The State is not the only entity overburdened as a result of the State's expansion into inappropriate areas and the suppression of private and religious initiatives. Another consequence is a heavier burden on the taxpayer through increased assessments to finance redistribution and entitlements.
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| Dr. Goetz Briefs (Georgetown University) |
A burden also falls on consumers as a result of inflating the price level by the government
emitting debt to finance social programs and raising the costs of production by
increasing wages. As the solidarist
labor economist Goetz Antony Briefs (1889-1974), a student of Fr. Heinrich Pesch,
S.J., and member of the Königswinterkreis,
noted regarding this transformation,
It is a fact that large groups of workers today have no objection to
raise against propertylessness — provided their jobs are secure, their wages
sufficient, and provisions are made through social insurance for old age and
unemployment. To meet these requirements
the economic system has had to shoulder increasing burdens and to put up with
an increasing amount of social legislation, which, of course, implies
additional regimentation. As long as the
risks of a propertyless, dependent life were private affairs of the worker, it
paid to transform work more and more into wage work. Now, however, since the concomitant costs of
this process are gradually being made public costs to be carried through taxes levied upon business and the
general public, it is becoming questionable whether or not the aforementioned
process was always as economical as it seemed to be. (Goetz A. Briefs, The Proletariat: A Challenge to Western
Civilization. New York: McGraw-Hill
Book Company, 1937, 273-274.)
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| Frederick Jackson Turner |
After World War
II, the United States relied on the reformed capitalism of the New Deal both domestically and internationally in an
attempt to ensure post-war government-sponsored economic prosperity and full
wage system employment. It could therefore
be argued that the Allied victory in World War II was in spite of, not because
of, the Keynesian economic policies of the New Deal.
The “Frontier
Thesis” of Frederick Jackson Turner (1861-1932) offers an explanation why the New
Deal and its
underlying philosophy were the antithesis of everything that had contributed to
the unique American character. That
character had impressed such diverse commentators and authorities as Alexis de
Tocqueville, William Cobbett (1763-1835),
Michel-Guillaume-Saint-Jean de Crèvecoeur
(“J. Hector Saint John de Crèvecoeur,” 1735-1813),
and every pope since Pius VII. As Turner noted in 1893 in his paper, “The Significance
of the Frontier in American History” —
American development has exhibited not merely advance along a single
line, but a return to primitive conditions on a continually advancing frontier
line, and a new development for that area. American social development has been
continually beginning over again on the frontier. This perennial rebirth, this fluidity of
American life, this expansion westward with its new opportunities, its
continuous touch with the simplicity of primitive society, furnish the forces
dominating American character. The true
point of view in the history of this nation is not the Atlantic coast, it is
the Great West. (Frederick Jackson Turner, “XVIII. — The Significance of the
Frontier in American History,” Annual
Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1893. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office,
1894, 200.)
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| Pope Pius IX, betrayed by liberals |
The American
character thereby developed out of a situation much closer to nature — human nature — than was possible in
Europe with its entrenched economic, political, and social élites. This situation was
not the result of the wilderness, per se,
but the opportunity the wilderness represented for anyone to make his or her
own way, freed from artificial and nature-stifling constraints. This was the opportunity to gain ownership of a reasonable amount of landed capital, and the power that necessarily
accompanies such ownership.
Personal
empowerment through capital ownership and the habit of forming private associations
for every conceivable purpose led to the development of democracy of a different kind than was possible in
Europe, as Pius IX discovered to his cost. American democracy inspired European
democracy, but the latter was a pale imitation of the former based on different
(and, according to the Catholic Church, erroneous)
assumptions about human nature, both individual and social. As Turner noted,
[T]he most important effect of the frontier has been in the
promotion of democracy here and in Europe. As has been indicated, the frontier is
productive of individualism. Complex society is
precipitated by the wilderness into a kind of primitive organization based on
the family. The tendency is anti-social.
It produces antipathy to control, and
particularly to any direct control. . . . The frontier individualism has from
the beginning promoted democracy. . . . So long as free land exists, the
opportunity for a competency exists, and economic power secures political
power. (Ibid., 221-223.)
Nor are the
effects of a frontier limited to individual economic and political power:
From the conditions of frontier life came intellectual traits of
profound importance. . . . That coarseness and strength combined with acuteness
and inquisitiveness; that practical, inventive turn of mind, quick to find
expedients; that masterful grasp of material things, lacking in the artistic
but powerful to effect great ends; that restless, nervous energy; that dominant
individualism, working for good and for evil, and withal that buoyancy and
exuberance which comes with freedom — these are traits of the frontier, or
traits called out elsewhere because of the existence of the frontier. Since the days when the fleet of Columbus
sailed into the waters of the New World, America has been another name for
opportunity, and the people of the United States have taken their tone from
the incessant expansion which has not only been open but has even been forced
upon them. (Ibid., 226-227.)
With the
closing of the frontier, democracy in the United States began to shift away from its uniquely American
and natural character based on the sovereignty of the individual and the
dignity of the human person with an appreciation of people’s political nature. Democracy gradually began transforming into
the European model based on sovereignty of the collective and the dignity of
the State.
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| FDR: the New Deal the Kingdom of God on Earth |
Nor were
individuals like Msgr. John A. Ryan, John Maynard Keynes, and
Franklin Delano Roosevelt slow to take advantage of this change. They and others worked to accelerate its
acceptance to implement the new order intended to establish New Christian concept of the Kingdom of God on Earth or its secular equivalent. As ordinary people lost property in capital and thus power, the government strengthened at
the expense of the nation, the public sector economy expanded displacing large
portions of the private sector, and the State intruded into family life, even to the point
of redefining the fundamental domestic institution of marriage.
Not that America
prior to the advent of capitalism and, later, Keynes and the New Deal, was perfect. Even given the treatment of native peoples,
the aftermath of slavery, and the reception given to many of
the new immigrant groups, however, the United States was still far better than the alternative in
Europe and elsewhere, as the popes consistently pointed out.
Nevertheless,
as Turner observed, “the democracy born of free land, strong in selfishness and
individualism, intolerant of administrative
experience and education, and pressing individual liberty beyond its proper
bounds, has its dangers as well as its benefits.” (Ibid., 223.)
These faults,
however, are correctible. It is possible
to gain the benefits of a frontier — initiative, opportunity, and democracy — without the disadvantages, or at least with
the disadvantages minimized.
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| Pope Pius XI, wanted power to the people. |
The solution
lies in the social doctrine of Pius XI, primarily
the act of social justice.
By means of this breakthrough in moral philosophy, the exercise of each
person’s individual rights can be optimized.
This is not merely without prejudice to the group as a whole, but to the
advantage of the individual, the group, and the whole of the common good.
Pius XI’s social
doctrine, however, as well as that of Leo XIII on which it is built, requires that every
person have power. This is both to
secure his or her individual rights as well as to be able to introduce
necessary changes in institutions to establish and maintain a just social order.
With the
closing of the land frontier, however, the opportunity for, and means of
acquiring widespread ownership of capital seemed to have disappeared. Continuing efforts that had been made to
control Americans without appreciable effect by the various élites as long as the frontier existed,
could now be successful. That, however,
was only so long as no new frontier opened up, together with the means whereby
ordinary people could gain access and benefit by it.
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