Thanks. I think that definition implies that any such system of rules and guidelines is necessarily legitimate and therefore should or must be followed. Do you agree or disagree?
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Decision by majority vote only works for small groups where there is a meaningfully non-zero probability that an individual vote will be the deciding vote. How small? Probably less than 1,000 and certainly less than 10,000.
But the problem isn’t the voting system. The problem is that property is taken from private hands and placed into the public purse where it ultimately becomes the property of politically enterprising thugs. Today, this process is justified by welfarism and other tugs on the collective heartstrings but the money transferred from the productive to the unproductive in the form of welfare is merely a cover for the true purpose of the State which is to transfer property from the productive class to the Elite parasitic class - the wealthy and powerful crime lords who are our rulers.
This transfer is always inherently immoral but it can be done in better and worse ways. I believe the least destructive way to tax is for the government to perform a random lottery and take half of all property which it can locate belonging to the unfortunates whose names were drawn. No measure taken to conceal or hide one’s assets would be illegal. Tax losses, then, can be insured against (getting taxed would be like being hit by a natural disaster) and the government’s revenues would be limited by the measures to which insurers will go to hide their clients’ assets. The more avaricious the government’s revenues (the more names it draws in the lottery each year), the more worthwhile it is to insure against tax losses which would drive insurers to invest in ever more elaborate methods of hiding their clients’ assets. There are a few more caveats, such as the government has to refrain from monopolizing, subsidizing or regulating any industry (including law and security).
Part of the reason a “Libertania” has never come into being is because governments tax and subsidize the production of armies which are then used to conquer territories that do not tax and subsidize an army to keep out the subsidized armies of other governments. Hence, taxation is everywhere inevitable if it is anywhere tolerated. I think the tax system listed above might be a good model for a city-state (think Singapore) to adopt in order to make a move towards a more libertarian society. The government would be maintaining its tax base and, hence, would be able to subsidize its army to keep out the subsidized armies of other governments yet it would be doing so in a way that minimizes the destructive effects of government revenuing on the economy. This would give a territory that adopted this system an advantage vis-a-vis all other governments in the manner described by Hoppe whereby the more liberal societies tend to become home to the most aggressive governments. In time, all other governments would be forced to adopt a similar model. The last remaining step would be abolition of the monopoly on armed force.
Clayton -"
While this would ideally be less destructive compared to our current system, I have some questions:
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What will stop the state from arresting people on the basis of concealing their property? What if the state made it look like another crime?
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What will stop the state from rigging the lottery? Or ultimately targeting people on the basis of risk/reward/political connectedness?
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How many names are drawn? Why doesn’t the state just seize half of everyone’s assets, and drop the lottery altogether?
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The government can still make laws? I think they could use that to their advantage. They might find loopholes in this law of no measure taken to hide ones assets.
I think you forgot another implications of this system:
- It may encourage bribing the state so that they don’t go after your property. Even if the lottery isn’t rigged, the state can simply require a yearly payment. If you pay up, the state won’t go after your property if your name gets drawn. Of course, the state would have to compete with insurance companies.
I agree they are legitimate, but I’m not so sure that means there is an imperative to follow them. In a voluntary situation (lets say at work) it would be hard to call any of the rules “illegitimate,” yet there are a lot of reasons why you might break or bend them. Their legitimacy is based upon the fact that if caught, you may be subject to various disciplinary actions. Under a state, we translate that as meaning legitimacy is a matter of consent, but I think legitimacy is a matter of enforceability.
I think this is more in line with subjective valuation because my action and choice is based upon what I want and what I perceive the repercussions to be, rather than moral imperatives.
With all due respect, I think your opinion above can be summarized with the following: “Might makes right.”
Let me ask you this: if Congress passed a law requiring everyone to walk on their hands on Sundays, and made it a capital crime (i.e. punishable by death) to do otherwise, would you say that that law is legitimate?
I fail to see how moral imperatives aren’t in line with subjective valuation. If I believe it’s wrong to do X, I won’t want to do X, will I? Otherwise, I would perceive negative repurcussions from doing X, wouldn’t I?
I don’t know all the ins and outs of that phrase (whoever coined it probably had a deeper meaning) but on face value I don’t think it jives with my view. For example, by all means its wrong for me to murder someone. It’s illegal, its socially unacceptable, and its out of line with religions and morals. Yet if I did murder, certainly we could say I had the “might” but it really wasn’t “right” on any grounds.
If Congress were able to do this, then it would be legitimate. But they can’t, so it isn’t.
Returning to what sparked this conversation, you said that legal positivism is the belief that “what those with power decree is what should be obeyed.” I responded that “its the view that law is not necessarily made valid or invalid by morals or ethics.” I believe that laws should (or shouldn’t) be followed based upon whether the individual is ok with the repercussions or believes he may avoid them by lying, luck, whatever. What I think you believe (and correct me if I’m wrong) is that legitimate or valid laws ought to be obeyed by their very nature and because of this immoral laws must be illegitimate or invalid.
Without a way to prove “action x is wrong” we have no actual baseline to measure legitimacy or validity or right and wrong. We have to tie it to an assumption (natural law) or a conditional (if you want y, do x). In casual speech we can use assumptions like theft is wrong, “wrongness” must be universalized, therefore taxation is wrong. But once those assumptions are challenged, you have to prove that theft is a wrong value.
So now you are stuck trying to prove that a given value is true or false (impossible) so that you can show why a given law in regards to that value is or isn’t legitimate. All I have to do is point to a law and say “people obey it, it is enforced, it is a law.”
(I don’t know how to split a thread, but I’m aware that this is wayyyy off topic.)
Yet you wouldn’t have as much might as the government, and since the government already had superior might before you murdered, one could say that you stood no chance of making more right than it unless you acquired superior might than it. Hopefully that makes sense.
In any case, I made that claim because you seemed to be claiming that Congress is legitimate because it can (presumably) back up its decrees and commands with coercion. My real point here is that no one is obligated to use that as their criterion for legitimacy.
Wait, why can’t they? Besides, I asked a question about a hypothetical situation, didn’t I? But it sounds to me like your answer to that question is really yes. In that case, let me say that I would not consider Congress to be legitimate there at all. Now prove me wrong. 
No, I don’t consider laws to have inherent nature. But to me, the word “legitimate” is inextricably bound to morality. I take it upon myself to conclude whether a given law is legitimate based on my moral views. The fact that morality is subjective is irrelevant here.
There’s no way to prove “action x is wrong” without first presupposing a definition for “wrong”. No one is obligated to follow that same definition, however.
No, all I have to do is say that I consider a given law to be illegitimate. You do the same thing, in fact. There’s no prima facie reason why people must use your criteria for legitimacy and no other.
I just don’t think might has anything to do with “right.” It might play a significant role in the creation of laws and institutions, but whether those things are right or wrong may or may not be a result of might.
Political power is limited by the laws of physics and ideological support. If a law comes into being it is not because someone shook a magic 8 ball, but rather a concerted effort by numerous individuals driven for various reasons. If every single person wanted a law to pass like the one you described would you still call it illegitimate?
Also, no offense, but I’m not sure if I can really finish this debate. I really just wanted to point out the legal positivist view and not necessarily defend it. I’m a lot better at criticizing the natural law position (which I believed in for quite some time) than I am at defending positivism.