Look Ma, I’m a Leftist

In addition to Mother’s Day, today (May 10) is Confederate Memorial Day in North Carolina. For those who care, it is a day to commemorate a “lost cause” – one that most Americans associate with the worst kind of proto-fascist racism. The truth of the matter is not so easily defined. The white Anglo-Scots Southerners that comprised the majority of the Confederate army (beyond the Native Americans, Germans, Jews, Hispanics, Asians, and not a few African Americans scattered among the ranks) were of the non-slaveholding middling and lower classes. The misnamed “Civil War” was less to them about slavery than simply being left alone.

At least for a short time those Southerners fought for what Joseph Stromberg saw as the makings of a radical, libertarian movement. Now, on the heels of Jeff Riggenbach’s new book on revisionist American history, we may say the rank-and-file Southern soldier was a downright leftist, a true son of the Whiskey Rebellion, whose motivation for the cause became muddled once he wised up to the true nature of the conservative planter hegemony and dictatorial Confederate central government in Richmond. One need only to read Sam R. Watkins’ first-hand account of the war to understand why the spirit of the Southern soldier dissipated with the realities of Confederate politics. The Johnny Rebs who deserted and walked home did so because the power structure of their leadership was largely inimical to their interests.

But the pivotal fifth chapter of Riggenbach’s book has a wider scope than the War for Total Government Control (1861-65). Beginning with Jefferson and Hamilton, Riggenbach traces through the pens of revisionist historians the distinction between the liberal republicanism of the Jeffersonians and the state-capitalist conservatism of Hamilton & co. From Lincoln’s day on the Federalist-Whig-Republican branch won out, and the Big Government-Big Business-Big Banking axis has sold a collectivist corporate state to Americans ever since.

Citing Murray Boochkin, Riggenbach shows how the conventional political appellations of “left” and “right” are turned on their heads:

[A] brief look at the history of the relevant political terms – Left and Right, liberal and conservative – will persuade us that libertarianism has absolutely nothing in common with anything on the Right. For it is as the anarchist Murray Bookchin said back in 1978: “People who resist authority, who defend the rights of the individual, who try in a period of increasing totalitarianism and centralization to reclaim these rights – this is the true left in the United States. Whether they are anarcho-communists, anarcho-syndicalists, or libertarians who believe in free enterprise, I regard theirs as the real legacy of the left […].” And what about the socialists, the Maoists and Trotskyites, and the liberals of the Democratic party? Bookchin was asked. What about the people most Americans regarded as “the Left”? Those people, Bookchin replied, were “going toward authoritarianism, toward totalitarianism.” They were “becoming the real right in the United States.”

In other words, one who believes in unhindered free markets and individual rights is really on the left side of the political spectrum. Those who favor government intervention in social and economic matters (thus considering themselves flaming liberals) turn out to be supporters of conservatism – unwittingly preserving the statist status quo that under different guises has dominated public affairs in this country for decades.

So, all the years I considered myself “paleoconservative” I had it backwards.

The GOP is the conservative party in American politics, the party that since Lincoln (and Henry Clay and Alexander Hamilton before him) has stood for mercantilism, welfare statism, and war. Libertarians are not conservatives; they are not on the Right. They are on the Left, the last remnant of the original liberals.

And lest we forget that Barack Obama’s #1 campaign contributor was Goldman Sachs,

Though some true liberals remain in the Democratic Party of today, almost all of them have made the error of pursuing liberal goals by conservative means. And the majority in the party has been New Deal liberal – false liberal, conservative in liberal’s clothing – since the 1930s. In effect, the United States is now governed by one or the other of two conservative parties.

Better sit down, Ma. Your boy is a liberal and a leftist.

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I have embedded a video of Sam Quinn + Japan Ten at the bottom of this blog. Sam, along with Josh Oliver (piano) and Tom Pryor (pedal steel) are also members of the Everybodyfields, which are currently on hiatus. My wife and I have followed the ’fields closely for the past four years.

What drew me to them, and continues to be a draw in Japan Ten, is what folk musicologist John Cohen heard in the voice of Kentucky singer Roscoe Holcomb; a sound that led Cohen to coin the now over-used expression high lonesome sound. You hear this as Japan Ten tune up their voices in front of an old house in a quiet Greensboro, NC neighborhood before the main video shoot.

Appalachian folk voice is sometimes harsh, modal, eerie and, to unappreciative ears, downright dissonant and annoying. But for me it is a sound that has buzzed in my head from my earliest youth. It is a sound that has antecedents in the folk singing of the Scottish border country and English West Country.

For a Carolina-Tennessee borderer like myself, it is the sound of home.

The Truth About the Economy (Updated)

There is indeed plenty of business-government col­laboration around, enough to justify calling it by its own name: corporatism. Since such practices are the antithesis of laissez-faire liberalism, it is hard to see how the free market can rightly get the blame for them. - Joseph Stromberg

My wife and I had a long discussion yesterday after church, one that began on the glider in her garden area and ended on the loveseat in our living room. We talked about the differences between laissez-faire free markets and the state-capitalist (or state-corporate, or virtual fascist) system we actually live under, and how very few people know the distinction.

This morning I ran across an absolutely brilliant piece at The Freeman by Chris Sciabarra that lays out the argument in no uncertain, John Taylorite terms:

There is no free market. There is no “laissez-faire capitalism.” The government has been deeply involved in setting the parameters for market relations for eons; in fact, genuine “laissez-faire capitalism” has never existed...

We heard a lot about “change” during the last presidential campaign, and about the necessity to end the influence of Washington lobbyists on public policy. But that influence exists because Washington has the power to dispense privilege. And privileges will always be dispensed in ways that benefit “ultimate decision-makers.” That’s the way the system is rigged. It is not simply that intervention breeds corruption; it’s that corruption is inherent in the process itself. [emphasis added]

Read all of this essential article here.

The Invisible Hand

It has been said that “only God can make a tree.” Why do we agree with this? Isn’t it because we realize that we ourselves could not make one? Indeed, can we even describe a tree? We cannot, except in superficial terms. We can say, for instance, that a certain molecular configuration manifests itself as a tree. But what mind is there among men that could even record, let alone direct, the constant changes in molecules that transpire in the life span of a tree? Such a feat is utterly unthinkable!

I, Pencil, am a complex combination of miracles: a tree, zinc, copper, graphite, and so on. But to these miracles which manifest themselves in Nature an even more extraordinary miracle has been added: the configuration of creative human energies—millions of tiny know-hows configurating naturally and spontaneously in response to human necessity and desire and in the absence of any human master-minding! Since only God can make a tree, I insist that only God could make me. Man can no more direct these millions of know-hows to bring me into being than he can put molecules together to create a tree.

- From Leonard Read’s wonderful essay, “I, Pencil” (1958).

Old Hop’s Paradigm

Taking a break from Rothbard’s economics epic, I stumbled across an article by Chandran Kukathas of the London School of Economics, entitled, “Two Constructions of Libertarianism.” Dr. Kukathas argues that in nature only two types of libertarian societies could theoretically emerge. One he calls “Federation of Liberty” (which I will call “Federal* Liberty”), the other, “Union of Liberty.”

The underlying premise of both theoretical systems is non-aggression. Respect for an individual’s self and property is paramount. However, the two systems have the potential to evolve toward different ends. Under the Federal Liberty model, non-aggression and freedom do not preclude the possibility of groups forming within the society that may not respect individual liberties. For example, religious cults that restrict or enforce certain behaviors on their members, or even groups that practice slavery, could arise. Under the Federal model, however, respect for libertarian rights is such that no group or individual can coerce other groups to alter or extend individual liberties to their members. At best, one can stand outside an “oppressive” group (my phrase) and beckon individuals out of it; or attempt to educate its members on the virtues of individual liberty. But no enforcement of liberty can be undertaken.

Under the Union of Liberty model, a similar coalescence of individuals into different pockets or groups would likely occur. However, within this system libertarian freedom is held on such an ideological pedestal that repressive or oppressive acts engaged in by separate groups cannot be tolerated by the society at large. Eventually, some committee or judicial authority would emerge that would enforce the rules upon the groups deemed outside the ideological mainstream. At that point, however, the fundamental premise of libertarianism is lost; coercion has been exercised, and its exercise empowers, perhaps permanently and detrimentally to the whole, the authority that brought that coercion to bear. For this reason, Kukathas concludes that the Federal model, all its potential perils notwithstanding, is preferable to the Union model.

In his study of 18th century Cherokee culture, anthropologist Fred Gearing describes a society that somewhat approximates Kukathas’ Federation model. While the Cherokees formed a tribal and linguistic nation, they were divided into over 60 separate and autonomous towns. No Cherokee town could impose its will upon a neighboring or distant town. No decision reached at a tribal “capital” like Great Tellico or Chota was binding upon an individual town or, for that matter, upon individual Cherokees.

At the individual level, Cherokee conduct was ruled by the principle of non-aggression. An honorable man was expected to walk away from potential conflict; he acted in self-defense only if his person or possessions were threatened.

Warfare among Cherokees was largely a matter of justice according to the tribal tradition of blood vengeance. When a member of the local town was slain by someone from another town (or different tribe) the member’s clan would form a war party to exact proportional retribution, i.e. “an eye for an eye.” But even here individual rights were highly regarded. Even to the point of attack, an individual warrior could decide that he wanted out of the enterprise and abort his participation without retaliation from his fellows.

Each town was ruled by a council of elders who upheld the tribal traditions. Tradition and family (clan) formed the glue that bound Cherokee society. The elders enforced tradition chiefly through their power to shame or to encourage the ostracizing of contentious individuals. But real coercive force they lacked. If an individual disagreed with a council decision, he was free to go his own way in the same sense that an entire town could ignore the decision of a higher, tribal council.

Tribal councils existed primarily for discussion of how to deal with foreigners, i.e. other American Indian tribes or European settlers. Councils arrived at major decisions only by consensus, at which point the appointed headman would speak, or have one of his representatives speak, on behalf of that consensus. Old Hop (d. 1761) was the headman at Chota when the Cherokee nation found itself sandwiched between the rival French and British colonial empires. Because of Old Hop’s physical infirmity (thus, his nickname) Attakullakulla, “the little carpenter,” served as his ambassador. But a reading of Anglo-Cherokee relations during the mid-18th century reveals how little coercive power Old Hop and the Chota council actually possessed. Retributive wars erupted between Cherokee towns and white settlers in the South Carolina upstate that Old Hop, from his seat in what is now southeast Tennessee, was powerless to prevent or stop.

The Cherokee nation was eventually overwhelmed by the expanding British and then American empires. But its polity left an indelible influence on the thought of some American Founders, particularly Thomas Jefferson. The defeat and dispersion of the nation should not be seen as a failure of its polity, especially given that the Cherokees lived in relative harmony and peace for centuries before European contact. For both paleoconservatives and paleolibertarians searching for historical culture examples that fall within their paradigms, the Cherokees of old are ripe for deeper investigation.

*I mean Federal in its original sense – the spreading of power over various constituencies; not to be confused with the present U.S. Federal government, which has become nothing if not authoritarian.

It Has Arrived

My copy of Murray Rothbard’s treatise, Man, Economy, and State arrived in the mail yesterday, all 890 pages (plus appendices) worth. Why should an ordinary plebeian like me bother to read such a vast work? I’ll let Rothbard’s mentor, the late Ludwig von Mises, explain:

[F]or whom are essays of this consequence written: only for specialists, the students of economics, or for all of the people?

To answer this question we have to keep in mind that the citizens, in their capacity as voters, are called upon to determine ultimately all issues of economic policies...

American public opinion rejects the market economy... Full government control of all activities of the individual is virtually the goal of both national parties. The individual is to be deprived of his moral, political, and economic responsibility and autonomy, and to be converted into a pawn in the schemes of a supreme authority aiming at a “national” purpose...

It is a fateful error on the part of our most valuable contemporaries to believe that economics can be left to specialists in the same way in which various fields of technology can be safely left to those who have chosen to make any one of them their vocation. The issues of society’s economic organization are every citizen’s business. To master them to the best of one’s ability is the duty of everyone.