I agree that it’s absurd, Clayton, but aren’t most thought experiments?
I was just trying to say that a property owner, by virtue of owning the land and discriminating who he allows on his property, could conceivably have people enter his property by signing contracts that would waive their rights to PDA protection or libertarian freedom if they have some reward of some type that is more valuable than the protection or the freedom. All I’m saying is that through contractual obligations this seems to pass libertarian muster.
Think of two people who want to duel in a gunfight and they sign a contract that says the loser’s family or insurance company or whomever will not sue the winner for murder. This is voluntary, so does this still count as murder? Do these people have the ability to voluntarily waive their right to life, in essence?
Excellent question and it illuminates the root problem. By definition, a dispute is between the parties involved and no one else. Hence, if two people want to settle their dispute through random lottery or a duel or betting or whatever method they choose, that’s their business. They do not create a tort against anyone else by settling their dispute in whatever way they choose. If Alan and Bob agree to have a duel and Alan kills Bob, Bob’s parents won’t have much of a case against Alan if Bob freely showed up to the duel. Note, however, that in the real world, duels always occurred in a neutral location. Inviting someone to your property in order to have a duel with them is just a bad idea… makes it look a lot like murder.
Opting out of arbitration is unthinkable in modern society because we are compelled by the State (through the threat of force) to patronize the State’s courts. But it regularly occurred in older times. This is the reason that dueling is virtually inconceivable to the modern mind.
The defining difference between dueling and the thought-experiment I gave is that dueling is a means of settling a dispute, where there was no dispute being settled in the thought-experiment. Alan was just trying to murder Bob and was being sly about it. Duelling is only possible with a certain legal framework that makes it possible. This is why duelling really can’t exist today, there’s no way to enforce the rules of the game. If somebody cheats, it’s no more illegal than if they don’t cheat. Instead of duels, we have drive-by shootings… because we’re so much more civilized today.
If it’s just pretentious way of saying you’ll eject someone from your property under these conditions but not otherwise (for example, the rules under which a landlord rents his property to a tenant), then it’s fine. The point is that the boundaries of your property are the limit at which you can exercise force. Just because a person is on top of your property (your land), that doesn’t make his body your property. You certainly have a right to remove him from your property - forcibly, if necessary, since once he refuses to willingly remove himself, he has begun aggressing against your property rights - but your rights in your property extend no further than the boundaries of your property.
No, it doesn’t, it just more strictly delimits the extents of private ownership and contract. You can’t own just anything. You can’t contract just anything. This has always been the case. You can’t own another human being because he can rightfully decide to resist your “ownership” at any time. If a slave escapes and you try to recapture him by suing him, he would be stupid to agree to become your slave again rather than accept that there exists a state of open conflict between you and him. He would necessarily prefer open conflict. Hence, a contract to the effect “You now own me from henceforth and forevermore and I must do everything you say no matter what” is just silly.
It’s not just that it’s against one’s interests but that it is necessarily preferable to repudiate the contract and accept a state of open conflict to abiding by the terms of the contract or negotiating a settlement based on the terms of the contract. Such contracts are absurd. Only contracts which specify terms that are less odious than open conflict resulting from repudiation of the terms of the contract are realistic and meaningful.
Well, let’s say that I sign a contract stating that I will perform some dangerous work in exchange for such-and-such pay. Further, let’s say that I didn’t fully understand just how dangerous it really was (as a result of my own failure to understand, not as a result of misrepresentation on the employer’s part which would be fraud and tortious). Let’s say there’s a 90% chance I will die from the work (e.g. from nuclear radiation). So, I renege on the contract. Now, the employer want to sue me saying that I must do the work because I agreed to do the work and I’ve been paid to do it. However, I’d much rather be in a state of open conflict with the employer where there is only a small probability that I will die than accept a 90% chance of dying, so there’s no way I’m going to agree to abide by the terms of the contract. This means the employer should have thought twice before drafting such a contract and probably should have put a clause specifying what happens in case I renege. If there’s no clause, there’s nothing the employer can do, he can only try to get his PDA to attack me or try to persuade my PDA to turn me over or something like that. If he had foresight (and he should have), he would have added a clause that in case of non-performance, I must return the money I was paid, in which case, that becomes a valid property claim which can be handled through a separate lawsuit, if necessary.
Another point I just thought of… I see little distinction between “contracts that permit violation of property rights” and serfdom. Everyone understood the rights and responsibilities of lords and serfs in medieval Europe, so there might as well have been a written contract between the serfs and their lord (the serfs couldn’t read or write anyway… and most lords couldn’t, either). Yet the position of the lord with respect to the serfs is clearly expropriatory and aggressive - it is indistinguishable from the relation between a State and its subjects.
Well, not that the state actually does anything, but heads of state are supposed to be prosecuted for their crimes, whereas kings were the law. Obviously there’s enough corruption so that the state is unaccountable, but in principal it’s different.
If non-retaliatory force is okay, then presumably that includes keeping people from leaving. This, then, amounts to a slavery contract - which is considered unenforceable by libertarian standards.
On the other hand, if non-retaliatory force is okay, then presumably that includes non-retaliatory force against the tycoon himself. I think he’d be foolish, at best, to allow for such a thing. Furthermore, if he tried to defend himself from someone else who’s on his land and trying to kill him, he’s technically violating the terms of his own contract. Again I think this essentially renders the contract unenforceable.
A contract which a person can’t break out of is not a voluntary contract IMO. The so-called American Civil War involved a statist analogy to this situation.
Well technically the tycoon could limit the law to his subjects; he could introduce a double-standard to protect himself. It is very ad hoc, but that is the whole point of stipulating every bit of minutiae in the contract for the sake of this thought experiment.
I agree though with your Civil War point. So what you guys are saying is that a contractual obligation isn’t absolute? You’re saying that if one party explicitly makes it known that he wishes to break the contract off at a later date and the other party continues forcing them in the relationship that this amounts to coercion? That sounds fair to me.
Holy shit. Have I somehow created an alias and started posting in my sleep?
The OP makes great points. Let me present a more detailed scenario. Say a man and a woman are traveling and come across a man who owns a large farm. The man invites them in and says that they can stay the night. The next day the couple decides that they would like to stay there permanently. A week later the man approaches them and says, “give me $50 or leave.” The couple decide to pay the money so that they can stay. Every week the man makes this same request and the couple agrees to pay. The landlord establishes rules in writing.
The couple have a baby. The baby grows up to become a man. His parents die but he continues to pay the rent. One day he thinks to himself, “wait a minute, I’ve never signed a contract with the landlord. Therefore, he can’t justly collect rent from me!” So the man decides to stop paying his rent. The landlord gets very angry, so when he stops paying his rent the landlord starts taking the money from the man’s drawer. “Rent is theft!” screams the man. The landlord reminds him that if he doesn’t want to abide by the rules, he’s always free to leave.
Is the landlord justified in confiscating the rent money when his tenant refuses to leave? How is this scenario different from that of a citizen and a state? If ease of leaving is the issue, what if this scenario occurred on a private island, a cruise ship, or and oil rig? Surely those things are just as hard to leave as a state. City’s are just as easy to leave as an apartment is. Are taxes imposed by a city just and consensual?
I haven’t really seen an answer beyond the “love it or leave it” argument with the addendum that it will magically be easier to leave and ignorance that people tend to grow fond of the places in which they live.
Fool on the Hill, no. The man doesn’t have a right to stay on the farmer’s property if it is actually the farmer’s property. Again, the State’s claim to the land is what is being challenged. They superimpose themselves on a large web of private property. Of course, none of us own any item or any private property since we pay sales or property taxes (essentially rent).
Fool on the Hill, no. The man doesn’t have a right to stay on the farmer’s property if it is actually the farmer’s property. Again, the State’s claim to the land is what is being challenged. They superimpose themselves on a large web of private property. Of course, none of us own any item or any private property since we pay sales or property taxes (essentially rent).
Let’s take the example back in history a bit. Once upon a time the land was a vacant, unhomesteaded area. The current landlord’s grandfather bought this plot of land from the government (of course this is illegitimate, but he’s going to be the one to homestead it, right?). So one day the grandfather is surveying his newly bought land when he sees some kids playing on it. He yells at them, “hey kids, get off my land!” The kids are afraid the grandfather might use force on them or call the police so they leave. Next before doing any work on the land himself, the grandfather hires someone to build a house on the land. So the construction workers homestead the land and give the house to the grandfather, which makes it his property. Flash forward to the present where the tenant is still screaming that he has a right to live there.
One day a descendent of the construction worker comes by and says, “my grandfather homesteaded this house before you had legitimate proerty rights over it. Therefore, it’s my house!”
The grandfather says, “but your grandfather and I had a deal. He agreed that the finished house would be mine.”
“Oh,” says the man, “but I have a witness that said that you used the threat of force to keep some kids off of land you hadn’t yet owned. You know what you are? You’re a state and all state land is illegitimate! You must give up all of your possessions!”
Does the landlord still have the right to charge rent and evict his tenant? Who is the rightful owner of the house?
Your timeline doesn’t even make sense. He bought the land with his own money, so it was his at the moment of transaction. You say the workers are “homesteading” the land, but all they would be doing in this scenario is performing a service on the grandfather’s property.
Nobody ever said that any thing a boss directs is wise or efficient or utilitarian or moral.
Unions can work as long as they are good for bargaining (equivalent of haggling). No libertarians are against worker’s demanding certain rights lest they withhold their work from the business owner. They are against artificial privileges granted by political means to unions at the expense of the business owner.
While it’s supposed to be a parody of some sort, parodies are only good so far as they reflect something of substance.
Only if he can certainly win every fight against all challengers, that is, he’d have to be a Leviathan. You’re forgetting the fact of uncertainty - two men of roughly equal size, strength and fitness each have about a 50% chance of winning a direct, physical conflict. And any two men drawn at random will be close to average size, strenght and fitness with high probability. Hence, uncertainty is the dominant factor in almost all conflicts. This is the only reason people ever began to arbitrate disputes in the first place. If you steal my flint knife and I challenge you to a fight over it if you don’t give it back, you have to ask yourself whether the chance of winning the fight and keeping the knife is worth the chance of losing the fight (and, possibly, your life) and losing at least the knife and whatever else I choose to take from you. The choice to fight represents a calculation (possibly mistaken) on your part that you can win with high enough probability to justify betting your life and other property against the stolen property.
Your timeline doesn’t even make sense. He bought the land with his own money, so it was his at the moment of transaction. You say the workers are “homesteading” the land, but all they would be doing in this scenario is performing a service on the grandfather’s property.
He bought unhomesteaded land from the state. According to proprietarianism, the state doesn’t have the right to make such a sale–or else you would have to accept them as a legitimate property owner. It would be like selling someone the moon. Let me quote Rothbard:
In the United States, we have been fortunate enough to largely escape continuing aggression in land titles. It is true that originally the English Crown gave land titles unjustly to favored persons (for example, the territory roughly of New York State to the ownership of the Duke of York), but fortunately these grantees were interested enough in quick returns to subdivide and sell their lands to the actual settlers. As soon as the settlers purchased their land, their titles were legitimate, and so were the titles of all those who inherited or purchased them. Later on, the United States government unfortunately laid claim to all virgin land as the “public domain,” and then unjustly sold the land to speculators who had not earned a homestead title. But eventually these speculators sold the land to the actual settlers, and from then on, the land title was proper and legitimate.
Rothbard clearly says that these “favored persons” never legitimately owned the land. If they weren’t legitimate owners, how could the grandfather in my example be?