Morty said: “That’s only legitimate in situations where your labor contract has a section dealing with unilateral early termination of the contract. Let me ask you: if you signed a contract with At&T to provide phone service to you for three years and one year in AT&T decides that it will just stop providing phone service, do you have any legal recourse against AT&T for breach of contract? Or can they just do that whenever they want without penalty?”
We are talking here about 2 completely different theories of contract. On one side, we have the contemporary ‘expectations’ theory which holds that promises of future obligations are enforceable; and on the other -praised by Rothbard and Hobbes himself- is the traditional centuries long interpretation of contracts, which in part rely on natural rights and TITLE TRANSFER of private property. I keep making this distinction and I have the impression is not getting notice, so I’ll try and explain it a bit better.
In the case of the contract with AT&T, unless I have paid some months in advance or that they have provided me with a service that is to be repaid in the future, exiting the contract by any of the parties DOES NOT cause any harm to the property of the other and thus IS NOT enforceable. It is only enforceable to the extent that the contract itself established as conditional penal bond such as “pay $200 to get out”, but even in such case, NOBODY can force you to keep taking the service or AT&T to be in business indefinitely.
The same goes, for instance, on a contract for ‘sexual services’ or even marriage for that matter. Should those be ‘enforceable’ on other than moral grounds?
Here is some more Rothbard on the subject from “The Ethics of Liberty”:
"Let us pursue more deeply our argument that mere promises or expectations should not be enforceable. The basic reason is that the only valid transfer of title of ownership in the free society is the case where the property is, in fact and in the nature of man, alienable by man. All physical property owned by a person is alienable, i.e., in natural fact it can be given or transferred to the ownership and control of another party. I can give away or sell to another person my shoes, my house, my car, my money, etc. But there are certain vital things which, in natural fact and in the nature of man, are inalienable, i.e., they cannot in fact be alienated, even voluntarily. Specifically, a person cannot alienate his will, more particularly his control over his own mind and body. Each man has control over his own mind and body. Each man has control over his own will and person, and he is, if you wish, “stuck” with that inherent and inalienable ownership. Since his will and control over his own person are inalienable, then so also are his rights to control that person and will. That is the ground for the famous position of the Declaration of Independence that man’s natural rights are inalienable; that is, they cannot be surrendered, even if the person wishes to do so.
Or, as Williamson Evers points out, the philosophical defenses of human rights
are founded upon the natural fact that each human is the proprietor of his own will. To take rights like those of property and contractual freedom that are based on a foundation of the absolute self-ownership of the will and then to use those derived rights to destroy their own foundation is philosophically invalid.2
Hence, the unenforceability, in libertarian theory, of voluntary slave contracts. Suppose that Smith makes the following agreement with the Jones Corporation: Smith, for the rest of his life, will obey all orders, under whatever conditions, that the Jones Corporation wishes to lay down. Now, in libertarian theory there is nothing to prevent Smith from making this agreement, and from serving the Jones Corporation and from obeying the latter’s orders indefinitely. The problem comes when, at some later date, Smith changes his mind and decides to leave. Shall he be held to his former voluntary promise? Our contention—and one that is fortunately upheld under present law—is that Smith’s promise was not a valid (i.e., not an enforceable) contract. There is no transfer of title in Smith’s agreement, because Smith’s control over his own body and will are inalienable. Since that control cannot be alienated, the agreement was not a valid contract, and therefore should not be enforceable. Smith’s agreement was a mere promise, which it might be held he is morally obligated to keep, but which should not be legally obligatory."
Cheers!
