Penny Thoughts: Free Will Preserves the Republic
About ten days ago we celebrated the 244th declaration of our independence from Great Britain, which many nonchalantly call, “July Fourth”. It always presents a good time to recall one of the most elemental principles our Founders believed as they sought to establish a new Nation.
It is a rudimentary tenet that the American Republic based on democracy is an unequivocal function of the notion and practice of free will. Free will is the foundational platform for individual and, by extension, collective choice. This is the underpinning of the argument, that not only does the American Republic promote free will, but free will is the very principle upon which it is predicated.
There always seems to be discussion on “freedom” and “liberty”. These terms are often seen as being the same and are interchanged with each other; however, there are some significant differences between these two concepts which occupied the minds of our Founders. I have distinguished them from each other as follows: “…freedom is the release or exemption from institutionally or structurally imposed regulations and strictures; whereas, liberty is the exercise of unrestrained individual free will in one’s life, expression, behavior, or political views. Hence, it can be said that liberty has to do with will and freedom has to do with application.”
When considering just what our philosophical distinctions between freedom and liberty are, weighing the importance of each is revealing. Once again freedom appeals to the institutional, structural, or systemic processes of a democratic republic and liberty appeals to the specific concepts of individual wills within a democratic republic. Because individual will precedes practices in a democratic republic it functions as its overall platform and as a roadmap to direct the ultimate structure of a democratic republic.
Clearly, the concept of free will was utmost in the minds of our Founders. Their antipathy for King George was prompted by his monarchical repression of individual wills. So intense was this antipathy that it framed some specifically enumerated freedoms as The Bill of Rights. Today, we refer to them as the “First Ten Amendments”, but so important were these Rights that they were called The Bill of Rights. It presented a very pointed inventory of liberties which were obviously formed in the concept of the notion of free will, a concept and practice which had been so brutally suppressed by King George. As such, free will crystallized the fundamental metrics of our American democratic republic. And for these past 244 years we have continued to enjoy their protections and liberties.
Thomas Jefferson has given us an insight into this overall concept of the importance and application of will when he observed,
“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the limits of the law’ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.”
This was a clear proclamation of the importance of the will in opposition to some oppressive laws of any governing entity.
To Jefferson’s commentary, we can add C.S. Lewis’ analysis of free will.
“God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go wrong or right…Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.”
From these two powerful quotations it is not difficult to see how impacting free will is in every aspect of human endeavor. Recognizing its organic basis in our world, and, perhaps even in our DNA, we know what it does to those who have it and particularly to those who are deprived of it. Somehow, and especially when it is absent, there is an epistemological realization that there is a void in the human condition which can be addressed in only one of two ways: 1) oppose that which denies free will through whatever form is available; or 2) acquiesce to its absence and live in servitude to another entity which dictates what one’s will is to be.
Yet, there is still a more insidious and more subtle progression of the state absconding with free will. It is a process which could very well be at work today in America. We are a country blessed with unbridled natural wealth from our continent. And from this wealth we have developed an unparalleled economy and crystallized it into an expansive technology. All of this has made us, to put it mildly, “comfortable”. This “comfort” is an alluring siren which can easily seduce us into surrendering free will for continued coziness.
The more comfortable a citizenry becomes the easier it is to manipulate. It is a short tour from “comfortable” to “sated”; from “sated” to “weak”; from “weak” to “lazy”; from “lazy” to “apathetic”; from “apathetic” to “subjugation”; and from “subjugation” to “involuntary servitude”. The process may seem to be an over-simplification, but through it we surrender free will to a perceived notion of “comfort”, as “safety”.
And sadly, the “herd” will come to accept this decline into slavery as the “new normal”.
This evolution from free will to slavery is more a function of attitude than of legalities, but it is an attitude which allows us, as a “herd”, to accept the legalities. The mentality of the “herd” is malleable. Its attitudes can be force-fed and convinced to believe that if “X” is desired to be protected and “Y” is the best process to achieve this, then the “herd” will accept “Y” without opposition. America’s democratic republic is a direct product of a concerted and continuous exercise of free will.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of The West Alabama Watchman.