Auberon Herbert
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- This article is about the British philosopher Auberon Herbert (1838-1906). For the British landowner (1922-1974), see Auberon Herbert (landowner)
-->Auberon Herbert (1838-1906) was a writer, theorist, philosopher, and member of the British parliament. He promoted a libertarian philosophy and took the ideas of Herbert Spencer a stage further by advocating voluntary-funded "government" that only uses force only in defense of individual liberty and property. He is known as the originator of Voluntaryism.
Government, he argued, should never initiate force but be "strictly limited to its legitimate duties in defense of self-ownership and individual rights", and to be consistent in not initiating force they should maintain themselves only through "voluntary taxation." He stressed that "we are governmentalists . . . formally constituted by the nation, employing in this matter of force the majority method" --however, using this force only in a defensive mode. He strongly opposed the idea that initiation of force may somehow become legitimate merely by constituting a majority, reasoning that "If we are self-owners (and it is absurd, it is doing violence to reason,2 to suppose that we are not), neither an individual, nor a majority, nor a government can have rights of ownership in other men." ESSAY X: THE PRINCIPLES OF VOLUNTARYISM AND FREE LIFE
Herbert recommends a "central agency" to defend liberty and property that is funded by a "voluntary tax," calling it "government." In his essay "A Politician in Sight of Haven," Herbert does discuss the franchise, stating it would be limited to those who paid a voluntary "income tax," anyone "paying it would have the right to vote; those who did not pay it would be -- as is just -- without the franchise. There would be no other tax." The law would be strictly limited, of course, and the "government . . . must confine itself simply to the defense of life and property, whether as regards internal or external defense."
Herbert says that in "voluntaryism the state employs force only to repel force—to protect the person and the property of the individual against force and fraud; under voluntaryism the state would defend the rights of liberty, never aggress upon them."
A collection of Herbert's work, The Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State and Other Essays, was published by Liberty Classics in 1978.
Herbert and Anarchism
In an announcement of Herbert's death, Benjamin Tucker said: "Auberon Herbert is dead. He was a true anarchist in everything but name. How much better (and how much rarer) to be an anarchist in everything but name than to be an anarchist in name only!"Tucker, Benjamin .Liberty, vol. 15, no. 6, p. 16 Tucker praised Herbert's work as "a magnificent assault on the majority idea, a searching exposure of the inherent evil of State systems, and a glorious assertion of the inestimable benefits of voluntary action and free competition..." while admonishing him for his support of profit in trade (but believes, unlike Herbert himself, that Herbert's system would result in an economy without profit).Tucker, Benjamin. [Auberon Herbert and His Work], Liberty, Vol. 3, No. 10, Saturday, May 23 1885, Whole No. 62 According to Eric Mack, Herbert felt that people who "like Tucker, favored the free establishment of defensive associations and juridical institutions were simply making a verbal error in calling themselves "anarchists"."Mack, Eric. [Voluntaryism: The Political Thought of Auberon Herbert] Mack says "Herbert was also regarded as an anarchist by serious and reasonably well-informed prostate critics like J. A. Hobson and T. H. Huxley"Mack, Eric (editor). [Introduction to The Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State, and Other Essays], Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1978Herbert explicitly rejected the label "anarchist" for his ideas. According to Chris Tame, "He refused to accept the label of 'anarchist', largely because of a semantic decision whereby he labelled the defensive use of force (which, naturally, he accepted) as "government."Tame, Chris R. [The libertarian tradition No 1: Auberon Herbert], The Journal of the Libertarian Alliance, Vol. 1, No.2, Spring 1980 Some scholars, such as Richard Sylvan, points out that "a variety of political arrangements and organization, including governments of certain sorts, are entirely compatible with anarchy." Rather, anarchists oppose the state or "coercive government."Slyvan, Richard. Anarchism. A Companion to Contemprary Political Philosophy, editors Goodin, Robert E. and Pettit, Philip. Blackwell Publishing, 1995, p.293.
Since the development of anarcho-capitalism in the 1950s, at least one anarcho-capitalist, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, believes that Herbert "develops the Spencerian idea of equal freedom to its logically consistent anarcho-capitalist end" as noted in a bibliography.[Anarcho-Capitalism: An Annotated Bibliography], 2002. Retrieved from LeeRockewell.comHowever, Herbert supports a central agency rather than competing defense providers that anarcho-capitalists, and individualist anarchists, support. But, Herbert does not express that this would be an enforced monopoly.
Criticism
Individualist anarchist, Victor Yarros, noted whate he believed to be a key flaw in Herbert's ideology, namely economic inequality. In an article called "Private Property and Freedom," Yarros argued that Herbert:
- "believes in allowing people to retain all their possessions, no matter how unjustly and basely acquired, while getting them, so to speak, to swear off stealing and usurping and to promise to behave well in the future. We, on the other hand, while insisting on the principle of private property, in wealth honestly obtained under the reign of liberty, do not think it either unjust or unwise to dispossess the landlords who have monopolized natural wealth by force and fraud. We hold that the poor and disinherited toilers would be justified in expropriating, not alone the landlords, who notoriously have no equitable titles to their lands, but all the financial lords and rulers, all the millionaires and very wealthy individuals. . . . Almost all possessors of great wealth enjoy neither what they nor their ancestors rightfully acquired (and if Mr. Herbert wishes to challenge the correctness of this statement, we are ready to go with him into a full discussion of the subject). . . . If he holds that the landlords are justly entitled to their lands, let him make a defense of the landlords or an attack on our unjust proposal." Yarros, Liberty 171 (1890): 4-5, quoted by Carl Watner in [The English Individualists As They Appear in Liberty]
Notes
See also
External links
- [Auberon Herbert and his Work] by Benjamin Tucker
- [''Voluntaryism: The Political Thought of Auberon Herbert] by Erick Mack
- [''ESSAY X: THE PRINCIPLES OF VOLUNTARYISM AND FREE LIFE (THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF COMPULSION BY THE STATE, AND OTHER ESSAYS)] by Auberon Herbert
- [Quotes by Auberon Herbert]
- [Libertas in Excelsius] a poem by Auberon Herbert
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