On Misery and Rule; S. McDonald

ON MISERYAND RULE STANLEY C. McDONALD A SOCIAL doctrine currently fash ionable within the "intellectual community" is that poverty, hun ger, and suffering in general are intolerable in a humane society. The implication is that society is not humane if it does not as a matter of course provide for the relief of all types of suffering .. Since there is no consensus as to the means or extent of the relief of suffering (otherwise the point taken would be manifestly redun·· dant) it must be left to the gov·· ernment, as society's instrument of force, to ensure this relief. Let us look at this principle in the context of the philosophy ex· pressed in the Declaration of In dependence, that the function of government is to secure the vari 0us "inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." To be consistent, we must either acknowledge as one of the Rights that of freedom from suffering, Dr. McDonald, a lecturer in the Department of . Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the University of Liverpool, England, cur rently is on leave of absence at the University of Rochester, New York.

or else append the philosophy of the Founding Fathers with the no tion that government has a fur ther function. On the one hand, it appears that it is not an inherent Right that we be free from suffering. The "inalienable Rights" claimed by the Founding Fathers are those states of being with which men are "endowed by their Creator," states which are not only possible, but manifest. The thesis that· a condition is a Right is thus ~n tenable if, under foreseeable cir cumstances, that condition cannot possibly he realized. Hence, one cannot claim the right to be Pres ident, although he may claim the right to one day qualify for nomi nation, simply because not every man can possibly attain that posi tion. Although the Creator is selec tive when providing men with physical and mental attributes, He is exceedingly impartial with Rights, to the extent that they are equally bestowed upon men .

The notion that freedom from suf fering is a Right cannot be justi205 206 THE FREEMAN April fled on the basis of any empirical evidence, since it has never been demonstrated that men can be free from suffering. Weare thus left with the alter native - the relief of suffering is a funcNon of government in addi tion to that of securing the "in alienable Rights/' What remains to .be shown is that it is not in violation of Rights th~t. govern ment exercises functions beyond the maintenance of Rights. In other words, is there a legitimate social use of force other than that necessary to secure men's natural rights? We would like to show that in the particular c~se of re lief from suffering the answer must be "no." We will base our conclusions on the premise· that suffering is an inherent aspect of man's cognizance of reality, and we will consequently try to dem onstrate that the suffering ex perienc'e is a necessary. part of the pursuit of Happiness.

Through experience and reason we have come to realize that it is always those conditions which give rise to suffering which we aim to eliminate. Although suffer ing is a disagreeable experience, which may .possibly bring about more suffering, it is not a substan tial condition. We may describe "suffering" as the natural re sponse of the body or mind to conditions which are not in harmony with the natural state of the body or mind. Whereas the state of Happiness may be characterized by the cog nizance of the condition of physi cal and psychological harmony, the pursuit of Happiness must entail the endeavor to eliminate the in harmonious conditions. Apparent ly the experience of suffering is the indication of sensitivity to such conditions; and, without that sensitivity, it is not clear how those conditions may be remedied. The systematic suppression of the suffering experience must prove a forbidding obstacle to the pursuit of Happiness. Only for those con ditions of suffering which are evi dently irremedial can we justify systematic relief.

Helpless or foolish? Let us look at two types of con ditions which give rise to suffer ing. One type of suffering is Poverty - a condition symptomatic of the lack of means, will, or freedom to attain a given level of productiv ity. Poverty itself is a state of in ability to attain some level of consumption, and is frequently a source of other types of suffering. Inasmuch as the degree of con sumption is determined by appe tite as well as by need, we distin guish Poverty solely as a matter of necessity.

1974 ON MISERY AND RULE 207 Hazlitt 1 has suggested that the poverty line be the "level of sub sistence sufficient to maintain rea sonable health and strength." One interpretation of "reasonable health and strength" is that con dition in which one can be pro ductive to the extent that, relative to the prevailing societal mechan isms which correlate productivity and consumption, he may sustain his physical condition. In this in terpretation, a man's situation is vie'wed in relation to self-perpetu ation, independently of appetite and other arbitrary considera-, tions. The poverty-stricken must somehow attain the necessities for consumption, presumably through increased productivity, or perish" It is for the relief of those who cannot help themselves that Char·· ity is devoted. In addition to Poverty, variou8 kinds of suffering arise from error and folly. Whether the resultant suffering is of a physical or psy·· chological nature, we are made sufficiently aware of actions which otherwise might pass as effecting harmonious conditions. Whether it is the remorse springing fronl harsh words to a friend, ora pain ful sunburn after a day at the beach, we have received a definite signal, a kind of natutal chastise ment.

1 Henry Hazlitt, The Conquest of Po't,· erty, (Arlington House, New Rochenc~, New Y.ork) 1973, p.39. Mistakes Become Habits 11 We Will Not Learn We then have a choice. We can disregard the causal relationship between certain actions and suffer ing, and instead rega:rd the pain as a matter of chance. We expect that as time passes we will suffer more and more': not only will we suffer repeatedly from the same type of mistake, but we will no doubt have to suffer from new mistakes. Alternatively, if we con clude that certain types of activ ities always result in suffering, we can resolve to avoid the suffering by not indulging in those actions. This is just what we mean by "learning from our mistakes." Only through this process do we have reason to expect that our efforts might become more fruit ful and our sufferings decrease. We could consider other types of suffering as well, but those which we have discussed cover a wide range of possible conditions and should be sufficient illustra tions for our argument. In the one, suffering indicates a lack of balance between consumption and productivity, and spurs men to strive for such balance. In the other, suffering indicates that the causative activities are faulty or misdirected.

We conclude that although suf fering is disagreeable, it is a nat ural response to certain conditions 208 THE FREEMAN April of life, which we disregard at our own peril. Life consists of a series of situations which are either forced upon us or are resultant from our actions. If we choose to be insensitive to the conditions which cause suffering, we are opt ing for ignorance and an endless struggle with a malevolent uni verse. On the other hand, if we pay heed to our sensitivity to the conditions we experience, we can expect the chance to learn from our mistakes. It thus seems that any systema tic attempts to shield men from the natural responses, including suffering, to those conditions to which their actions have led nec essarily deny those men the facil ity to pursue Happiness. This is just another way of saying that if men are not held accountable for their actions, then they will soon have little way of knowing which actions they should under take.

It may well be argued that, since government is an institution of force rather than production, it does not command the means to alleviate the conditions underlying suffering. Moreover, it is argued, government is sensitive only to political activity; its response to conditions of suffering must at most· be unreliable. What, then, is the point of our argument? We have shown that the attempt to protect men from the results of their actions, particularly suf fering, is a move to deny them their inherent means with which to pursue Happiness. The pro posal that a basic function of gov ernment is the relief of suffering is incompatible with the philos ophy that government guarantee the Right of the pursuit of Hap piness. Moreover, such a function is destructive of this end, and it is the "Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.... " In the past forty years, the no tion that "suffering is intolerable in a humane society" has been used with increasing effectiveness by those who would have an om nipresent state. We have seen, and are seeing more and more each day, the countless burdens we are having to bear as a result of some foggy theories about misery and rule. If anything, the cry that the government should undertake the relief of suffering has resulted in a gigantic free-for-all for the spoils of power.

If we will, we may learn from these mistakes and proceed on a course which, as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, will truly "se cure the Blessings of Liberty to Ourselves and our Posterity." If we won't, we have only ourselves to blame. ~ ThePuritanExperiment inCommon Ownership GARY NORTH ONE of the more familiar inci dents in American history, at least within conservative .circles, is the disastrous experiment with. a com mon storehous~ in the Pilgrim col ony in 1621-23. Governor .Brad ford describes in some detail in his history of the .colony how young men refused to work in the common fields in order to lay up produce. for a common storehouse, only to see all goods divided equal ly among families. Upon·· petition of the planters, the. Governor and his council decided to follow their advice: assign families their per sonal plots of farm land (accord ing to family size) and abolish the common storehouse. Immediately, men and women returned to the harvest fields.