The Cost of Rights: Why Liberty Depends on Taxes

by Stephen Holmes

Book Overview

The simple insight that all legally enforceable rights cost money reminds us that freedom is not violated by a government that taxes and spends, but requires it--and requires a citizenry vigilant about how money is allocated. Drawing from these practical, commonsense notions, The Cost of Rights provides a useful corrective to the all-or-nothing feel of much political debate nowadays (The Economist).

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393320332
• ISBN13: 9780393320336
• Release Date: April 2000
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.5" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

An Excellent Overview

The authors present a well written view of how the exercise of individual rights cost money if those rights are to be accomplished reasonably and in the abscence of armed force on the part of the individual. A number of previous reviewers have sanctimoniously and self righteously assumed for the book objectives far beyound its meager size and intent. I suspect they are the usual (1) "no gummint is good gummint" and (2) "no taxes is good taxes" types who feel that God, or something, made them exempt from cooperating with other people - a general description of so-called libertarians and far-right conservatives. In other words, their rights are paramount and they have no responsibilities or accountability. That road appears by magical thinking, as did garbage delivery and the sheriff's department in their view. They don't owe anyone anything for any reason, and they will shoot you to prove it. Sounds like they did not get socialized in K-12. Read the book for its intent, which is to object to "no gummint and taxes" movement in the US over the past decades which has brought us a really sorry pass and nearly into a form of fascism light. Holmes and Sunstein have done a great service here by raising substantive counter arguments to the "screw you, I got mine" groups in this era.

Simple assumptions, refreshing insights

As the authors say at some passage in the text, biblically simple ideas can make a profound difference. They say this when it comes to stress the importance of values like truth, honesty and integrity. We could also say the same about "loving your neighbor as yourself", the core of equality and reciprocity. This book is an example of how you can do much by sticking to simple assumptions. I must say that I appreciate Sunstein and Holmes a lot, and try to read all that thy write. Steven Holmes and Cass Sunstein have made a strong case, in this and their other writings, that while we can appreciate and defend free enterprise, private property, private media, free exercise of religion, and so on, we still need a strong State to impose liberal constraints on private power. In fact, that's what classical social contract theory is all about. The State is created by a social contract to protect individuals from one another, since the state of nature is a state of war between men, in which man is a wolf to other man. Historically, the liberal revolutions were fought against not only absolute monarchs, but also against authoritarian churches, catholic and protestant, that used State power as a secular arm ("braccio seculare") to impose their own dogmas to believers and non believers, thus excercising an undue "power over the hearts of man" (Baruch Spinoza). While we should advocate a strong marketplace of ideas (including religious ones), and while we should appreciate religion contribution to civic virtues, we still have to protect our liberal institutions from ilegitimate attempts to get these institutions under the control of iliberal and anti-liberal religious dogmas that want to fight equal religious liberty for all citizens and groups alike, believers and non-believers, men and women, adults and children, black and white, gay and straight. That's what separation of religious communities and State is all about. When we think of Enron, for instance, we realize that corporations can be a Leviathan to many defenseless citizens, by totally destroying their life savings and prospects, with profound psicological consequences. That's plain evil. More, we realize that some already rich man will evade their duties of citizenship and civility (v.g. the duty of paying taxes) to get even more rich. I am in favor of a strong market economy. It allows for human creativity, it creates wealth, it creates habits of work, trust and tolerance, it decentralizes authority, and by doing this it can further human rights. But I think that only a robust liberal State, with strong legislative, administrative and judicial branches, can counter the threat to liberty, security and well being that some corporations here and there may represent. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, as Lord Acton said. Only a strong liberal State can make, market economy both possible and credible. Originally liberals are defenders of the State, an institution tipical of a c

A sorely needed corrective to bad thinking

It is the fashion to disparage government and all its works these days. Sunstein and Holmes have given this timely reminder that Constitutional and property rights only have meaning if they can be enforced BY the government (that is, by courts, executive agencies, police departments, disaster relief, and the like). The book is flawed to the extent that seems to call for affirmative rights to public services (social workers, police) to be enforced by judges. Such a state of affairs would totally undercut the majority-rule principle of democratic society. However, the book is a welcome antidote to the trendy, bumper-sticker diatribes against the evils of government. We need a serious dialogue on the proper (and limited) functions of government in the new global economy, not more slogans. If you like this book, also look at Garry Wills's "Necessary Evil" (which does a better job with historical background) and Brinkley's "New Federalist Papers."

Interesting book that seems to induce knee jerk responses

This book covers an important issue that is rarely bought up: liberty, rights etc. depend of an enforcement mechanism. And this enforcement mechanism is government. Weak governments (such as those of the current Russia) cannot guarantee property rights or any other rights for their citizens. Anyone who feels they can establish their rights without government should visit Somalia and see how easy or difficult it is in the absence of government. How would you establish right to a plot of land, for instance, without a title, some means of enforcing property laws ? The Founding Fathers most certainly recognized the value of government -- thats why they wrote the Constitution, because the Articles of Confederation proved inadequate. They also provided the government with the means to fund itself -- through tarrifs, which are just another form of taxes. This is something the authors do indeed support, and at least two of the 1-star reviews lead me to conclude the authors never got beyond the title. Finally, the Constition does indeed provide powers to the States. But is unclear why this should necessarily please someone who claims that governments take away all rights, since the states are also run by governments. In fact, historically, the states have had practically all the powers (public schools, eminent domain, property taxes) etc. etc. that libertarian types find distasteful. This book is NOT a call for higher taxes, and it recognizes the tax-and-spend problems as well.

A false distinction

The authors make a valiant attempt to remove an artificial distinction between 'rights' and 'entitlements' , a distinction often used by right wing commentators to add moral stature to right wing parties chosen methodology of rewarding their constituency. The point is obvious, freedoms, like benefits, incur costs, borne by society as a whole. The political debate should therefore always be a question of cost and benefit, rather than some idealised debate about rights or entitlements. The authors take a long time to explain this point, but given previous reviews, perhaps not long enough.