Why true liberals should embrace limited government

Those who truly advocate for freedom should abhor the expansion of government into our personal lives and Liberty.

This is the second in a series inspired by JD Rucker’s article on What classical liberalism is, briefly. As a basis for this discussion, these are the relevant parts of the definition of the term Liberal from the Oxford English Dictionary:

Definition of liberal in English:
adjective

1 Willing to respect or accept behaviour or opinions different from one’s own; open to new ideas.
1.1 Favourable to or respectful of individual rights and freedoms.

1.2 (in a political context) favouring individual liberty, free trade, and moderate political and social reform.
noun
1A person of liberal views.
Origin
Middle English: via Old French from Latin liberalis, from liber ‘free (man)’.

Despite the post modernist mentality of some, the terms Liberal and Liberty haven’t changed in meaning. Both have the same roots in the ‘female personification of liberty and personal freedom’: Libertas. A true Liberal values ‘individual rights and freedoms’ along with free trade, in other words: Liberty.

Expansive or Limited government: Which is the best condition for the cause of Liberty?

It should be intuitively understood that as government grows, individual Liberty is diminished. Or as one of the founding fathers so eloquently stated it:

“The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground.”
Thomas Jefferson

Most people understand this to be true, that as governmental power expands, individual Liberty decreases. The worst examples of totalitarian governance stem from socialist, fascist or communist regimes of the Collectivist-Left. Can anyone argue that the cause of Liberty even had a chance in the ‘Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik’? Or the country tight in the totalitarian grip of the had the ‘Nationalsozialistische deutsche Arbeiter-Partei’? Or at present the nation under the complete control of the ‘Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela’?
We will dispense with the typical leftist folderol that those regimes of the past and present weren’t socialist or communist. This is a logical discussion of basic ideological constructs, it is pointless to rehash the ad hoc rescues of the Left.
There are those who make the false claim that wealth redistribution somehow ‘frees’ people since they no longer have to strive to make a living. The error with this point of view is the severe lack of Liberty on the part of those who have to supply this ‘largess’. Not to mention that being dependent on the government is also antithetical to Liberty.

Moving to the Left results in diminished Liberty.

Any decent model of the political spectrum will have one scale with the proper metric of governmental power as it’s standard of measurement. These properly situate minimal government control on the Right and place total government control on the Left. This aligns perfectly with ideological definitions, despite the assertions of those who prefer to muddy the waters as to who belongs on the Right or the Left. A logical construct of the political spectrum enables someone to quickly and easily determine where they are situated on the scale instead of making the determination more opaque.
Thus it should be obvious that minimal government equates to maximum freedom on the Right end of the political spectrum. The Left end of the political spectrum has the opposite condition with maximum government equating to minimal freedom. This is why the Right is properly labelled as the Pro-Liberty side of the political spectrum.

The Takeaway

The national Socialist-Left would clearly like to deprive the people of a number of human rights and Liberties. On top of their now incessant attacks against the Commonsense human Right of Self-defence, they would like stricter controls on speech. The have also expanded their ire against freedom with assaults against due process and the presumption of innocence.
Not only have they revealed their true nature as being hostile to freedom, but they have proven the point that unlimited government is the death of Liberty. It’s only by keeping government in check that we can keep our freedom. True Liberals innately know this to be the case and the reason the ‘resist’ its expansion.

 Originally published on the NOQ Report