Jason,

Thanks for the link and the reply.

I recognize that there are minarchists more radical or principled than Dale Franks, who would have refused to collaborate in a drug conviction. I have other problems with their position (after all, I’m not a minarchist), but not the problem that I have with Dale Franks. I didn’t mean to imply that every minarchist would have done what he did.

However, I do think that it’s fair for me to suggest that being a minarchist makes one systematically more likely to indulge in that kind of legalistic error than one might otherwise be. Being an anarchist has built-in intellectual safeguards against it, whereas being a minarchist doesn’t. (That’s not intended as an argument for anarchism over minarchism per se; rather it’s why I think that this case and others like it go to support my prior argument that people who have already been convinced of anarchism for other reasons should be cautious about how closely they work with smaller-government campaigns or institutions.)

As far as drug trial juries go, I would happily lie about my political views in order to get on the jury, and then, if I got on it, do everything in my power to obstruct or prevent a conviction. I think that the prosecutor in a drug case has no more moral entitlement to get the truth from me than the Gestapo would if they stopped by to ask whether I’m hiding any Jews in my attic. And while the pay scale for sitting as a juror would be shitty compared to what I could be making for my time in other pursuits, I’d be happy to give up the profits in order to help an innocent person go free.

Concerning (6), yes, as per (2), I decline to make use of any government goods or services whatsoever. If you imagine that your minimal government, rather than market providers, will be laying pipes and building roads and putting up wires, then I won’t use any of those, provided that in return the government will not force me to pay for pipes and roads and wires that I’m not using (cf. (5)), and also provided that, when I make arrangements with other people to arrange for my own water, electric, and transportation needs using our own private property, your minimal government will not barge onto my property or theirs in order to force us back into their “natural” monopoly.

Concerning (7), I don’t know precisely what you mean. If you’re asking whether I intend to pay for services rendered that I requested and agreed to pay for, then of course I will honor my agreements. If you’re asking whether I intend to pay for “services” that I never agreed with anyone to pay for, which I never asked anyone for, and which were “rendered” by the free choice of the “service” provider, for her own reasons, whether I wanted them or not, then of course I intend to do no such thing.

Now that that’s out of the way, again, just so we’re clear, am I correct in saying that your view, as a self-identified minarchist, is that in Minarchistan your limited government cops will have the right to shoot me in order to force me to pay taxes in support of a minimal government whose services I have explicitly declined to make use of?

And if so, given that you said that your limited government cops would only have the right to shoot someone who was engaged in those who commit aggression or engage in revolutionary violence, and given that in my hypothetical I am clearly not engaging in revolutionary violence, am I correct in inferring that your view is that they have the right to shoot me because I am aggressing against one or more identifiable victims by declining to pay in for “public goods” which I never agreed to support, which I never asked anyone to build, which I may not ever make use of, which I may not even want, but which I was never given any option to refuse or veto, and which other people decided to build for their own reasons and for their own benefit?

I ask in the interest of clarity, not for the purposes of debate. If these are indeed your views, then I’m not much interested in arguing over (say) the legitimacy of the Single Tax, or whatever other form of taxation you believe in. I doubt either of us would convince the other. But I would like to know whether or not I’ve accurately characterized your views about the prerogatives of a minimal State. If you do indeed plan to shoot me someday for not paying my taxes, then I figure it’s worthwhile for me to know that ahead of time.

So, just so we’re clear, since the risk of shooting is involved, I’d like to know what will and will not get me shot in Minarchistan.

Let’s say that I live in the territory that your limited government lays claim to, but I don’t want anything to do with it. (Maybe I’m dissatisfied with the juridical and defense services that it offers. Or maybe I’m just an ornery cuss who doesn’t like governments.) So I henceforth (1) renounce any allegiance to your minimal government. (2) I decline to partake of any of its offered services. (3) I will arrange for my own self-defense, and (4) I’ll go to willing third parties, not to government courts, in order to adjudicate any disputes I may have over questions of right. And since I don’t intend to pay for things that I’m not using, (5) I’ll also refuse to pay any taxes whatsoever to support your minimal government from this point forward. In short, I’m not interested in being part of your minimal government’s constituency, and I quit.

If I do all of (1)-(5), do you think that any of them will justify sending the limited-government cops after me in order to make me stop doing them? If so, which, and why?

Lopez: Aren’t you saying that a good percentage of movement libertarians are as unreasonable as white supremacists?

Sure, on at least some issues, many if not most movement libertarians are at least as unreasonable as white supremacists are on issues of race.

For what it’s worth, I’d advise keeping minarchists, just to take one example, at arm’s length to much the same extent that I’d advise keeping paleocreep white supremacists at arm’s length. Even if white supremacist in question were professedly an anarchist, I prefer not to rely on the virtue or intelligence of people who demonstrate obviously stupid and evil ideas in other domains. And even if the minarchist were right-on on just about everything except for minimal statism, I prefer not rely on people whose political program will sooner or later involve shooting me.