April 13, 2003

The civilized libertarian

By ALAN W. BOCK
Senior editorial writer

If this country ever returns to the sturdy principles of liberty and republican virtue on which it was founded, then today, Thomas Jefferson's birthday, should be a national holiday. I suggest this despite the fact that when some good citizens of Boston sought to do precisely that, he refused to tell them his birthday, saying he did not approve of "transferring the honors and veneration for the great birthday of our Republic to any individual."

But Tom Jefferson was eminently practical, in theory and interests if not always in practice (he tried so hard to be scientific, but he was a terrible farmer), and at this late hour he might see utility in such a holiday. Perhaps it would be merely an occasion for department stores to have white sales. But if it inspired only a few to dip into Thomas Jefferson's writings and to ponder the legacy he strove to leave to this country, it would be worth it.

It has been fashionable of late, beginning with Joseph Ellis, to debunk Jefferson - thoughtfully, regretfully and with respect, of course, but with purpose - as a hypocrite on the issue of slavery, as a politician who didn't practice what he preached, as a clay-footed human rather than a marble statue to be venerated. That's fine. Jefferson, although he had a personal reserve that left a certain mystery about who he really was, is more valuable to posterity as an imperfect human being than as a marble statue.

What rankles modern intellectuals about Jefferson is that he distrusted concentrated power with every fiber of his being, and most modern intellectuals worship concentrated power and seek to serve it - to make it constructive and refined and sensitive, of course, but to celebrate political power rather than to decimate it or even to question it.

Worse, Jefferson was no backwoods yahoo spouting this retrograde nonsense, although he got along with yahoos and saved his scorn for those ambitious for power. "Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices," he noted, "a rottenness begins in his conduct." He was perhaps the most cultivated, civilized American of his era, and he wrote, "I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."

Of course he needs to be taken down a few pegs, lest people take his ideas seriously again.

If only.

Jefferson thought deeply and profoundly about the role of government but put it simply and elegantly in the Declaration of Independence. After declaring that we are all endowed by our creator with inalienable rights, including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, he turns to government's purpose. "That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, and that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it."

The purpose of government is to secure our inalienable rights. Not to feed us, clothe us, medicate us, control us, lead us in worship, look after our mental health or - perish the thought! - to nibble away at our rights and freedoms and expand its own power. The sole legitimate function of government is to secure our rights. When it fails to do so it ceases to be legitimate and the people have the right to take matters (back) into their own hands.

This doctrine is profoundly revolutionary, placing the individual person at the center with the state conceived as servant rather than master. It was close to conventional wisdom among American colonists who had decided to break with Great Britain. But it is difficult to imagine anyone else phrasing it so well as Jefferson did.

That radical simplicity makes Jefferson profoundly subversive today, when the original republic has become a megastate with imperial pretensions. I suspect he would be quietly pleased to be seen in this light.

A nation whose dominant party wants to make the intrusive USA Patriot Act permanent would do well to ponder this: "Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the law,' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."

Jefferson despised politics yet served two terms as president, during which he negotiated the Louisiana Purchase and sent Marines to root out the Barbary Pirates. Inconsistent? A bit. But he also paid down most of the national debt, cut spending, cut taxes, abolished agencies, reduced the size of the military and eschewed patronage. "We have set a good example" was the closest he came to boasting. It didn't take, but that would not have surprised him.

"A government regulating itself by what is just and wise for the many, uninfluenced by the local and selfish views of the few who direct their affairs," he believed, "has not been seen, perhaps, on Earth. Or if it existed for a moment at the birth of ours, it would not be easy to fix the term of its continuance."

An idealistic realist, a paragon of taste and manners, the man who said "I have sworn on the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man" deserves to be celebrated, now more than ever.