The problem isn't the government. The problem is we the people. We get the government we deserve. The more we become like a democracy, the more we become socialized.
The role of the government is to do for the people what the people cannot do for themselves. Not to do for the people what they can and should be doing for themselves. The problem is that people who want the government to do for them what they can and should be doing for themselves, elect public servants that will agree to do for them what they should be doing for themselves.
Of course this is untenable over the long haul and will ultimately lead to debauching the dollar and anarchy. Which means we will need government to protect the weak from the strong which was the original basis for government in the first place.
God help us in what that government will look like when this all comes crashing down.
I have to applaud this because you pretty well nailed the situation that currently exists. Of course you left out the other side of the argument which is the anarchists saying that no government can be good government and therefore there should be no government.
But they provide no solution for how the strong will not be deterred or discouraged from preying on the weak and how anything other than violence will determine who will be able to access available resources.
The government the Founders gave us was a government limited to very specific functions such as:
1. The ability to pass such laws and regulation as necessary for the various states to operate as one nation without doing violence to each other. (The strong would not be allowed to prey upon the weak.)
2. The authority to negotiate trade agreements with other nations for the benefit of all.
3. The authority to create a common currency and such infrastructure and policy as necessary to promote the general (everybody's) welfare such as construction of post roads (federal roads) crossing state lines.
4. The responsibility to provide the common defense which included defense of our own borders against intruders and rules by which new states would be allowed to join the union, i.e. those who would respect and honor the U.S. Constitution.
Pretty much everything else was to be left to the various states who could organize themselves into whatever sorts of society they wished to have.
Such was the social contract mutually agreed by those determined to create a nation like no other with unalienable rights and liberties facilitated and uninterferred with by a central government that had never existed until the U.S.A. was formed.
And the people abdicated the social contract and created the corrupt and self serving mess we have now when it allowed the federal government overstep its restraints and be populated with people who would use government to their own personal advantage. And they do so by using the people's money to bribe or bludgeon them into acquiescence.
We have nobody to blame for that but ourselves. And nobody will be able to restore the social contract except for we the people with the courage and determination to do so.
Exactly.
1. Locke believed that most people are good and respect the rights of others because their conscience tells them they should. However, some people are not so good. Sometimes people who are stronger and more skilled abuse those who are weaker or less skilled.
2. Locke believed that in a state of nature, people protect their natural rights – life, liberty and property- by using their own strength and skill. The weaker and less skilled would find it difficult to protect their rights. Instead, the weaker people would try to protect their rights by joining together against the strong.
3. Locke believed that in a state of nature, no one’s life, liberty or property would be safe because there would be no government or laws to protect them. This is why people agreed to form governments. According to Locke, governments do no exist until people create them.
4. Locke believed that in a state of nature, no one would have the right to govern (rule over) you, and you would not have the right to govern anyone else. According to Locke, the only way the people get the right to govern anyone else is when the people give their consent (approval/permission). If the people have not given their consent to create a government, the government is not lawful or legal. In other words, the power of a lawful government comes from the consent (permission) of the people.
Why do people agree to form a social contract?
Although people agree everyone has natural rights (life, liberty and property), they worry about how those rights will be protected. In a state of nature, people might feel free to do anything they want to do. However, their rights would not be protected and that would make them feel insecure.
For John Locke, the great problem was to find a way to protect each person’s natural rights so that everyone could enjoy them and live at peace with each other. He felt that the best way to solve this problem is for each person to agree with others and create a government that gives it the power to make and enforce laws. Locke called this kind of agreement a social contact.
As in all contracts, you must give up something to get something (compromise). In a social contract everyone promises to give up the right to do everything they want in exchange for security that can be provided by a government. Each person agrees to obey the limits placed on them by the laws of the government. Everyone gains the security of knowing that their rights to life, liberty, and property are protected.
According to Locke, the main purpose of government is to protect those natural rights that the individual cannot effectively protect in a state of nature.
