measures to the Congress, the convention changed
‘may’ to ‘shall,’
which provided a ready conduit to the president for wielding
effective law-making
powers, while the legislature was essentially reduced to a
ratification agency of laws
proposed by the president. [190-91]
As if this was not bad
enough the office was given the ability to create departments within its own
domain.
In another fateful change, the president was given the power to
create a
bureaucracy within the executive by filling all offices not
otherwise provided for in
the Constitution, in addition to
those later created by laws. [191]
The totalitarian
federal agencies that plague the daily lives of Americans were not some later
innovation by the Progressive movement or New Dealers, but had been provided
for within the document itself. The efforts of those opposed to the
various social welfare schemes of the past, which have been put into effect
through the various Cabinet departments, have been in vain since the power was
given to the Presidency and has been taken advantage of by nearly all of its
occupants.
Rothbard’s analysis of
the chief executive office is especially pertinent since the nation is once
again in the midst of another seemingly endless presidential election
cycle. The reason that the office has attracted so many of the worst sort
(which is being kind) is because of its power. If elected, the ability to
control, regulate, impoverish, and kill not only one’s fellow citizen, but
peoples across the globe is an immense attraction for sociopaths!
A Coup d’état and
Counter Revolution
Rothbard makes the compelling case that the Constitution
was a counter revolution, which was a betrayal of the ideology that brought
about the Revolution:
The Americans were struggling not primarily for independence but
for political-
economic liberty against the mercantilism of the British
Empire. The struggle was
waged against taxes, prohibitions, and regulations – a whole
failure of repression
that the Americans, upheld by an ideology of liberty, had fought
and torn
asunder. . . . [T]he American Revolution was in
essence not so much against Britain
as against British Big Government – and specially against an
all-powerful central
government and a supreme executive. [307]
He continues:
[T]he American Revolution was liberal, democratic, and
quasi-anarchistic; for
decentralization, free markets, and individual liberty; for
natural rights of
life, liberty, and property; against monarchy, mercantilism, and
especially
against strong central government. [307-08]
There was, however,
always a “conservative” element within the revolutionary leadership that admired
Great Britain and wanted to replicate it in America. It was only when
there was no alternative to British political and economic oppression that they
joined with their more liberal-libertarian brethren and decided for
independence.
Conservatives did not
go away after independence, but would continue to push for an expansion of
government under the Articles and finally, after most of their designs were
consistently thwarted, did they scheme to impose a powerful central state upon
the unsuspecting country.
Yet, they would not
have triumphed had a number of key liberal-libertarians of the revolutionary
generation moved to the Right during the decade following independence.
Rothbard shows why he is the master in power-elite historical analysis in his discussion
of this tragic shift, which would spell the death knell to any future
politically decentralized America:
[O]ne of the . . . reasons for the defeat of the
Antifederalists, though they
commanded a majority of the public, was the decimation that had taken
place in
radical and liberal leadership during the 1780s. A whole
galaxy of ex-radicals, ex-
decentralists, and ex-libertarians, found in their old age that
they could comfortably
live in the new Establishment. The list of such defections
is impressive, including
John Adams, Sam Adams, John Hancock, Benjamin Rush, Thomas
Paine, Alexander
McDougall, Isaac Sears, and Christopher Gadsden. [308-09]
As the country’s elite
became more statist and as political (Shays Rebellion) and economic (a
depression) factors played into their hands, conservatives seized the
opportunity to erect on America a powerful national government:
It was a bloodless coup d’état against
an unresisting Confederation Congress. . . .
The drive was managed by a corps of brilliant members and
representatives
of the financial and landed oligarchy. These wealthy
merchants and large
landowners were joined by the urban artisans of the large cities
in their
drive to create a strong overriding central government – a
supreme government
with its own absolute power to tax, regulate commerce, and raise
armies. [306]
Conclusion
The Mises Institute
and the editor of the book, Patrick Neumann, must be given immense credit for
bringing this important piece of scholarship into print. Once read, any
notion of the “founding fathers” as disinterested statesmen who sublimated
their own interests and that of their constituents to that of their country
will be disavowed. Moreover, The New Republic:1784-1791 is
the most important in the series since the grave crises that the nation now
faces can be traced to those fateful days in Philadelphia when a powerful
central state was created.
Volume Five shows that the problems of America’s past and
the ones it now faces are due to the Constitution. The remedy to the present
societal ills is not electing the “right” congressman, or president, but to
“devolve” politically into a multitude of states and jurisdictions. For the future of
liberty and economic well-being, this is where efforts should be placed and
Murray Rothbard’s final volume of Conceived in Liberty is essential reading if
that long, arduous, but much necessary task is to be undertaken.
Originally published at Antonius
Aquinas.
Copyright
© Antonius
Aquinas
