Banned From Having Libertarian Literature In A Car??? - Follow up on my debate with Chris Freiman
Two weeks ago I debated Chris Freiman on immigration. It was one of the best debates ever, so you should immediately watch it. Patrick Carroll did a fantastic job as the moderator.
For most of the debate, I was a real tour de force, completely vanquishing the pro-open borders position with my powerful arguments. However, I must admit that Chris got the better of me on one point when he pressed me about whether it would be okay to ban him from transporting libertarian literature on public roads if 97% of Americans voted for the ban.
American public property - roads, government buildings, the court system, the political system - is owned as a club good by Americans. If someone steals money from you and 9 other people and uses it to buy a farm, you and the 9 other people are the rightful owners of the farm. Since American public property was built with resources stolen from American taxpayers, American taxpayers and their heirs are the rightful owners of American public property.
Immigrants come to America precisely because they want to use that property, but they have no right to use our property without our consent. Furthermore, immigrants tend to vote for socialism, so in aggregate, they’re not merely using our property without our consent, they’re stealing and destroying our property.
Chris pressed me on the limits of what Americans may do with their jointly-owned property. If 97% of Americans don’t want me to have libertarian literature in my car when I drive on public roads, can they forbid it? Do they have that right?
In the debate, I said yes; I would vote against the ban, I think it would be morally wrong to exercise their property rights over the roads in that way, but technically, if 97% of Americans wanted to do it, they would have the right to ban people from transporting libertarian literature on the roads.
After thinking about it, I don’t think that’s correct. Consider again the case where someone robs 10 people and uses the money to buy a farm. The 10 people jointly possess a property right to the farm. Majority rule would not be a just way to make every decision about how the farm is used. To take an extreme case, it would definitely be unjust for 9 of the people to vote to confiscate the share of the 10th person. The 10th person has property rights to the farm that can’t be alienated by a majority of the other joint owners. Each of the 10 joint owners has the right to visit the farm and use its equipment - even without permission from the other owners. An individual joint owner does not have the right to damage or sell the farm’s equipment1 without the permission of the other joint owners.
There are not going to be perfectly clear rights here, and that’s because it is in the context of a situation that was created by a previous act of injustice: the original theft and purchase of the farm with stolen money. But even when things can’t be sorted out in a morally perfect way, some things are clearly more just than others. Handing control of the farm to the 10 people who were robbed to purchase it is clearly more just than handing control of the farm to some random person off the street. Handing control over public roads to the heirs of the Americans who were taxed to build them is clearly more just than handing control over the roads to someone from Sudan.
Chris asked if 97% of Americans can justly forbid him from carrying libertarian literature in his car when he drives on public roads. The answer is no. Chris is a joint owner of the roads, just like any other net-taxpaying American2. Other joint owners of the American roads do not have a right to tell Chris what kind of literature he can carry. They do have the right to tell Chris he can’t destroy the roads, and they do have a right to forbid people who are not joint owners from using the roads.
Recapping my main points from the debate:
American net taxpayers and their heirs are the rightful owners of American public property, which include the American court system and the American political system, as well as roads and bridges.
Cutting a current citizen off from the roads after their house is already built seems quite unfair. It’s a bit like buying a circular strip of land around someone’s house and then charging them a fee to cross it. So preventing a person who has always lived in America from using American roads is quite different from preventing people in other countries from using American roads.
A support troop in an army can be guilty of participating in an unjust war even if they don’t personally shoot anyone. A voter who votes for tyranny is guilty of the state’s crimes. If you can use force against the support troop in an invading army, you can use force to stop a pro-tyranny voter from gaining voting power in your country.
A ban on voting for the socialist party is different from a ban on reading socialist literature because the moral responsibility lies with the person who commits the act. Reading a pro-murder book is allowed. Acting on the book and committing murder is not allowed.
or at least not more than one tenth of the farm’s equipment
and heirs of net taxpayers as well
That's interesting. Some libertarians make the point that all rights are property rights and opponents use this as proof that libertarianism has freedom-crushing consequences, but it feels that you're working your way through a framework that doesn't suffer from that defect. I mean, other rights still seem to be downstream from property rights in your model, but you're adding important guardrails.
I as a holder of one share in SpaceX, do not have the legal right to storm into Elon’s corporate office willy-nilly and hector him about his children out of wedlock even though I am morally in the right about his children. Elon however, does not have the right to veto his shareholders if we vote to be given an audience with him there.