History

Libertarianism and Republican Virtue

Brandon Christensen History, Liberty , , , , , ,

I am short on time and effort these days, so I apologize for bringing up my school readings on the blog. I have moved on from Locke’s Two Treatises to Montesquieu’s Spirit of the Laws.  This passage in particular has stood out to me so far:

When Sulla wanted to return liberty to Rome, it could no longer be accepted; Rome had but a weak remnant of virtue, and as it had ever less, instead of reawakening after Caesar, Tiberius […] Nero, and Domitian, it became ever more enslaved; all the blows were struck against tyrants, none against tyranny (pg. 22).

The decay of the American republic has been a worry of learned men since the agreement first took place.  My big question here is not so much about decay or liberty, but rather what virtue is.  I have some conception of it, but any sort of clarification would be great.

Montesquieu treats the desires and defenses of manufacturing, commerce, wealth, finance and luxury as the end of virtue and the beginnings of ambition, which leads to despotism and tyranny.

Given that most libertarians are also republicans (small “r”), how do we go about explaining that the freedom to pursue material goods is what is actually compatible with democratic government?  Was Montesquieu attacking a straw man?

Reading John Locke

Brandon Christensen Books, History

My MLK Day will be spent finishing up an assigned reading project for a political theory course: John Locke’s Second Treatise of Government.  Most of the arguments seem pretty self-evident to me, a testament to the soundness of his writings.

But I know that there is much more to Locke than meets the undergraduate’s eye.  Does anybody out there have any thoughts (or tips on what to keep an eye out for) about John Locke’s musings on private property?  Are there any closet monarchists out there who believe that Locke was wrong about the beginnings of political society?

Happy MLK Day folks!

Austrian Economics and the Left

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Economics, History , , , ,

Matt Yglesias has a post up over at Slate.com on Ron Paul and Austrian Economics.  I won’t get into the details of what he got right and wrong about his largely honest attempt to explain the Austrian School to Leftists (the word “crank” was only used once!  A new high for the Left).  Instead, what I’d like to do is hone in on this whopper:

Many of the original Austrians found their business cycle ideas discredited by the Great Depression, in which the bust was clearly not self-correcting […]

Has Yglesias conveniently forgotten about Hoover’s attempts to prop up wages and his signing of the protectionist Smoot-Hawley tariff?

Why don’t Hoover’s policies get more attention by economists and journalists trying to understand and explain the Great Depression, or am I missing something?