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From: bprice@bmcg.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Attention Libertarians
Message-ID: <1211@bmcg.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 13-Aug-84 19:55:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: bmcg.1211
Posted: Mon Aug 13 19:55:58 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 15-Aug-84 07:02:30 EDT
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Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Attention Libertarians
References: <919@pyuxa.UUCP>

>Any one can reply, but I am particularly interested in how a dyed
>in the wool Libertarian would feel about them.

As a dyed-in-the-wool libertarian, and as a registered Libertarian, I'm pleased
to give the official Bill Price stand on these issues.  My stand my, indeed,
accurately represent the Official Libertarian stand, except that there really
isn't any such thing.  I claim only myself as believing this.  Laura Creighton
has reviewed a draft of this, and has pointed out some errors in my thinking,
but she, too, does not completely agree.  That's libertarianism for you.

First, some general comments:  
---the essence of libertarianism is *personal responsibility*.  Perhaps the
name was poorly chosen, because the connection between liberty and
responsibility is not always obvious.  In particular, it is not always obvious
what "personal responsibility" really means.  It does not mean the willingness
to 'take your lumps' as a consequence of your actions:  it does mean an
obligation to fix anything you have broken, if it's someone else's thing.  It
means, in the limit, that a murderer should not be executed:  he should be put
to work, for the rest of his life, "fixing" any and all contractual and
personal obligations of his victim.
---most (or all) of the issues that you bring up are attempts to separate the 
person from his responsibility: either to take away a person's responsibility, 
or to hide the responsibility of the rulle-maker, by attributing it to some 
agency or institution.

>1.  A regulation which prohibits the use of an unvented kerosene
>    stove in an apartment or house.
   Depends on who is making the regulation.  If the maker is in some
contractual relationship with the stove-user--e.g., landlord--then there is no
problem.  The regulation is part of the contract, entered into willingly.  In
this case, the reason for the regulation is not interesting--it is proper and
acceptable.  If, on the other hand, the regulation is made under some "police
power"--the government's monopoly on force--then it is wrong.  The reason that
it is wrong is that it takes away the stove-user's responsibility for his
actions, and gives that responsibility to the force monopoly.  By taking away
that responsibility, such an ordinance takes away any protection that a third
party might have (or at least makes it more difficult for a third-party
'victim' to collect damages from the person who should be responsible).  For
example:  if I asphixiate a guest in my home, the responsibility is mine.
However, if I do in the tenant of another apartment by my stupid use of the
unvented stove, I'm punished by the state in such a way (jail or fines) that my
neighbor (or his estate) can't collect anything from me.  The state, you see,
is much more interested in making me lose than it is in making my neighbor
whole, again.  In this case, too, the reason for such an ordinance is not 
relevent:  the reason is interesting, in a way, because it reveals a lot about
the nature of government and of the people who are "in the government".

>2.  A law which requires a home swimming pool to have a locked
>    fence around it.
    The poolowner has, really, no responsibility for the misbehaviour of the
neighbourhood children, unless he wishes to, out of his own good will.
    The usual reason for such a law as this is to protect neighborhood children 
from a potentially lethal "attractive nuisance." At least, that is the reason 
usually given for the law.  The "attractive nuisance" doctrine is based on the 
theory that a child is not able to control his desires well enough to avoid the
temptations of trespassing on the pool-owner's property; that the child's 
parents are not competent, neither to control the child nor to teach him to 
control himself; and that the parents are right to blame the pool-owner for the
parents' problems.  The "attractive-nuisance" doctrine absolves neighborhood 
parents from their responsibilities to teach their kids how to cope with life, 
shifting the responsibility to the poolowner.  Then the law absolves the 
poolowner of that imaginary responsibility that the "attractive nuisance" theory
imputes to him.  The law says to the poolowner:  you are liable for certain 
misbehaviour of the neighbour-kids, unless you have a locked fence around your 
pool.
    There is a maxim in the politicolegal field:  "Any legislated minimum
becomes a de-facto maximum."  When the law says to build a fence *at least* six
feet high, the fences that are built are *no more than* six feet high.
The results are, as with most such laws, that the kids have less protection than
the libertarian solution provides, all pool-owners have had to pay more for 
their pools, and all of us have paid the costs of enforcement.  We all pay,
too, the 'social' costs of law-inspired irresponsibility.
    The libertarian solution is strict personal responsibility for all parties:
the pool-owner, the parents, and the kids.  Everyone would be better off by
this, too.  The pool-owner would be able to build any protection he deems
advisable, whether it be none (as is his right), whether it be a fence (because
he likes to help his neighbours), whether he chooses to teach all the 
neighborhood kids to swim (because he likes teaching swimming to kids).  If 
the neighborhood has no kids, he wouldn't have to build a useless fence:  if 
the circumstances are such that a standard six-foot fence would not be adequate,
there would not be a law to tell him that the required inadequate fence is good
enough.  The kids would be more likely to learn to cope with life, and with the
attractive nuisances all around them.  In the most unlikely event that a parent
has neither taught the kid, nor cared enough to watch the kid, nor fenced the
kid into his own yard, nor did any of the other things that life demands of
each of us, all we can give is our sorrow that the parent was so unloving of
his child as to fail the kid so.

>3.  A law which prohibits you from building and operating a
>    business in a residentially zoned neighborhood.
   This is quite simply wrong.  If no damage occurs to the residents and/or
property owners, the law is obviously not helping anybody.  If, on the other 
hand, putting your business in a residential area does damage someone--someone 
who was there before the business was known to be there--then you are liable.  
What could be simpler?  What could be more just?  What could be more right?
   The second issue here, by implication, is zoning.  In the libertarian view,
there is no useful purpose served by zoning, since no proper law or ordinance
could make use of the zones.  We reject any such improper expenditure of tax
collections.  A remedy which is akin to zoning, but which has no illicit use of
the force monopoly, arises when the owner of land sells it with a 'covenant,' a
clause in the contract which makes the sale contigent on use of the property.
A covenant is usually defined recursively, and prevents the seller from (e.g.)
operating a business on the property, and requires the seller to include the
covenant when he sells the property.  This is proper, because the covenant
arises from a contract with the consent of the contracting parties.  Since
nobody else *is* involved, nobody else *gets* involved.

>4.  A regulation which prohibits you from taking clams from designated
>    waters.
   As in the first case, this depends on who is making the regulation.  If the
owner of the waters, or of the clams, is doing it, there is no problem.  If
anyone but the owner tries to prevent their taking, then it is an illicit use
of force.  Again, if any damage is done as a result of taking those
clams--whereever they're taken from--then the taker is liable for damages to
whoever is damaged.  If noone is damaged, there is no liability.

>5.  A rule which prohibts you from using your front or back yard
>    to store junk automobiles.
   If the rule is a law, then it is wrong, as discussed in 3, above.  If the
rule is imposed as a condition of some contract, there is no problem.  In this
case, in particular (as in many others), the existance of a law prohibiting the
behavior would prevent some creative solutions.  The case cannot arise under
the postulated law--but in a libertarian realm, the junk-storer and his
neighbors would be free to agree on "compensatory damages".  Under such an
agreement, both parties would win.  Under such a law, both parties lose.  That,
by the way, is a common distinction between libertarian solutions and statist
solutions--the libertarian solution is generally win-win; the statist solution
is usually lose-lose for the parties in dispute, and for most "innocent
bystanders."  The statist solution usually has exactly one winner--the state.

>6.  A regulation which says you must apply for a buiding permit
>    in order to make structural changes to your house.
   This issue is adequately covered under other items.

>7.  A law which prohibits door-to-door salesmen unless they have
>    a license from the town.
   Wrong, unconditionally.  However, you may post a sign--NO TRESPASSING; NO
CANVASSERS; NO SOLICITORS; etc.--that informs the door-to-door salesman that
you will consider any trespass or disturbance to be damage.  He will be liable,
and will probably not bother you.

>8.  A rule that only allows you to fish from one designated side
>    of a bridge only.
   Depends, again, on whether the owner of the fish (or bridge) is making the
rule, or whether it's another illicit use of the force monopoly.
   In this country, most highways and their bridges are owned by the
government.  A government, as the owner of the bridge, can properly make a rule
against fishing from it.  However, by owning the bridge, the government is
abusing its force monopoly--government ownership of such properties as roads
and bridges is itself illicit.  Before gasping that "it's gotta be that way,"
consider that government ownership of roads and bridges is a fairly recent
idea.

>9.  A law that prohibits the use of fireworks.
   Since the user of the fireworks would be strictly liable for any damage he
might cause to himself or others, such a law could only hurt more than it would
help.

>What would be the consequences of scraping all of them and letting
>the individual choose their own course of action in each case?
   If the laws, rules, and regulations were simply to be scrapped, letting the
individual have license to do as he will without regard for the results, the
libertarians would be even more vehement than we are now.  The common
misrepresentation of libertarianism is that it proposes such license:  in fact,
no libertarian that I know is interested in doing that.  What the libertarian
view proposes is that all those laws, rules, and regulations that are illicit
use of the government's monopoly on force be replaced by a strict liability of
each person for his own actions.  Nothing more, and certainly nothing less.
   
   Libertarians are not all united on everything.  We are united on one--the
idea that there is not much place in your life for government interference with
your responsibilities and rights.  Since we are individual people, with 
individual points of view, we have differing opinions on just how much room 
there is for government.  There is a wing of libertarianism, the anarchist
wing, which believes that the existence of any (governmental) monopoly on force
is wrong.  There is another wing which would allow the government to retain its
force monopoly, but would not allow it to be used except in response to force
or fraud.  Some of us would limit it to defense from outside aggression; others
would allow a government police force; some would have 'criminal'
responsibility resolved by (e.g.) insurance companies; others would keep
'criminal justice' within the government.

>T. C. Wheeler
   I hope that you find this response to be as helpful to you as the writing of
it has been to me.  I also hope that the tone of my other response doesn't 
create any ill-feeling.  To you, and to each reader who's made it through my
sometimes turgid prose, the Libertarian Party and I extend an invitation to
find out more are libertarianism and the Libertarian Party.  Look in your phone
book--the Libertarian Party may be listed.  Call them.  If not, mail me your
address, and I'll pass it on.  Whether you agree or are just curious, we'd like
to help you find out.  What you'll find are people--some of them
interesting--with a outlook on life that you may find fascinating.

-- 
--Bill Price    uucp:   {decvax!ucbvax  philabs}!sdcsvax!bmcg!bprice
                arpa:?  sdcsvax!bmcg!bprice@nosc