BlackRose#17
"In order to grasp the meaning of this liberal program we need to imagine
a world order in which liberalism is supreme. Either all the states in it are
liberal, or enough are so that when united they are able to repulse an attack
of militarist aggressors. In this liberal world, or liberal part of the world, there is private property in the means of production. The working of the market is not hampered by government interference. There are no trade barriers; men
can live and work where they want. Frontiers are drawn on the maps but they do not hinder the migrations of men and shipping of commodities.
Natives do not enjoy rights that are denied to aliens. Governments and their
servants restrict their activities to the protection of life, health, and property against fraudulent or violent aggression. They do not discriminate against foreigners. The courts are independent and effectively protect everybody
against the encroachments of officialdom. Everyone is permitted to say, to
write, and to print what he likes. Education is not subject to government
interference. Governments are like night-watchmen whom the citizens have
entrusted with the task of handling the police power. The men in office are
regarded as mortal men, not as superhuman beings or as paternal authorities
who have the right and duty to hold the people in tutelage. Governments do
not have the power to dictate to the citizens what language they must use in
their daily speech or in what language they must bring up and educate their
children. Administrative organs and tribunals are bound to use each man’s
language in dealing with him, provided this language is spoken in the district
by a reasonable number of residents.
In such a world it makes no difference where the frontiers of a country
are drawn. Nobody has a special material interest in enlarging the territory of
the state in which he lives; nobody suffers loss if a part of this area is
separated from the state. It is also immaterial whether all parts of the state’s
territory are in direct geographical connection, or whether they are separated
by a piece of land belonging to another state. It is of no economic importance
whether the country has a frontage on the ocean or not. In such a world the
people of every village or district could decide by plebiscite to which state
they wanted to belong. There would be no more wars because there would
be no incentive for aggression. War would not pay. Armies and navies would
be superfluous. Policemen would suffice for the fight against crime. In such
a world the state is not a metaphysical entity but simply the producer of
security and peace. It is the night-watchman, as Lassalle contemptuously
dubbed it. But it fulfills this task in a satisfactory way. The citizen’s sleep is not disturbed, bombs do not destroy his home, and if somebody knocks at his
door late at night it is certainly neither the Gestapo nor the O.G.P.U.
The reality in which we have to live differs very much from this perfect
world of ideal liberalism. But this is due only to the fact that men have
rejected liberalism for etatism. They have burdened the state, which could be
a more or less efficient night-watchman, with a multitude of other duties.
Neither nature, nor the working of forces beyond human control, nor
inevitable necessity has led to etatism, but the acts of men. Entangled by
dialectic fallacies and fantastic illusions, blindly believing in erroneous
doctrines, biased by envy and insatiable greed, men have derided capitalism
and have substituted for it an order engendering conflicts for which no
peaceful solution can be found."
Ludwig von Mises - Omnipotent Government (1944)
Nem lenne jobb egy ilyen világban élni? Nem lenne jobb a világ ha az állam csak azt tenné amire jogunk van felhatalmazni?