Hello my name is Josh Springfield, and right now I would like to provide a systematic defense of a Christian voluntarist society. I will be the first to say, that I am a hypocrite when it comes to implementing what this essay is about to demonstrate. I’m a very cold hearted person, and when I do things for other people I frequently think to myself, “If I do this for this guy, then what will he do for me?” I know that thought process demonstrates that I am a poor Christian AND I will struggle in business. I pray that God will forgive me and soften my heart for these selfish thoughts. This is besides the point though. In this essay, I want to prove that there is absolutely no need for any form of government or coercion in a society that perfectly follows what the Bible has laid out for us. In effect, I am saying that in heaven there will be no need for civil government, since people will not sin. It is important to note, it is IMPOSSIBLE to achieve a sinless society before the second coming of Christ. I don’t think I should spend my time defending that point, since it seems fairly obvious and is based upon common sense. The largest point I wish to address in this essay is this question, “Since there will be people who sin on earth, what form of government, if any, should be implemented?”
I have not “intensely” studied what the Bible has said about government, and what government should do. This morning I did spend almost 2 hours researching on Wikipedia, and the original King James Bible, about what type of government God advocates. I went into my research holding the belief that the Bible supports anarcho-capitalism. Now, as far as I can understand, the Bible appears to advocate a civil government that functions similarly to the government described in the United States Constitution. The Bible advocates a government that’s sole purpose is to enforce negative sanctions on people who break the law, or in other words infringe upon our “God given rights”. It was very tough for me to think about why the Bible would advocate any form of government, when a purely free market seems to be the most logically sound way to allow society to voluntarily operate. Then it hit me. I think the reason why the Bible defended the governments that existed at the time, was because people will operate more peacefully in society, if they fear negative sanctions from a “civil government”, rather than their rich neighbor who wants the person to pay retribution if they cross him. If the two groups both say, “You must pay 2 times what you have stolen for restitution,” and both the civil government and the angry rich next door neighbor both enforce the rule exactly the same, then there is no difference in the strength of their negative sanctions. To a logical person in the situation above, the civil government and the rich angry neighbor would have the same scare factor, but most people are illogical and don’t understand this. I once asked a group of my friends about the situation above, and most of them said they would fear and respect a civil government more than they would respect individuals trying to voluntarily defend their own rights. My friends were saying that they would be less likely to become criminals in a society where a civil government enforced negative sanctions, than in a society where individuals defended their own rights with the threat of equal negative sanctions. I believe God understands that some people will be illogical, which means they would fear the civil government in the situation above more than the angry rich neighbor, even though the situation says they would enforce equal negative sanctions. Due to God’s understanding of the illogical people, God would then advocate that civil governments should enforce the law, or protect people’s God given rights, rather than allowing people to voluntarily defend themselves AND others natural rights in an anarchical voluntarist society. One of the only reasons I can see for God choosing civil government over voluntary defense, is that the criminals or offenders would offend less, if they were intimidated by a civil government rather than voluntary individual/group defense agencies. Another reason could be that God works His will through people’s voluntary decisions, and that since people voluntarily allowed governments to form after Adam and Eve got kicked out of Eden, then governments must be legitimate until they are removed either forcefully or voluntarily. I support the first reason I listed more, because the Bible says that you shouldn’t resist civil governments, which means my second reason would not be legitimate if people forcefully removed governments. The sections of the Bible I read related to civil government, did not advocate a government enforcing its laws through positive sanctions. The sections I read seemed to advocate a government that only enforces its laws, and protects its people’s rights, through negative sanctions. The United States Constitution, as it appears to me, places nearly the same limitations on government. This means there should be no government enforced “benefits” or “welfare” in the society that the Bible advocated.
Economics can also prove that welfare is destructive. Most common forms of welfare have already been debunked, so now I would like to debunk the most gut wrenching argument for welfare. My father proposed that perhaps we need government enforced welfare to save people’s lives who have incurable diseases, which would costs loads of money to treat. So let’s say Marvin has a new form of cancer that is terminal, and Marvin does not have enough money saved up for him to pay for his treatments. I AM NOT BLAMING MARVIN FOR HIS MISFORTUNE. There are three ways Marvin could get the treatments he needs. The first way is for him to work incredibly hard to get enough money to pay for his own treatments, the second way is for the government to pay for his treatments, and the third way is for people to voluntarily give him the money he needs through the kindness and charity of their hearts. Now I will logically, economically, and passionately assess the three options. Let’s say Marvin is hurting bad from his disease so he can’t work to get the money he needs, because the first option Marvin should pursue is to pay for his own treatments as that is the fairest thing to do since people are responsible for buying their own food, water, and shelter to survive as well. Marvin understands that he has a rare, painful, and terminal disease limiting him from providing for himself. This is okay and understandable. If you went blind all of a sudden, you could be stuck between a rock and a hard place financially. The second option is to have the government provide the money for Marvin’s treatments. This second option will have very bad economic effects. Perhaps this second option seems good, because the government MIGHT save Marvin’s life. I’m not saying it is bad that the government saved Marvin, but I am saying charity will have vastly better economic benefits. So the government saves Marvin, party time, right? Well, not for everyone. We most now critically examine how the government acquired the money it used for Marvin’s treatments. The government got the money through taxes. Taxes are not voluntary, you are forced to pay taxes under the threat of violence. Now we see that the taxpayer loses money that he would have allocated to a different resource that he deemed more valuable than Marvin’s life. This is a good example of don’t hate the game hate the player. Don’t blame the free market for not allocating the money voluntarily to Marvin, blame the people whose money was taxed from them. But that is not the major point. Let’s say Bill Gates paid all the money necessary for Marvin’s treatments, although the principal would still be the same if multiple people’s tax money was used. Bill Gates loses in this exchange, because he didn’t get to allocate his resources how he wanted to. Then, the people who would have received Bill Gates’ resources lost in the exchange, because they wouldn’t receive the money that they normally would have. The government does benefit, because it will likely take a piece of the tax for themselves and give the rest to the people who produced Marvin’s medicine. The people who produced the medicine will benefit and so will Marvin. It seems like only a few people lost and many benefited right? But what if I told you there was another way, the voluntary way. In the case of the third option, charity would cover Marvin’s expenses. I will now list the economic benefits of the charity paying rather than the government. In the case of charity, the people who donate would not lose, because they would be voluntarily giving to Marvin. In our world people tend to choose to do things that will benefit them and choose not to do things that won’t benefit them. So in this case our charitable donor is winning because he gets to spend his money how he wants! What about the people whom the donor would have bought from if Marvin was never sick? They would not get the money that they desire from the donor, because the donor sees Marvin’s life as a more valuable resource than what the producer could produce. This guy lost, but not through theft, only through competition in the market place. Also Marvin wins in the voluntary exchange because he gets to live! The people who produced Marvin’s medicine and treatments also benefit in the voluntary charity, because the charity would cover the price they ask for the medicine. The producers of the medicine would clearly ask for a price that benefits them the most, but that the charitable people would be willing to pay. In the case of charity no one is robbed or coerced, like they are in the case of the government paying. But wait there’s more. Did you know that the quality of the medicine and the price of the medicine will be better and more accurate in the case of the charitable donor or donors? When the government pays the producer of the medicine, the producer knows that the government can pay however much it wants or more than normal people can pay, because the government can always tax people harder to get more money. This means the producer could raise his price astronomically to benefit himself, at the expense of the tax payer and the people who sell to the tax payer. The quality of the medicine could be slightly worse, but still functional, if the government paid since the producer would know that government doesn’t generally care about poor Marvin. In the case that someone donates money to save Marvin, the producer would have to price his medicine reasonably, because it is unlikely that people would be willing to donate all or large amounts of their money to help Marvin. In effect, there is a limit to how much the charitable people will be willing to pay for Marvin’s medicine. This means that the producer will have to keep his prices low enough to entice the charitable people to buy from him. Since the prices will be lower, it will be easier for charitable people to help more people like Marvin. There will also be an incentive for the medicine to be high quality, since the producer of the medicine will get a bad reputation if the medicine does not function according to the standards that he said it would. Some people think that Christians wouldn’t provide assistance for Marvin. Christians actually have an incentive to help Marvin, because the Bible says that people will be given rewards in heaven based on their good deeds. So it is actually in a Christian’s self interest to help Marvin. To sum up this paragraph, we see that the charity produced the best economic and social benefits for a person who was sick and needed help.
Now that we know voluntarism should cover positive sanctions and NOT the government, it is important to realize that we as healthy people have a duty to fulfill, which is to help others who are stuck in tough spots. I realize that I have an obligation to tithe around 10% to people in true need who can’t help their circumstances. I pray that God will help me become more charitable with time.
In conclusion, the Bible, as far as I can tell, recommends a government based on protecting people’s God given rights through negative sanctions. The reason why I think God recommends a small civil government instead of anarchy, is because God knows that illogical people psychologically respect civil governments more than equally powerful individuals voluntarily protecting their rights. The Bible says we should not physically resist civil government. The Bible does not advocate civil government providing positive sanctions. The Bible definitely advocates that we as Christian individuals provide positive sanctions to those in need.
Josh Springfield 