Cato Unbound: “Can an Omnipotent Government Make a Rock Bigger than It Can Lift?” by Michael Munger; Response to “Government, Bound or Unbound?” by Anthony de Jasay
Feb 15th, 2008 by Micah Tillman | 3 Comments |
Munger responds to de Jasay’s essay (summarized here). Gaus was the first (summarized here), and we still await a response from Randy Barnett.
I think Munger’s essay is more relevant than Gaus’s. Or maybe it’s that I like Munger’s thinking better than Gaus’s (in their respective articles, that is. I’ve never read anything else by them).
Munger argues that it can actually be in the interest of those in government to limit their own powers, contra what de Jasay seems to have claimed. This is the case at least when it comes to contracts. A government which does not allow itself to be held to account on anything cannot be trusted, and thus will not be cooperated with by those who control resources that it needs.
Munger then goes on to provide an interesting thought experiment which shows the problem of majority rule when “the Common Good” isn’t properly understood (when people don’t understand the difference “mine” and “ours”).
In the final part of the essay, Munger talks about the difference between a government’s having a lot of power, but being unable to use it without going through a lot of hassle, and a government having limited power. He says that the purpose of the “separation of powers” is not so much to limit the power of government, but to make it difficult for government to exercise the great power it has.
Those who want government to be more “efficient,” he says, want to destroy the separation of powers. Inefficiency is a good thing.
Munger is correct. The U.S. Constitution gives us a government with the engine of a lawnmower and the brakes of a Rolls-Royce. This was entirely intentional as anyone who has read The Federalist Papers knows.
There is a very good reason why U.S. Treasury bonds are the risk-free asset of the entire world. The United States is the country most trusted to pay back its debts, allowing us to borrow money very cheaply.
Help me out with some history, Andrew. Were the Federalist Papers written before or after the Articles of Confederation?
My old American History Teacher would have said that the articles were quite aptly described by you as having the breaks of a Rolls Royce and the engine of a lawn mower.
It seems like the common view is that the Constiution fixed this, but it seems like you don’t think it went far enough.
The Federalist Papers were written in support of the Constitution, not the Articles of Confederation. However, don’t get me wrong, while the Constitution created a federal government difficult to start and easy to stop, the Articles of Confederation created a federal government impossible to start at all.