I would like to send a special thanks to my liberty-loving friend Dan Shippey, founder and President of the Breed’s Hill Institute, for inspiring this post. Dan introduced me to the idea of making the case for the “restoration of our foundation,” which, in my view would be based on a return to natural law in life, politics, and jurisprudence. I will begin a series on this soon, but wanted to first post on a serious concern that I have been pondering lately. My concern is the question of why liberals feel that conservatives are cold, heartless, and uncaring when it comes to social issues. On the Mark Levin talk radio program a couple of weeks ago, Mark made a point to a liberal caller in reference to the NPR firing of analyst Juan Williams that his firing demonstrates the intolerance of the left, and reinforces his contention that it is conservatives who are actually the most tolerant of others, and who are staunch defenders of personal liberty. In fact, he specifically mentioned the hot button topics of abortion and gay marriage as two issues that conservatives believe should be decided on by the people, not state judges, bureaucrats in Washington, or the Supreme Court.
Personally, it pains me to no end that liberals, particularly those in the mainstream media, argue that conservatives are somehow against liberty on social issues, and that liberals are the only ones who are for liberty. Well the truth is that conservatives are the most liberty loving folks in this nation, its just that we have different methods for how those liberties are both provided and maintained, while at the same time believing there are traditional values that should be maintained for a properly ordered and prosperous society. Liberals may not like the fact that we believe there are moral absolutes in the world, but I wonder if they have thought of what the end game would be if their vision of a morally relativistic world was actually implemented in full. It is wholly illogical for a liberal to believe there are no moral absolutes, but to then also believe it is objectively wrong for for someone to steal from them. Moreover, how could a moral relativist believe that anyone could ever use the words “ought” or “should”? I just don’t see how there could be a working society that functionally operates on moral relativism.
Now as a conservative, though I believe there are moral absolutes, I want to be explicit that this does not mean I have a right to impose my views forcibly on anyone. However, as a citizen I do believe that I have a right as a citizen to have a voice in the public square, and I would say it is quite obvious that many of our laws are based on traditional moral values, enforced on society by government. What is at stake is liberals don’t want social issues decided on traditional moral reasoning because this reasoning indicates there is something that objectively transcends the human condition. I believe that if society really does want to overturn traditional values, it should be decided by the people at the state level. When activist state judges instead legislate from the bench, these cases eventually end up in the Supreme Court, whose rulings give people nowhere to go if we don’t like what they’re forcing on us. Liberals, however, seem to have no problem with Supreme Court judges issuing rulings that favor what they want, but scream bloody murder if it is something they don’t. If the people speak at the state level, one can always move to another state that better suits their values. This is why conservatives advocate returning power from the federal government back to the states, which is consistent with its constitutionally limited and enumerated powers. What we have now is a federal government bordering on tyranny in the legislature and the courts, taking away liberties from the people daily.
It is important to dispel the liberal myth that conservatives wish to restrict the private lives of consenting adults. As long as they are not breaking any laws, we believe that consenting adults should have the liberty to conduct their lives as they choose, even though we may not agree with the behavior they engage in with such liberty. Indeed, I agree with Pope John Paul II, who said in a 1995 homily: “Americans need to know that freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” Below, I would like to outline my positions on three issues, which I think demonstrate thoughtfulness from a conservative perspective, and seeks to maximize liberty and compassion while respecting traditional values and natural law:
- Abortion – The terms “reproductive freedom” or “pro-choice” are simply euphemisms for being pro-abortion. Why would any pro-choice advocate think I am intolerant for simply arguing that it is quite odd how they would extend choice to the woman, but at the same time refuse to acknowledge that they are removing the choice of the fetus at the same time? I believe it is because if they acknowledge this, it would sear their conscience. If a woman is murdered with a baby in her womb, the murderer is charged with two counts of murder. In estate law, if a woman is pregnant, then the child is included as well. Now if a fetus in a womb is not a life, then how come the law treats a fetus as a human beginning, but when it comes to abortion, it is suddenly not treated as one? This is why I believe that Roe v. Wade is simply bad law.
- Homosexual Marriage – Marriage is not the federal government’s business, period, as marriage of any type is not a constitutional right. The people in each state have the sovereignty to make this decision for themselves as to whether they want to simply redefine traditional marriage. Heterosexual marriage is the natural order of things, and it is only through heterosexual sex that a life can be created, whether that is the intent of the act or not. I believe strongly that if people want to enter into other types of contracts between mutually consenting adults, they have the constitutional right to do so in pursuit of happiness. Asking unelected judges to force homosexual marriage on the American people is a selfish pursuit of a particular desire, not the pursuit of happiness. I don’t see how any American is being denied their personal pursuit of happiness, even if they don’t achieve what they desire. Such is life.
- Illegal Immigration – My wish is to stop the exploitation of illegal workers and human trafficking. Having lived in Mexico for 1-1/2 years, I know why they come here illegally (as I would probably do the same), and I know that the growers here want to exploit them and have been doing this since the early 60s. I support a guest worker program which would include illegal immigrants, but I don’t believe they should get citizenship as a reward. We can discuss that down the road once we get a comprehensive guest worker program up and running, and it makes no sense to come here illegally except for illegal purposes. In fact, there is a new pilot program going on right now that few people know about.
Now with all I have said above, how could anyone say that conservatives are “extreme right wing” and are not at least thoughtful? We fully recognize that we want many of the same things as liberals, but vehemently disagree on the means to accomplishing the same goals because we see those means as being accomplished in a manner that in practice promote tyranny. Conservatives want solutions that maximize liberty and give people freedom from a tyrannical federal government that would force a “one size fits all” solution on the entire populus, which seems to be what liberals want to do even if has to be done by the courts, thus bypassing the will of the people. This is why I’m unsure what is the true goal of liberals. It appears to me they want to have everything their way, envisioning an America that is in accord with their current, relativistic thinking, rejecting the wisdom of the ages and anything that smacks of tradition or the transcendent.
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