Government for the Good of the People: Ten Questions about Freedom, Virtue, and the Role of Government by Ryan Messmore

Government for the Good of the People: Ten Questions about Freedom, Virtue, and the Role of Government

by Ryan Messmore

Today's political debates are often muddied by misconceptions of the role of government and its responsibility to American citizens. What are the limits of good government? How can the virtues necessary for freedom flourish? Sustaining ordered liberty depends on good answers to these questions. 1. What should government do? Government plays an indispensable role in a healthy community, but this does not mean that everything a community needs to be healthy is government's responsibility. Government expresses society's understanding of justice and enacts judgment in light of that understanding. Government's task is to articulate the rights and duties of citizens and protect them from threats. This is very different from the belief that government should create rights or exercise people's duties for them through programs that replace individual and community initiatives. 2. Does morality have anything to do with government? The government, acting on behalf of the people, declares certain actions to be just and unjust. This is a moral distinction between right and wrong. Whenever government debates whether or not certain actions and institutions are lawful, it takes moral considerations into account. Put another way, by formulating and upholding laws, government encourages and expresses a society's fundamental moral principles. 3. What should limit government's authority? "If angels were to govern men," wrote James Madison, "neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary." But even if political authorities were angels, there would still be limits on what government should and should not do. In this sense, government power is inherently limited by the role of other social institutions, such as families, religious congregations, schools, and businesses. The rightful authority of these institutions helps to check the authority of the state. Government's formal authority is restrained by its primary purpose (see question #1). Government is supposed to protect the ability of individuals and social institutions to exercise legitimate authority within their own particular areas of influence without unjust interference from other institutions. If the government is supposed to protect this freedom for citizens, its power to intrude must be subject to clearly defined limits. Such limits are defined in the United States Constitution and individual state constitutions. 4. Does big government pose moral problems? When government oversteps its bounds and begins to assume more authority, it weakens other important social institutions, including those, like the family and religious congregations, that are particularly capable of encouraging moral virtue among citizens. Big-government programs and policies also tend to confuse the lines between citizen responsibility and government responsibility. As a result, they erode our understanding of the ethical obligations we have to one another—especially in regard to issues such as poverty and economic justice—and encourage us to assume and to expect that government will provide for our neighbors' needs. 5. What is the relationship between freedom and virtue? Freedom relies on virtue for its survival. Government protects ordered liberty, but it is virtuous citizens taking personal responsibility for their actions and exercising mutual responsibility for the welfare of others who make ordered liberty possible. As Benjamin Franklin declared, "Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom." All political communities are held together by common civic bonds. As the motto of the United States—e pluribus unum,or "out of many, one"—implies, the bonds that unite the nation's many individual citizens into one people are of critical importance. These bonds often take the form of moral obligations that we owe to one another as members of the same community. To fulfill these obligations, citizens need to exercise certain virtues. A virtuous citizen is someone who is enabled by character to act in a way that promotes the common good within the community. Americans tend to see freedom, prosperity, and security as necessary elements of the common good. The habits needed to achieve these ends include trust, cooperation, self-sacrifice, hard work, and a sense of responsibility for others. These are key virtues for members of the American community and essential to the preservation of ordered liberty. 6. If virtue is necessary for freedom, what institutions are best equipped to promote virtuous behavior? America's founders recognized that local forms of association are the best way for citizens to fulfill their moral obligations to one another. They believed that families, religious congregations, and other institutions of civil society are most effective in uniting their members in cooperative pursuit of the common good and thereby cultivating the indispensable virtues that are the foundation of a healthy democracy. The founders especially emphasized the role of religion in moral formation. The belief in a "God All Powerful wise and good," claimed James Madison, is "essential to the moral order of the world." George Washington declared that "reason and experience both forbid us to expect that National morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle." Religious communities bind people vertically to God and horizontally to one another. These social bonds not only depend upon, but actually help to generate, trust, cooperation, respect for authority, self-sacrifice, and a shared pursuit of and participation in the common good. The family is also crucial to the cultivation of virtue and moral sense. In the family, continual character training and moral authority are exercised by those who love and desire the best for each member. In addition, sports teams, orchestras, schools, professional guilds, neighborhoods, theatre troupes, and other voluntary associations can function as local communities that cultivate moral development in similar ways. On a basketball team, for example, players learn what it means to trust others, work together, train hard, respect authority, identify and coordinate different personal skills, accommodate the errors of others, and rely on others to accommodate their own errors. Team members are trained not to consider just themselves, but to act in the best interest of the whole team. 7. How does big government weaken smaller, virtue-producing communities? As government claims responsibility for more tasks, it absorbs the allegiance that citizens once placed in other relationships and forms of association. When the federal government assumes more responsibility for fulfilling the moral obligations among citizens, it tends to undermine the perceived significance and authority of local institutions and communities. This encourages citizens, instead of looking to their families, churches, or local communities for guidance and assistance, to depend on the government for education, welfare, and various other services. As individuals begin to look more consistently to the government for support, the institutions that are able to generate virtues like trust and responsibility begin to lose their sway in the community. Excessive bureaucratic centralization thus sets in motion a dangerous cycle of dependence and social decay. 8. Does government have a role in the moral formation of its citizens? Smaller institutions can encourage virtue among their members because of the strong social bonds and personal contact they share, but government is more dependent on fear of punishment to motivate good behavior. Government can promote political goods such as justice and equality and can contribute to habits such as self-restraint and moderation. However, it is not as equipped as other institutions to cultivate the virtues necessary for many other important ends. As Martin Luther King, Jr., explained, laws can restrain the heartless; they cannot change the heart. But while government is not equipped to cultivate some virtues in citizens, it does have a role to play in their moral formation: It articulates a sense of justice, impartial judgment, and equality before the law. Government also protects those institutions that, through their strong social bonds and personal contact, are equipped to encourage other virtues among citizens. By protecting virtue-forming institutions such as the family or religious congregations against unjust interference from other institutions—including the state—government can influence the cultivation of virtue and the strength of social bonds. Government officials should work to provide the social and legal conditions that help local associations to exercise the authority that rightly belongs to them. 9. How does government influence public opinion and values? Government actions subtly shape how citizens think, speak, and act, thereby influencing where we tend to place our trust, hope, and expectations. The authority to enforce laws carries certain implicit powers: the power to promote certain causes, prioritize certain risks, endorse certain values and beliefs, uphold certain standards, encourage certain expectations, and define and interpret certain terms. For example, government policy dictates that American taxpayers must contribute to Social Security, and that shapes how we think about addressing need in our society (regardless of one's opinion of the current Social Security program). Government also has the power to influence our expectations and outlook on important social questions, such as where to seek assistance for material needs (the welfare state); whom to blame in times of crisis (FEMA, the President, the Federal Reserve); and what people are entitled to by right (privacy, cheap prescription drugs, same-sex marriage). The powers to pass laws and collect taxes therefore entail the power to set social priorities and to define, to some extent, the terms of public understanding, involvement, and debate. 10. How much should we trust government? We should be able to trust our government to perform its appropriate tasks of promoting justice and punishing injustice. Without this protection, communities would not be as free to strengthen social bonds, encourage pursuit of the common good, or cultivate virtue. Therefore, the government deserves a certain degree of trust, hope, and loyalty. But a healthy democracy is one in which citizens give government only the loyalty it deserves without diminishing their trust in or allegiance to other institutions and authorities. Cultural allegiances to family, church, and local associations are some of "the most powerful resources of democracy," according to Robert Nisbet. By not placing complete trust in the government, citizens can help to prevent any one institution from becoming too powerful. For this reason, the diversification of authority and allegiance among various social institutions actually strengthens democracy. Conclusion The power of government carries significant moral implications. The amount of responsibility yielded to or claimed by government can shape attitudes, motivations, expectations, and even the terms of public debate. Government can also influence the cultivation of character and the strength of social bonds by protecting institutions that help to encourage virtue in society, such as the family or religious congregations, against unjust interference from other institutions, including the state. In other words, there is a strong moral case to be made for limited government authority. Ryan Messmore is William E. Simon Fellow in Religion and a Free Society in the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society at The Heritage Foundation.

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! This is a fun year for us. Lucas and Eden are both in Preschool now. Which means they get to wear costumes to school. Lucas is an awesome cowboy this year. He won most creative costume. Eden is a flapper. Although she really wanted to be a kangaroo again.



After we got her all dressed up she began to dance and shake it. Her fringe looked really cute! Tonight we are going to David and Tammy's neighborhood party. Like we do every year. Aaron and Shawna join us and we trick or treat in the neighborhood. It is a lot of fun and the kids love getting to see there cousins!

So happy Halloween everyone and have a wonderful day!

Cake decorationg

So I am taking a cake decorating class at Michaels. 3 weeks into the 4 and I finally got to decorate a cake. We were supposed to practice a bunch of stuff we learned in class. But because Halloween was today I scraped the grapes, apples,flowers, and cherries and just did the border, dots and leaves and made up the vine. I made a pumpkin patch. I am very proud and wanted to share!

Dinomania

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So last Friday was Lucas' birthday. He is 5 now and I can't believe how much he has grown and how fast it has gone. He is a truely amazing little boy. Definitively an apple that didn't fall too far from the tree. DJ and he share so much in common. I can turn on animal planet and the two of them would be entertained for hours.
So for his birthday we had a dino party. Since last year we had the African Safari. We invited only a few of his little friends. Just the boys this time. Then I let Eden have one friend. We had a great day. The children colored dino pictures.When all the children had arrived we played pin the plate on the stegosaurus. We then we went outside and DJ made a volcano. They thought that was pretty cool. But they just wanted to play for a while.
After a bit we came in and made dino slime (flubber) DJ read some dino books and then he opened presents. When that was finally all done we had dino bites, french fries. apples carrots and dino kool-aid.
Finally I made awesome chocolate cupcakes with white chocolate butter cream frosting and attempted a chocolate filling. Which I couldn't get to fill the cupcake right so I used it on a birthday cake we had on Sunday.
Each child went home with a goodie bag of things we had done during the party, candy and the dino they picked for there cup cake. 2 hours baby I am good!

Anyway here are some photos of the day. I hope I don't scare anyone but looking cute was not my first priority!

technical difficulties

SO today was Lucas' 5th birthday that is right 5!! We had a fantastic Dinosaur birthday party and we are all exhausted now. I took a bunch of pictures but apparently my camera was set on Raw so I have to do some rearranging won't really be able to post any photos for a day or 2. Because tomorrow (sat18th) is our 7 year anniversary and we are going to Mesa to a very special friends sealing. The adopted a beautiful baby girl and invited us to be part of this special day!
So I will post pics as soon as I can I promise!!

need something to read? I got 16 out of 100

The Big Read is a National Endowment for the Arts program designed to encourage community reading initiatives and of their top 100 books. They estimate the average adult has read only six.
Here’s what you are supposed to do:
Look at the list and bold those you have read. Italicize those we intend to read.*Star the books we LOVE.

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen **
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien **
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling *
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible (not sure if this counts for me reading because I've never read cover to cover)
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller1
4. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell **
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis **
34. Emma - Jane Austen **
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen **
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis **
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery **
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility- Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens ( i did start this)
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett **
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

YUMM-O

I made this today. I guess I should have taken a picture but it didn't last long enough. I will double the corn cakes recipe next time.

Sweet Corn Tamale Cakes the Cheesecake Factory Copycat Recipe

1 hour | 30 min prep

SERVES 4

• 
  

Salsa Verde

• 2 tomatillos, diced
• 4 ounces mild green chilies, drained and diced
• 1 green onion, minced
• 2 tablespoons fresh cilantro, minced
• 1 1/4 teaspoons granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 pinch ground black pepper

For Tomato Salsa

• 1 medium tomato, diced
• 1 tablespoon minced Spanish onion
• 1 tablespoon fresh cilantro, minced
• 1/4 teaspoon lime juice
• 1/2 small jalapeno, seeded and minced
• 1 dash salt
• 1 dash ground black pepper

For Southwestern Sauce

• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1 teaspoon white vinegar
• 1 teaspoon water
• 3/4 teaspoon granulated sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1 pinch cayenne pepper
• 1 pinch onion powder
• 1 dash salt
• 1 dash garlic powder

For Cakes

• 1 1/2 cups frozen sweet corn
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 1 pinch salt
• 1/2 cup corn masa harina flour (corn flour)
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

For Garnish

• 1/4 cup sour cream
• 1/2 avocado, diced
• 2 tablespoons fresh cilantro, chopped

1. Prepare salsa verde by combining all prepared ingredients. Chill.
2. Prepare tomato salsa by combining all prepared ingredients. Chill.
3. Prepare southwestern sauce by combining all ingredients. Chill.
4. Preheat oven to 400°F.
5. Prepare the tamale cakes by chopping 1 cup of the frozen corn in a food processor until it's coarsely pureed. Combine pureed corn with softened butter, sugar, and salt. Blend well.
6. Add masa and flour and blend well. Mix in the remaining 1/2 cup of frozen corn kernels by hand.
7. Measure 1/2 cup portions of the mixture and form it into 3" wide patties with your hands. Arrange the patties on a baking sheet and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until the cakes are browned on the bottom.
8. Carefully flip all cakes with a spatula and bake for an additional 5 to 7 minutes or until other side is browned.
9. Assembly: Place all three cakes on a warmed serving platter. Dollop each with one of the three sauces. Garnish with diced avocado, cilantro and a dollop of sour cream.