IS MAN FREE?

Or Does He Belong to the State?

The fundamental question that determines the nature of any social system, and which provides that system with its source of legitimacy, can be simply stated: Is Man Free? All the rest, as Ayn Rand puts it, is merely “consequences and practical implementations”.

It is true that nature herself impinges upon man’s ability to act. The freest man may still not be as free as a bird is to fly. But the question being asked here is not about man’s capability but about his political condition. Freedom of speech does not lose any of its vitality just because a man is unable to speak unhaltingly, for example, a language he has not yet thoroughly learnt. His freedom to speak, or the lack thereof, is a question of political autonomy.

Simply put, is man a sovereign being? Does he belong to himself and himself alone, or, does one man belong to another, to a group of men?

This is a political question, not a philosophical one. Taking a philosophical stance, man as a social creature, as a creature “born for love”1 , in binding himself to another, in this sense belongs as much to himself as to those he loves (as they belong to him). His actions are determined in part by his responsibility for and accountability to them. In a similar way, man as a transcendent being, recognizes in himself a fealty to a higher principle. Virgil identifies this transcendent principle, as does Disraeli who is quoted above: “Love conquers all things, so we too shall yield to love.” But this question is not about the fidelity that guides his character and his actions, but about his political agency.

The question of sovereignty has long lain at the root of political philosophy, which has struggled with squaring these two competing ideas. On one hand, that man is sovereign. This inescapable conclusion comes not just from observing man in his ‘natural state’, but from experiencing his transcendent nature. The nobility of man rests upon him being a free creature. “Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.”2 On the other hand, that we cannot permit man total freedom; that freedom without constraint impinges on the freedom of others. But if man is a free agent, if man is sovereign, then by what right do we impose ourselves upon him?

Western civilization has been founded on a compromise.

Long ago, Cicero wrote, “We are all servants of the laws in order that we may be free.” The law is an attempt at uniting the sovereignty of men under a transcendent principle, where each man then becomes equally ‘free under the law’. The same was the case for theocratic states, for whom the term ‘law’ was synonymous with God. Man relinquishes his sovereignty, not to other men, but to a transcendent principle, that all may be equal and equally free. Equal under the law. Equal under God.

In another case, that of the ‘social contract’, man — for purposes of self-preservation — voluntarily gives up his sovereignty to be a member of a group in exchange for security and community. But he relinquishes only those freedoms which are necessary to surrender in exchange for certain protections.

In both cases, man’s sovereignty is recognized. Man is indeed a sovereign being but consents to submit his sovereignty to the collective, in order to gain freedom. How does relinquishing autonomy result in greater freedom of action? In much the same way that a free man alone is less free to walk down a street lined with bandits. Man, as a sovereign being, agrees to these constraints, so long as his resulting freedom is enriched, not diminished by this submission. But while he submits himself to constraints, never does he actually give up his autonomy. This at least was clear to Rousseau: “to renounce liberty is to renounce being a man… Such a renunciation is incompatible with man’s nature”.3

But these attempts at finding an acceptable compromise between autonomy and freedom are fraught with inconsistences that have left them open to corruption. When in fact has any particular man ever signed such a contract? And even if he did, each generation must do so for themselves — for a man’s child is equally sovereign. And what of the man who does not consent? What right might we claim over him besides exile? Finally, what becomes of the social contract when the collective wields the power of the state against a powerless individual? It is no longer a contract. It is a protection racket.

Laws are conventions conceived by man. Who creates these laws; who applies and enforces them? Even in the most theocratic government, any divine laws must be interpreted by men; who then becomes the mouthpiece for God? If laws are foisted upon man without his consent, then it is no longer the law that unites the sovereignty of men under a transcendent principle, but power — power that has been taken from the individual and used to subdue him.

This question of man’s sovereignty has become all the more imperative as we face threats both from a new kind of collectivism that hides under the banner of diversity, equity, and inclusion; and from a new kind of technological encroachment, which is really the age-old story of the overreach of a government that has forgotten the source of its legitimacy and authority.

Each generation must answer this for themselves, and reap the consequences of their answer.

Will we empower a state seemingly intent on making itself into a god in order to establish a self-referential source of legitimacy, on growing its technological prowess to ensure resistance becomes not only impossible but also unthinkable? — A state that would claim to be the depository of society, able to subsume the sovereignty of its members, able to act on its behalf and in its interest, even though there is no such entity as society, since society can only be made up of a number of individual men.

Or will we affirm that only man may possess his sovereignty and that by his nature he is unable to abdicate it; that liberty is not a privilege but an unalienable, universal right of humanity, not something that can be traded, acquired, sold, or even temporarily revoked.

“All previous systems had held that man’s life belongs to society, that society can dispose of him in any way it pleases, and that any freedom he enjoys is his only by favor, by the permission of society, which may be revoked at any time. The United States held that man’s life is his by right (which means: by moral principle and by his nature), that a right is the property of an individual, that society as such has no rights, and that the only moral purpose of a government is the protection of individual rights.” — Ayn Rand, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

— Revised from an article written in 2010

1. We are all born for love. It is the principle of existence, and its only end. ― Benjamin Disraeli
2. Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. It is not for the sake of a good public administration that it is required, but for security in the pursuit of the highest objects of civil society, and of private life. — Lord Acton
3. To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties. For him who renounces everything no indemnity is possible. Such a renunciation is incompatible with man’s nature; to remove all liberty from his will is to remove all morality from his acts. — Rousseau