It appears evident upon even cursory reflection that taxation is not the problem that most vexes Americans; rather, the problem is the manner in which dollars confiscated from the productive are spent. Which is to say: without approval, authorization, or oversight. To be fair, suggesting that tax dollars are merely “spent” rhetorically bestows a degree of measurement, even prudence, upon the holder of the national checkbook that experience shows is unwarranted. If we’ve learned anything about how government spends money it is that it is manifestly not prudent.
I had the honor of speaking to a group of regular Americans at a Tax Day Tea Party in Lisle Illinois on April 15th.
Yours truly, April 15, 2009
I was invited to speak not because I’m an elected politician, but because a friend of mine suggested me to the organizer. There was a wonderful sort of meritocracy about the event. It mattered not at all who you were, but what your principles were. Case in point: an elected official did get up and offer some brief remarks to the crowd, which received a lukewarm response. Not five minutes later, a woman got up and addressed the crowd by saying that this politician isn’t your friend, and in fact had voted for the so-called stimulus bill. Wild applause.
More than one person at the event made this point: taxation itself isn’t bad. We band together in our community (call it civil society if you prefer) and agree that we’re going to outsource certain things rather than do them ourselves. There was a time in this country when volunteer fire departments were commonplace. That we’ve decided to hire full-time firefighters simply means that in most American communities, the accepted value is “we ought to have a fire department” and that service is funded by community taxes.
It’s when taxation is used for social engineering that Americans balk. Thomas Jefferson once said: “To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.”
This problem – the inclination to bow to a conception of fairness, social justice or just plain redistribution – is exacerbated by an over-reaching general government.
The example I’ve long used – and I’m going to continue to do so until someone can convince me that the example is inadequate or can offer a superior analogy – is that of my own community. Suppose that DuPage County, Illinois decided that it was part of our values to offer residents of DuPage County free access to health care, preschool, and complementary jetskis and gold chains. I can, admittedly through some hardship to myself, pick up and leave DuPage County for a more sensible place in which to live; or, at least, one that appeals more to my sensibilities. If my city, instead, made this decision, I would have greater freedom to escape this – to my view – bad policy. I could move to a neighboring town, and stay within the same county. Again we begin to see how “balanced government” would change the debate or discussion over taxation.
We would all pay taxes to support those things which the general government in Washington is responsible for, pursuant to that handy little guide called the Constitution. On a local level, we could select how much intrusiveness we wanted from the “government” on domestic matters: health care, social security, education, all would be within the domain of your village board. In this way, we again acknowledge the superiority of balanced government as a tool for reform.
Thankfully, this remains a quintessentially American idea, and we have Madison (among others) to thank for its sheer brilliance.
