Under Siege: Voting Rights of Felons or Property Rights of Citizens?
The New York Times misses almost no opportunity to advance the cause of government robbery and other forms of force and violence against the citizens of the United States. Its latest effort, expressed today in an editorial titled “Voting Rights Under Siege,� is to urge the enfranchisement of five million felons.
With exceptions, such as those convicted of income-tax evasion or violations of other interventionist legislation, felons are people who have committed acts of force against their fellow citizens. It is sound policy to keep them from the polls, where they would be in a position to contribute to more of the same, by voting for politicians who would do under cover of the law the very kind of thing that they have done in violation of the law.
For example, holding up a gas station at the point of a gun is a felony. But a tax collector taking the gas station owner’s money—under the threat of armed force—that’s legal. And the money may even serve exactly the same purpose in both instances. The holdup man doesn’t want to work, so he commits a holdup. The government gives money to people so that they don’t have to work, and now don’t even have to pull the holdup themselves.
Of course, it doesn’t actually work out that any fewer private holdups or other private acts of force are committed. Quite the contrary. This is because when the use of force to seize other people’s wealth is sanctioned and legitimized by the behavior of the government itself, the moral barrier to its use is weakened throughout society. The government, in effect, tells the robbers that their behavior is essentially justified.
In an effort to limit the extent of force and violence against its citizens, the Legislature of the State of Pennsylvania is considering a bill that would limit the voting rights of felons. At present, felons have the right to vote in Pennsylvania once they leave prison. What is under consideration is preventing them from voting until the terms of their maximum sentences have expired. In addition, the Pennsylvania Legislature is considering requiring proof of identity on the part of all voters, not just first-time voters, in order to reduce fraud at the polls.
The Times identifies these measures, probably correctly, as creating a voting barrier “especially for groups that tend to be Democratic.� That, of course, is the constituency which it favors. And it is especially concerned because “Pennsylvania [is] a swing state that will hold some critical elections this fall.� What The Times is doing here is fighting against barriers to criminality and fraud. And this from a newspaper that pretends to have high moral standards and regularly puts itself in the position of moral censor of the nation. What hypocrisy!
There are property rights. There is no right to steal. There is no right to vote to steal. A majority voting to steal is no different in principle than a majority voting for a lynching.
The American people need protection from crime, private and government. The starting point of any real protection must be the unmasking of the sophistries and dishonesty present in such mistakenly esteemed publications as The New York Times.
This article is copyright © 2006, by George Reisman. Permission is hereby granted to reproduce and distribute it electronically and in print, other than as part of a book and provided that the author’s web site www.capitalism.net is included. (Email notification is requested.) All other rights reserved.
Comments (17)
And indeed, the felons in government will seek to enfranchise the felons in prison. They understand each other. Witness the recent federal election in Canada, where the recently-enfranchised prison inmate population made it clear that they overwhelming preferred the governing Liberal Party, themselves nothing but a gang of Marxism-spouting thieves in three piece suits.
Published: February 11, 2006 12:14 AM
I'm not sure I agree with this. While I don't like the notion of anybody voting who would tend to want to use government to take away my freedoms, it seems to me like it just leavs way too much subjective room for the government to decide who can vote and who can't. Just how long would it be before it would extend over to unauthorized drug posession, then to unauthorized firearms ownership, then to breaking tax law, then to "unruly" protestors.
I think if we're going to limit government, it is far better to seek out opportunities to limit it as a higher level than it is to try and limit looser voters.
Published: February 11, 2006 10:16 AM
Elections let the sheep decide who will shear them.
Published: February 11, 2006 1:00 PM
Prof. Reiseman,
"it doesn’t actually work out that any fewer private holdups or other private acts of force are committed. Quite the contrary. This is because when the use of force to seize other people’s wealth is sanctioned and legitimized by the behavior of the government itself, the moral barrier to its use is weakened throughout society. The government, in effect, tells the robbers that their behavior is essentially justified."
If I didn't know better, I'd almost say that the author was anarcho-capitalist: i.e., the government taxes sanction thievery.
Putting that aside, I disagree with the above poster who thinks this is a slippery slope. The fewer people who vote, the better! Hans-Hermann Hoppe has made an excellent argument on this in Democracy: The God That Failed. However, in civilizing and libertarian process of disenfranchisement from voting, those who are not property owners, those who are violent criminals and thieves, those who are welfare-recipients, and anyone who's on the State payroll, should be disenfranchised from the voting right prior to the disenfranchisement of those who are real private property owners. Otherwise, one could imagine the perverse effects of such disenfranchisement.
Howevedr, an alternate strategy woudl be to pursue unilateral disenfranchisment without respect to property-ownership status; e.g., "this group is disenfranchised", where the group isn't one that divides croooks from non-crooks. Of course, that wouldn't be PC.
Published: February 11, 2006 1:17 PM
Ol' Freddie B discussed the "right to vote" in "The Law":
Published: February 11, 2006 4:40 PM
"With exceptions, such as those convicted of income-tax evasion or violations of other interventionist legislation, felons are people who have committed acts of force against their fellow citizens."
Just like politicians, who should also be denied the right to vote, especially in legislative sessions.
As a practical matter, however, I think it is ridiculous to think that restricting the voting rights of felons, who would tend to vote Democratic, would increase freedom since Republicans are now generally worse than Democrats in almost all ways.
Published: February 12, 2006 1:33 AM
If taxation for government is theft, shouldn't we put all the government people in jail, which is run by warders who work for the.....
I'm confused.
Published: February 12, 2006 3:57 AM
Paul Mason -- ...warders work for the...
people. I would gladly pay part of what the government currently steals from me in taxes for the upkeep of a prison dedicated to keeping all government officials in it. I think I'm not alone.
Published: February 12, 2006 4:37 AM
Something just doesn't seem right about giving preference to property owners rather than the property-less. After all, the state is about more than simply taking money. It is also, of course, about the monopoly on violence in a given territory. If one is to be ruled, property or no, he ought to have the right to vote at least as a defensive measure.
Published: February 12, 2006 6:06 AM
Dr. Reisman's reasoning puzzles me. If there is a moral equivalence between voting and theft, then what does it matter who is doing the voting? There may be an argument as to why felons should be deprived of their franchise, but it is not present in the above article.
Published: February 12, 2006 12:35 PM
Taring and feathering is much cheaper than imprisoning.
Published: February 12, 2006 2:14 PM
Curt, Dain,
I would be all in support of giving the property-less veto-voting power on anything that others might vote on that could violate their natural rights.
The issue is that those who are property-less, those who are on the State dole, those who are welfare recipients, criminals, and so-on and so-forth, are all much more likely to vote for measures that violate private property rights, increase taxes, and redistribute wealth to them -- they have an incentive to do this. Of course, everyone has an incentive to have wealth redistributed to them, but at least those with property have some incentives to protect private property rights.
There isn't a necessary moral equivalence between voting and theft. Depending on the situation, a vote can be cast defensively, to try to contribute some minute thing to reducing the taxes one is burdened with. However, often, they are not used defensively. The very idea is dangerous -- it encourages people to think that they have the right to vote for property-violating measures, the right to steal from their neighbors if enough people agree on it.
Published: February 12, 2006 2:22 PM
My paradox has an obvious resolution- the death penalty. Every problem has a (final) solution. You guys are just not thinking far enough outside the square.
Published: February 12, 2006 9:58 PM
Will they get jury duty too?
The only bad thing I see about this is prisoners will more likely bother to vote.
C'mon guys, we all know voting is almost worthless in terms of power (unless you're the one being elected). Prisoners, like the rest of us, have a far more powerful tool: not giving consent. Indeed, voting takes power away from this tool.
Don't be a tool, don't vote, and don't give consent to this ludicrous "process".
Published: February 13, 2006 12:31 AM
I always come away with a bitter feeling when reading a Reisman opinion. It's not that I necessarily disagree with them, but there's too often something obviously missing. His pieces on energy focus on U.S. drilling and ANWR, but deceptively try to convince the reader that it will be anything but a drop in the ocean of the global oil industry. I fully support deregulating the U.S. oil industry, but let's try to maintain our intellectual integrity and not make promises that won't be delivered.
This article on felon disenfrenchisement makes the assumption that lawmakers who decide what a felony is won't take advantage of the system to destroy their opposition and secure for themselves a monopoly on the political body. And as others have pointed out, the act of voting for a raiding party should itself disqualify you from voting following Reisman's logic, thus the focus on convicted felons is a bit strange.
I can't shake the feeling the Mr. Reisman is just a republican in libertarian clothing.
Published: February 13, 2006 2:40 PM
“There is no right to vote to steal.� That is a revelation to me. I thought the whole point of voting was to legitimize theft.
Or, as Mencken put it,
“Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods.�
Published: February 13, 2006 3:45 PM
Isn't price fixing a felony?
Published: March 16, 2006 1:06 PM