Near the top of my long and ever-growing list of pet peeves is articles titled, “The Conservative Case for [Insert Radical and/or Libertarian Proposal Here].” It’s an iron-clad rule that before you even read the article you can be assured of two things: (1) the case is not conservative and (b) that the writer is a libertarian. I’ve never seen an exception.
My all-time favorite example is Andrew Sullivan’s “The Conservative Case for Gay Marriage.” His justification for radically redefining one of the oldest institutions in human history is that it will help homosexuals connect sex with love and commitment. (Seriously, that’s his argument.) Whether that reason is good or bad, justifiable or indefensible is debatable. That there is nothing particularly conservative about it is indisputable.
Libertarians recognize that making “The Libertarian Case for Libertarian Idea Du Jour” is not going to generate much interest. So they make the slight semantic shift under the assumption that most people will be fooled or intrigued enough to give them a hearing. In the case of Warren Meyer’s recent piece for Forbes, a double shift occurs. Although the article is titled “The Conservative Case for Immigration,” the real title, as Ramesh Ponnuru notes, should be “The Conservative Case for Open Borders.”
Of course the title it more interesting than the argument, which is the standard libertarian case for open borders: Business owners should have the absolute right to hire labor from anywhere in the world and bring them to America to live like second-class citizens. The only surprising thing about the op-ed is that Meyer seems to think that conservatives should come to the exact same conclusion about the issue as open-borders advocating libertarians.
Sadly, he isn’t the only one that makes that mistake. Recently the new star of the GOP, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, was asked to name the best five books on conservatism. His list Frederick Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom, Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose, Charles Murray’s What It Means to Be a Libertarian, Mancur Olson’s The Rise and Decline of Nations, and Virginia Postrel’s The Future and Its Enemies.
While these are all worthy books, they all share a unique trait in common: they were written by libertarians advocating libertarian positions. Mitch Daniels was asked to name the five best books on conservatism and instead he lists five books on libertarianism. He even has the termerity to say that he should have included Hayek’s “Why I’m Not a Conservative”(!) It’s like if someone were asked to list the five best books on Catholicism and they listed works by John Calvin, Martin Luther, John Wesley, Jonathan Edwards, and C.S. Lewis.
In the interview the also admits that he’s a libertarian, which sheds new light on the his recent comment that “the next president will “have to call a truce on the so-called social issues.” (Joseph Bottum rips into Daniels in his most recent On the Square feature.)
So why does it matter that libertarians are trying to pass themselves off as conservatives? After all, they’ve been doing it ever since the day’s when the libertarian Goldwater had his (conservative) ghostwriter title his book The Conscience of a Conservative. What’s new about it today?
One difference is that while libertarians are a political minority, they hold an outsized influence on and within the right-leaning intellectual elite. (Disagree? Quick: Think of a prominent economist on the right that isn’t a libertarian or that is an outspoken social conservative.) By shifting the terminology—call themselves conservative while supporting libertarian ideas—they will eventually reshape the conservative movement into their own image. This should be viewed with great trepidation by those of us who believe that the most important issues of the day are not the GDP and open borders but protecting the sanctity of life and marriage.
See also: Social Conservatives, Libertarians, and Russell Kirk and Virtue Ethics and Broken Windows or Why I Am Not a Libertarian
July 7th, 2010 | 9:26 am
Your main point, and it is well taken, is that there is that conservatism and libertarianism are not equivalent, and it is worth making an effort not to conflate the terms.
But in the example of immigration, it’s not clear at all to me that a virtue ethics based conservatism leads to tight immigration restrictions; in fact I seem to come to the opposite conclusion. The fact is I can’t understand the broad conservative opposition to immigration at all.
July 7th, 2010 | 9:45 am
I’m another pro-”immigration” conservative but this article is spot on. The fact is that our country was founded on ideas that in fact lead to libertarianism, more than to conservatism, and thus American conservatives find themselves torn between the two ways. Still, it’s wrong to ease the tension by redefining liberalism as conservative.
July 7th, 2010 | 11:51 am
Here’s an exception:
http://www.cardus.ca/comment/article/233
July 7th, 2010 | 12:44 pm
I agree whole heartedly that libertarians are not conservatives and conservatives are NOT libertarians. While no self-respecting libertarian would pretend to be a conservative I have noticed an influx of big government conservatives (are their really any other kind?) claiming to be libertarian.
Free markets encourage the very kind of social change that conservatives oppose and I suggest that is the reason why conservatives have been such ineffective defenders of free markets—their hearts just aren’t in it. And, when in power, conservatives have proven themselves to be advocates of expanded state power in both the economic and social realms.
July 7th, 2010 | 1:37 pm
One of the interesting things about the conservative/liberal (classical sense) distinction is that in large part it depends on where you are.
If I found myself living in, say, China, I would be a radical liberal. Certainly I wouldn’t be conserving any of the traditions of the Chinese in advocating life, liberty, property, the pursuit of happiness etc.
But in the United States I am a conservative. I overlap with libertarians (basically the Anglo-American word for Classical Liberals) on many principles (less government intrusion, freer markets) but only to the extent that those have been the hallmarks of American civil life since Plymouth rock.
I think a great part of the trouble comes from conservatism being taken too literally. People latch onto libertarianism because it lets them advocate positively for a position that does not exist. Such people have an awful hard time calling someone like Margaret Thatcher a conservative because she broke down the economic structures of post-war Britain. But this is the narrow view of Conservatism, and especially one that doesn’t understand the power of change. There’s a fantastic quote from Edmund Burke that I will have to paraphrase but basically says “change, properly directed, and derived from a need generally felt, is the most powerful tool of conservatism.” I think that’s about right.
People who would otherwise be conservative throw on the libertarian hat every time they want to change something, and then think that the only way to “get things done” is to keep that hat on all the time. But then to get actual conservatives on board they have to make “the conservative case for X.”
July 7th, 2010 | 1:45 pm
There is a reason Mexicans come here illegally, they, excepting an exceedingly small class, cannot come legally. So they are left with the unenviable choice between staying in their country, where gang warfare, corruption and poverty are rampant, and passing illegally into this country.
July 7th, 2010 | 3:04 pm
“By shifting the terminology—call themselves conservative while supporting libertarian ideas—they will eventually reshape the conservative movement into their own image.”
As far as I can tell, that’s already happened. Note, for instance, how most conservatives already take it for granted that a free market and limited government are conservative positions. There’s nothing inherently anti-conservative about tweaking the market or expanding the government to conserve one’s social policies.
July 7th, 2010 | 3:39 pm
It is worth noting that Milton Friedman himself stated that you cannot have both open boarders and a welfare state. You can have one or the other, but not both.
July 7th, 2010 | 4:26 pm
I get that there’s a distinction between libertarians and conservatives, though I’m not convinced (yet, anyway) that it’s comparable the distinction between Protestant and Catholic. I seem to recall burnings at the stake, hung-drawn-quartering, that kind of thing.
I think libertarian thinking has influenced the Right in America, overall. And I think often for the better. But, it seems a stretch to say that libertarians will remake (or have remade) conservatism as a libertarian movement. Partly because conservatism is more than economics.
July 7th, 2010 | 5:26 pm
Modern American conservatism was a “fusionism” of moral traditionalists, economic libertarians, and cold warriors. It was a tensive fusion, but a fusion nonetheless. So, it seems that one cannot simply define conservatism and libertarianism mutually exclusive alternatives.
July 7th, 2010 | 10:22 pm
When you said this:
“One difference is that while libertarians are a political minority, they hold an outsized influence on and within the right-leaning intellectual elite.”
I was about to disagree until you said this:
“(Disagree? Quick: Think of a prominent economist on the right that isn’t a libertarian or that is an outspoken social conservative.)”
Like this piece of your article, there are probably a few other chunks I might come around to.
Great post. Thanks for giving me something to chew on.
July 8th, 2010 | 12:24 am
Surely conservatism is not about resisting change, it is about not changing for its own sake? Wilberforce was a Tory, but he made a principled stand against slavery that was quite integrated into his own belief system; he wasn’t putting on a libertarian hat, was he?
There is a sense in which cultures and regimes which fight tooth and nail to prevent social change (for instance, Franco’s Spain) are conservative – but it is a very frail kind of conservatism. To expand upon Chesterton, to be a conservative is to believe that our grandfathers have a vote – as do our grandsons. That means not throwing out conventions that have served us well without good reason, and bequeathing to our descendants a society which is well ordered. This is in stark contrast to any number of radical regimes (and well illustrates why a lot of “ultra-conservative” movements, like the Taliban, are actually profoundly radical).
Conservatives also tend to believe in free associations, like political parties, religion and, yes, trade unions (where they are truly free, and not coerced, as they so often are, in all instances), which allow people to invest their own resources in bettering society as they understand it. Within reasonable bounds, this drives organic change in society, rather than top-down disruption. Likewise, conservatives tend to see a well-ordered, law-abiding society as an asset which allows human flourishing, rather than a brake on revolutionary change.
This suggests several natural points of connexion with libertarianism, and a couple of points of departure. Both movements see excessive state intervention in the citizen’s life as a negative thing, which is a huge issue in Western societies at the moment. While conservatives might be more accepting of taxes than libertarians, neither is comfortable with the massive transfer of power to the state that high taxes allow. Conservatives are often supportive of limited welfare transfers that reinforce helpful social patterns, like maternity payments, but share the libertarian’s mistrust of the welfare state; the conservative is perhaps more concerned by the social evils which often flow from it, whereas the libertarian is more concerned by the abstract issues of personal agency.
The points of difference, however, are stark. Libertarianism sees the state’s main roles as the defence of the realm and the enforcement of private contracts, whereas conservatism sees the state’s role as supporting the social order; the two are very divergent views. Conservatism’s acceptance of multiple foci of social legitimacy and indeed authority within society (the family, the Church, the sports club, etc.) squeezes the state out of many aspects of private life. Paradoxically, a consistently libertarian society would see the state, as the final enforcer of private contracts, being more involved in an individual’s life, as the other associations are frozen out. Think about marriage; for a conservative, this goes far beyond a private contract to include a raft of social, religious and familial expectations, and yet this is what the libertarian reduces it to.
As for migration? A conservative sees society as something that has developed over time, and a massive (or worse, uncontrolled) influx of migrants, even decent folk, threatens to radically disrupt the existing order, whereas an ordered process of migration allows society to absorb the newcomers and change in a healthy way. For the libertarian, society doesn’t get a say, and the rights of the individual migrant are paramount.
In any case, the many points of agreement between conservatives and libertarians are sufficient to explain their habitual political alliance. The various movements on the left tend to be authoritarian in general, even where they are committed to specific freedoms which coincide with libertarian concerns (like sexual freedoms, or uncontrolled migration); they are thus a less natural fit for libertarians.
July 8th, 2010 | 12:02 pm
On explaining the lack of socially conservative economists, that’s an easy one. Economics makes as one of its most basic assumptions the idea that the satisfaction of individual preferences is a valid measure of individual welfare. Real social conservatives are repelled at the implications of such an idea, which explicitly entered the field with the writings of John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham. It might well be easier to be a conservative sociologist than a conservative economist.
I do have to wonder what the genuinely conservative argument against immigration is, though. Immigration restrictions owed much more historically to Progressives, eugenicists and labor organizers than to conservatives. America’s traditions strongly support having reasonably open borders.
July 8th, 2010 | 12:21 pm
Good article.
…and I’m loving “First Things” little nod to the existence of Social Media – I think I’ll be using that “LIKE” button quite a bit.
July 8th, 2010 | 12:31 pm
The various movements on the left tend to be authoritarian in general
No, the various movements on the left tend to support government regulation of economic activity. That is what makes them a mismatch with libertarians. Unless you redefine “authoritarian” as “someone who supports government regulation of economic activity” (or worse, you are using it as a synonym for socialist or communist) I don’t see your claim getting much traction when it comes into contact with the facts.
People on both sides can be authoritarian when given the chance. Conservative darling Michelle Malkin wrote an extremely bad piece of history defending FDR’s internment of Japanese-Americans. That strikes me as a bit authoritarian in nature (although, as a point against me, she is defending the wartime policies of a liberal hero). One would have to entirely re-write history to ignore the critical role the Left played in the Civil Rights Movement. This is not to downplay the non-leftists who took part in the movement as well but just have a look at the biographies of Dr. King’s closest friends and advisers (Farmer, Rustin, Randolf, Baker, etc) before you disagree.
The ACLU is much loathed in these circles but it was started to oppose the authoritarianism of the Wilson Administration and on more than a few occasions over the years has found itself with allies on both the left and right.
July 8th, 2010 | 2:54 pm
Let me be clear: I am conservative, socially and fiscally and temperamentally.
Libertarians are conservative allies. They have a less-than fully developed political philosophy, yes, but politics is the art of the possible. Avoiding unnecessary and unproductive fights with friends is not gutless, it’s prudent. I don’t apply a sophisticated Zagat’s critique to my in-laws’ cooking at family events either, bland or unhealthy though it may be.
This is where Mr. Carter and Mr. Bottum err. We come to these fora to defend principles against a culture that does not respect them or their sources (“first things”). Indeed, the entire purpose of this site’s “public square” mission is just such a thorough defense. But to apply our purpose to the politician’s duty or the ally’s disagreement is a category mistake, the mistake of the single-issue “let justice be done though the heavens fall” zealot. Justice is the god of the left. We worship The Good.
We should all be fully on-board with Mitch Daniels’s idea of a truce, whether he is a conservative or a libertarian. Gov. Daniels has a conservative temperament, the soul of a fastidious accountant. The destruction of basic governing processes (the economy, the separation of powers) is the proximate catastrophe to be addressed by our practical public servants. Like in total war, they must subsume their pet issues, important though any one of them may be in isolation, until we can afford to bicker again. We are not rich enough to be this stupid. If we want to win the culture we first need a robust presence in the trenches. These are not mutually exclusive aims.
I am first champion of the conservative social issues — I take a back seat to no one in that regard. I’ve been called a zealot. I win the intellectual fights more often than I lose them. But such victories of abstraction are distant and irrelevant to the issue at hand. Trade a hundred chastened opponents for one charitable deed, a hundred legislative losses for one influential cultural exemplar.
Fixing the culture is not a task well suited for the realm of politics. Yes, my soul has much to answer for the way my culture disrespects life and God’s creation. At the same time — if not as important — my country has bills to pay. Let us focus on hiring the competent.
Fix the exchequer, public servants. We freeborn will address our perennial sinfulness without your typically counterproductive meddling. With the culture making its slow turn back, removing political influence becomes a pro-life victory: top-down fiat has unfairly allowed pro-abortionism to maintain its foothold for nearly 40 years. Send a focused caretaker technocrat to office. Elect Daniels president. It will be the most positive development in abortion politics since Roe.
[substantially cross-posted on http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2010/07/the-signpost-at-the-crossroads ]
July 9th, 2010 | 12:50 am
Mark,
I respect your comment, but my use of the word “authoritarian” was deliberate. In Australia at least, parties on the left tend to see the application of state power as the primary way to fix problems, and this expresses itself in a myriad of laws that are policed by the state. This has the effect of turning more and more people in to lawbreakers, and potentially subjecting them to legal penalties. Governments on the right do use state power, of course, but this is a much less reflexive response.
A petty example in my home town, which consistently elects left of centre governments, is the nearly complete prohibition on front fences, a decision made by urban planners many years ago. I live next door to an ex-con who has menaced my wife’s lady-friends and has actually assaulted a tradesman out the front of my house, but I am not allowed to build a fence to protect my family. Many folk plant a hedge and build a fence behind it to get around this law, but they are thereby lawbreakers.
This is, I believe, a political outworking of St Paul’s distinction between Law and Grace: multiplying laws does not make people good, and genuine change cannot be imposed from without. To establish the framework for human flourishing is much more effective than using state power to create a “perfect” society.
Does this make sense? I was not using the word “authoritarian” in a pejorative sense, but to describe an approach to government.
As for the Civil Rights movement, I don’t disagree. I do not think that people who have left of centre political opinions are morally dubious, or that they want an unjust society; many have fought hard for all kinds of good causes, and I welcome their collaboration. Their championing of state intervention is often quite innocent: here is a problem, the state is the best resourced entity around; it should fix the problem. The fact is, though, that this often ends in tears, with very poor policy outcomes. Worse, the state’s use of coercive power risks engendering a sense of dependence in the citizenry, such that people become “clients” of the government, reliant on it for their ongoing wellbeing. I observed this in my family growing up, and my political outlook has been deeply shaped by the experience.
July 9th, 2010 | 12:43 pm
How is getting government out of our bedrooms NOT a conservative issue.
July 9th, 2010 | 1:22 pm
On this blog, “conservative” is unrelated to a particular ethical system of government. Principles like federalism, self-reliance, and responsibility for ones own which once defined conservatism are discarded when inconvenient.
How was Barry Goldwater not a conservative? Because he was a Jew? Pardon me, Mr. Carter but your conservatism seems an awful lot like National Socialism.
July 9th, 2010 | 1:44 pm
It’s inconvenient for your argument, but male-female marriage has not been the EXCLUSIVE norm for “thousands of years”. Insofar as it has been the norm, it has been so mostly under Christianity. BEFORE Christianity, and in places where Christianity had not yet arrived, the natural behavior of ALL people was accommodated in a variety of ways, including various forms of marriage.
There is nothing “conservative” about a new religion coming in and radically altering cultures. You just call it that because 1) you like that religion and 2) you like to think of yourself as conservative.
July 12th, 2010 | 12:02 am
Frank-the first person to call another a Nazi loses the argument.
Goldwater was libertarian on sexual issues, like abortion and homosexuality. Those weren’t in play during his ’64 presidential run, but were by the 80s when he started to distance himself from social conservatives. Thus, he was more libertarian than conservative in the modern American sense of the word.
This is an interesting piece that deserves a full blog reply rather than just a comment
July 12th, 2010 | 9:32 am
[...] Joe Carter wonders why my case for marriage equality has always been a conservative [...]
July 14th, 2010 | 10:03 am
It’s good to know that someone called Joe Carter has been appointed the Ultimate Arbiter of Conservatism. What a relief that we won’t have to spend any time actually debating issues and the implications of a given worldview; now we can just wait to see what Mr. Carter says and follow along like sheep.
The narrow-mindedness required to claim such a specific meaning for a term as vague as “conservative” is pretty stunning. The arrogance and condescension required to ask everyone else to conform to that meaning stretches incredulity.
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